NBA All-Star Weekend 2010 comes to an end...

So I'm finally back in the 773 (Chicago for those of you who don't know) and I'm exhausted. All-Star weekend was crazy hectic and super stressful looking back at it all I don't know how I survived it. But I'm getting ahead of myself here. Let me start from the beginning.

I woke up at around 8:30am on Friday morning with a headache, a stomach ache, and feeling incredibly tired. I had gotten around seven hours of sleep but because of all the anticipation, both with All-Star Weekend overall but also with flying, as I hate and fear it, it wasn't the type of sleep that leaves you feeling rested, instead it was the type of sleep that lets you barely function the next day. This of course is almost irrelevant to the story but what I'm trying to point out is that from the minute All-Star Weekend began, things were a little less than perfect. Nevertheless though I got myself together and headed to O'Hare, getting there in good time, checking in, going through security, waiting at the gate and then finally boarding the plane. I got stuck near the window which I hate, but due to the excitement that this weekend had finally come, a weekend I had been planning since June or July, I barely even noticed. I spent my plane ride listening to music (mostly rap and hip-hop of course) and reading Glamour, with the time flying by. At 2pm we were finally in Dallas and I got off the plane happy as could be. After waiting around for some time for our luggage (this again took longer than desired but my high expectations for the weekend clouded all the negativity around me) I finally had my things, grabbed a cab, and headed to the hotel. The hotel was quite far from everything, airport and both All-Star arenas included but it was nice. Very luxurious and with good service, both things that I expect from a hotel in a major city. So far it was going well. Until we checked if our tickets had arrived.

I had ordered my tickets through a broker, two different ones, one for Saturday night and one for Sunday, both around the same price ($400-$500 a ticket) and both around the same time (late June to early July). My tickets for Sunday night had come well in advance but the same did not happen for my Saturday night tickets. However, because the event time was changed from 5pm to 7pm, I excused it for a while, thinking that they had to reprint a whole batch of tickets, delaying the shipping process. I was wrong. Long story short when I had seen that my tickets had not arrived a week before I left for Dallas, I called the broker company up and explained to them that they would need to send my tickets straight to my hotel, because otherwise I may not get them in time. They said sure, that it would be no problem, that they would be there, but they weren't. There was a problem, and the problem was that no one would be honest with me. My tickets were lost, nowhere to be found, but instead of owning up to this fact, I was taken for a ride, a ride resulting in numerous phonecalls and even more headaches. When I found out my tickets were not at the hotel, I immediately called the company, but got nowhere. I then called the website I actually purchased the tickets from (as its a two-step process) and they proceeded to tell me that some tickets could actually not be purchased from the NBA as they were being reserved for celebrities and guests of players. Hm, who would have guessed that one? Its All-Star Weekend, a weekend full of players and celebrities alike, but yet no one thought that maybe they should reserve the really good seats for them? After hearing this, I quickly called back the broker themselves and they denied that this is what had happened, saying my tickets were different. In the end it had turned out that they were right, they weren't being held by the league, they were just lost, but to understand the frustration I dealt with this weekend, I need to take you through this step by step. To sum it up, my entire Friday afternoon was spent making phone calls and wanting to put my fist through a wall. In the end my tickets were promised to be delivered on Saturday, and I let the matter go, opting to not let this horrible experience ruin my night.

I was fortunate enough to be able to go to the Rookie/Sophomore game at the AA Arena in Dallas as I got tickets through a very kind NBA.com writer and that saved my night. I got there early to have enough time to soak the arena in as well as go to the fan shop and get some food, both of which turned out successful, and then the game began. It was great to see young talent such as Brandon Jennings, Tyreke Evans, Omri Casspi and of course my boy Taj Gibson all under one roof going head to head with players like O.J. Mayo, Marc Gasol and Eric Gordon, especially when the halftime show consisted of a "dunk-in" between rookie DeMar DeRozan and Eric Gordon, two very skilled dunkers who were quite entertaining to watch. Ultimately DeRozan took the win, sending him to participate in the dunk contest on Saturday night, but both players did a good job and seemed to have a lot of fun with it. In the end the rooks took the win, something that has not happened in QUITE some time, and I had a good night. In terms of events, my first night there was a success, but sadly things got a little more complicated after this.

