NBA All-Star voting often misses the mark.
Fans are voting for players that have star power, or score a lot of points, or play in big markets. Players are voting for guys that they like or who have been good for a long time. Some national media take a balanced approach, but so many are merely remarking upon which players look good when facing the team that they cover.
That's why looking at career All-Star appearances to determine which players had the best careers is a flawed tactic, because so many unpredictable factors influence who makes the team and who does not. That unpredictability will likely (we predict) lead to Darius Garland missing the All-Star Game this season despite playing at a clear All-Star level.
The NBA's third fan voting returns were published this past week, and the All-Star Starters will be announced in just a few days. From there, the remainder of the All-Star teams will be selected by the league's coaches, and then NBA Commissioner Adam Silver may step in and assign injury replacements as needed.
That process seems likely to select a certain group of players that will exclude Darius Garland -- and potentially now Jarrett Allen with Pascal Siakam and the Indiana Pacers coming on -- and include a number of Eastern Conference guards who do not deserve the spot.
Let's look at three guards that Darius Garland is outplaying but who are higher than him in the fan voting, and why Garland deserves to make the All-Star team above them.
No. 3: Tyrese Maxey, Philadelphia 76ers
After the third counting of fan votes, the fact that Tyrese Maxey of the Philadelphia 76ers remains firmly ahead of Darius Garland is positively ludicrous.
Maxey took a massive step forward as a player last season, winning the NBA's Most Improved Player award and averaging 25.9 points per game, making his first All-Star Game in the process. Heading into this season, he was a reasonable player to project onto the All-Star rosters.
Yet now that the games have been played, the idea of Maxey making the roster over Darius Garland is hard to fathom. Maxey is averaging essentially the same number of points this season but doing so on career-worst efficiency, taking a whopping 9.4 3-pointers per game but hitting just 33.1 percent of them.
His turnovers are up by 50 percent, his assists are down and he is overall a much worse player than a season ago. Some of that is team context, as he has been playing without his star teammates Joel Embiid and Paul George for much of the year, but he has not been able to elevate the team. The 76ers are 15-25 on the year, a whopping 19.5 games back of the Cavaliers.
Maxey has more raw points than Garland, but the shooting comparison is staggering. Maxey has an effective field goal percentage of 49.5 percent on 21.2 shots per game; Garland is at 59.6 percent on his 15.1 attempts per game. Garland is shooting better from all three levels, has more assists than Maxey despite a smaller workload, and is contributing to winning much more than Maxey.
Maxey won't be named an All-Star Starter, so he is competing with Garland for an East reserve spot. It seems probable that NBA coaches won't elevate Maxey given the 76ers' terrible record, but that clearly hasn't prevented fans from voting him well ahead of Garland.
No. 2: Damian Lillard, Milwaukee Bucks
Now for a player who seems like an All-Star lock given discussions from media and his third-place ranking in East Guard All-Star fan voting, just a few votes behind Donovan Mitchell in second. Damian Lillard is a player with a lot of name recognition and a high-scoring role on the Milwaukee Bucks, they have elevated him in the eyes of fans and likely everyone else involved as well.
There is no questioning the track record for Lillard, but this season has clearly not been his best. Again, Garland has fewer counting stats because he plays on a team with two other on-ball stars, while Lillard gets to dominate the perimeter touches for the Bucks and is playing six minutes more per game than Garland. Lillard takes more shots, particularly 3-point attempts (8.8 for Lillard compared to 6.9 for Garland) but he is shooting worse from 2-point and 3-point range.
That's not to say Lillard has necessarily been bad, but it's hard to make a case for him over Garland other than "more volume" or "track record." The Bucks have been mediocre and often carried by Giannis Antetokounmpo. Many of their stats are nearly identical despite Garland's reduced volume; both have a PER of 21.8, both have a Box Plus-Minus of 4.0, and each have very similar steal and turnover percentages.
Garland has a higher assist percentage and is making a similar impact in fewer minutes, and again, the fact that the Cavaliers are dominating teams and allowing Garland to rest fourth quarters shouldn't be counted too much against him. What's more, while Garland is playing fewer minutes per game, he has been much more healthy than Lillard, and therefore has played a handful of minutes more than Lillard.
Let's try their per-36 minute marks, then: Garland has 25.3 points and 8.1 assists, slightly more than Lillard's 25.0 points and 7.2 assists. What's more, the Cavaliers can have other players taking and making shots during those other minutes, while Lillard is filling the Bucks' stat sheets with less efficient shots.
Lillard is deserving of being in the All-Star conversation, but he seems likely to make the team over Garland and that would be a mistake.
No. 