Saturday rolls around and still no word of my tickets. Not until about noon that is. At around noon the broker finally called and fessed up: my tickets were nowhere to be found. However, before a fight could even begin to break out he promised me better tickets, with no financial penalty, and that was that. The conversation was short but sweet and within the hour the tickets arrived at the hotel's front desk, a few rows ahead of the ones I had purchased. I was satisfied so I decided to spend my day at North Park Mall, a great mall with every store imaginable, but one that was beyond crowded due to there not only being players lurking but players' wives, girlfriends, friends and family all having nothing to do and having money to blow. I can't really complain about that experience though as for me, as long as I can shop, I'm happy, but it did make getting a cab there and back quite a task. And speaking of that, now would probably be a good time to introduce the fact that about $80 a day was spent on cabs, if not more. Yes this has nothing to do with the All-Star events or the league but it goes to show that if you do attend such an event, its going to cost you a lot more than just ticket prices. Because even if you have a car, with each lot being around $50, you won't be saving too much. Moving on to that evening however, I got to the AA Arena early once again, and met up with a friend who was also in Dallas for the event. We actually ended up sitting together which was great, but before that a lot of walking around was done, and I once again ended up in the fan shop, which I must stop and talk about for a second.

Though the fan shop was large, considering the amount of people expected to attend this year's events, it was not as fully stocked as I expected it to be, and lacked variety. Don't get me wrong, I ended up getting a shirt, one that I am content with, but what I was really searching for, a generic "East" shirt, I could not find. All I could find were players' jerseys, mainly those of Wade, Lebron and Howard, and track suits, which looking back may have made a nice addition to my waredrob if only they weren't $130 a pop...the point is, I would suggest ordering All-Star merchandise before you get to All-Star weekend, if you really want to be decked out in the way you specifically had in mind. Again, seemingly pointless details, but helpful if anyone reading this decides to venture out to All-Star Weekend at any point.

Most of Saturday night was enjoyable, despite Derrick Rose not taking part in the Skills Challenge, as now broadcasters like Chris Webber and Kenny Smith participated in the first event, and superstars like Steve Nash and Paul Pierce (yes I'm just naming the winners) in the second and third, but I must lodge a few complaints about the dunk contest. First of all, this was the least creative batch I have seen in a while, which is not only disappointing to me because I was there, but because it made me feel as though players just don't care about it anymore. People can argue that players such as DeMar DeRozan are first-timers, not knowing what to do, and that Nate Robinson has been through it too many times and is bored, but I would say just the opposite. Someone like DeMar DeRozan and Shannon Brown should be excited to be chosen to show off their skills, and should give it their all, whether or not they know exactly what the protocol is or what would be overdoing it. And as for Nate Robinson, well theres a reason you keep winning, so if you no longer want to be here, which honestly seemed to be the case this time around, then speak up, don't let fans down. All-Star Weekend may not count for anything record wise but it does mean something to basketball fans around the country and is a tradition that has been held for a long time now. Sure watching DeRozan dunk over his Raptor teammate was breath-taking, and it was nice to see Kobe help his fellow Laker out, but what happened to the props, the costumes, the creativity? I really hope next year things are better structured because although I was wide awake and on edge the entire time, I have spoken to people who said they fell asleep and/or turned their tvs off after seeing that the dunks were bland. That is no way to conduct such a thing and hopefully players will be more conscience of their impact for next year. Overall though, despite all that being said, I did enjoy myself on Saturday night and am very happy to have been there. I just wish the players felt the same way. Or at least showed it more.

But Sunday is where the story gets ugly. I spent the day lounging in the hotel, doing some work and just resting, as all of this travel by cab had taken a toll on me, and I was quite tired. The shuttle to Cowboy Stadium was scheduled to leave at 5pm though, so around 4pm I got out of bed and started to get ready. This was the night I was truly waiting for. Not only would so many of my favorite players be there but so would a hand full of celebrities and I for one could not wait to see who I spot. I had row 1 tickets, yes, row 1, and was ready to make it a night I would remember forever. And lo and behold it is. But not exactly in the best way...

After riding the shuttle for over an hour, I was finally at Cowboy Stadium, and just from standing outside I had a feeling throwing such an event into such a big space would be a bad idea. However, I continued towards the doors, still feeling excited, but also freezing half to death. This was a problem. I was forced to stand in line for the next hour and a half as hundreds upon hundreds of people were all around me, all trying to get in to the stadium. My tickets said gates B, C and D only, but apparently I was not the only one as my line stood virtually still, only really moving around 7:20pm. The event was said to start at 7pm, but as I was soon informed, tip-off was not till 7:40pm. I think it actually ended up being later than that, but it did not matter, because not only did I miss Usher's opening performance and tip-off, but I missed the entire first quarter and 90% of the second quarter as well.

When I finally got inside the stadium it was chaos. Everyone was running around trying to get to their seats, trying not to spill their overflowing beer cups, trying to stuff food in their faces as quickly as they could...it was a scene straight out of a zoo. On top of this no one who worked there knew where anything was, whipping out a stadium map before answering a question, as if the fans could not just do that themselves. No one could give you any answers, and after a while, no one really seemed to care, as hundreds of people kept asking the same questions, getting frustrated (and in my opinion rightfully so) and ending up yelling at the event staff and security for their lack of aid. If you were seated on the 200 level you were more or less ok, though I have to say that it took almost 30 minutes to get from one end of the arena to the other, as select "club" enterances were blocked off and there was so many people in there that you could barely walk a foot without having to stop and wait in some sort of line, but if you were anywhere else, especially on the 100 level like I was, you were done for. The only way to get there was to go upstairs to the 400 level, the only level not blocked off anywhere, and walk all the way around to your section, then having to walk down 4 flights of crowded stairs just to get to your seat. And you better believe that that took more than 30 minutes, as people are usually slower on stairs than on flat ground. Honestly I could go on about this for days, but I think you get the picture, so I will move on. Once I finally got to my seat, I was stunned. These were not the seats I ordered. Not even though. I was on the 100 level but I was pushed all the way back, facing an inner-court with a place to buy merchandise and several groups of event staff members huddled together. And as if this was not bad enough, there were two 15-20 foot black pillars, with camera men standing on top of them, right in front of my entire section, not allowing anyone to see a thing. After a lot of complaining, and yes, a lot of screaming, our section, or those who were not too tired to do it, was sent to guest services to get new tickets. 30 minutes later, and no I'm not just making it seem worse than it was, everything I say is the 100% the truth, at guest services, they tried to give us seats still in the same section, 127, but higher up, claiming that the higher we went, the more likely it was that we could see over the cameras. The more likely? Are you kidding? I pay $500 a ticket and there is a chance I might not see anything? I'm 5'3 for crying out loud. My mom, who was the one with me on this trip by the way, is barely 5'1. We aren't going to see anything. Being the hot head that I am, but in this case rightly so, I refused to accept such tickets and got them to give us ones in section 132. Though I went from row 1, which was not really row one, but may as well be compared to level 200 because of the way they structured the stadium, to row 11, I now had a much better view of the court and at half-time finally made it to my seat. Yes I enjoyed half-time, Shakira and Alicia Keys were amazing, and a girl I went to high school with, Cortni Brown was actually Alicia's backup singer, and yes the remainder of the game was enjoyable, but by that point I was so tired, so upset, so beat down, all I wanted to do was go home. When I bought my tickets back in the summer, I studied a venue map for a long time before deciding on the ones I did, because I wanted to the best seats. There was no way I was going to fly to Dallas and spend thousands of dollars on one weekend, to see less than I would on tv. But that was exactly what happened. Either the venue layout was changed over the last few months or the map that was provided with the broker site that I used was not actually that of Cowbow Stadium, but overall it was a disaster, and yes, put a huge downer on the weekend.

Am I glad I was forunate enough to be able to take such a trip? Of course. Did I like the events themselves? Yes. Almost anything basketball related is a positive experience for me. But did I have a good weekend? I really don't know how to answer that.

There was no need to beat a world record for attendance at a NBA game. There was no need to stuff over 10,800 people in a football stadium for a basketball game. There was no need to make it into such a big event. All-Star Weekend is big in itself. The best players in the league get to show off their various talents all weekend and spend some time with their friends and families. Celebrities get to come together to share their love for the sport and spend some time meeting the players. And fans get to take a break from worrying over their team's record or a player's injury and just relax. But the way this year's All-Star game was set up, none of that could happen. And its a shame. A real shame. I didn't need to meet any players. I didn't need to get anything signed. I didn't need to be on tv. I just needed to be able to get what was promised, get what I paid for, have the weekend follow the plan, and with the immensity of it all, that was impossible. Could tickets get lost for anything? Of course. Could seats be falsely advertised for anything? Of course. Are there going to be long lines at big events? Of course. But it was because of the grand scale of it all that all of these things, that everything stressful that could have happened, happened. I think it goes without saying, at least in my opinion, that the expression "less is more" really would have helped in this case.

I did not have a horrible time nor do I regret going, as I did (whether I like it or not) get to be a part of history and did get to see all these traditions live, but my weekend was not at all what I expected, and for that I am sorry. So NBA, listen up. Don't worry about setting records or about making more money. That is not what your organization should be about. Worry about players not caring about events anymore (ie, the dunk contest). Worry about fans not being able to make it to their seats on time (ie, having no sense of organization outside the stadium, having no one inside the stadium know at all what they are doing, and having an event like this in a place intended for a different sport). And worry about what people, what individuals say when it is over. Sure you have broadcasters tweeting about what a tremendous success it was, and players saying it was the most exciting year yet, but step outside of your family for a second. Listen to what real people who have to fend for themselves have to say. Because my bias aside, so far, from both people who went and who watched it on tv, no one seemed that impressed.

Once again I am grateful that I was able to experience such a NBA staple, but to be honest, I am glad All-Star weekend is in the past, and am ready to dive back into the real season. Bulls play Tuesday. Lets go.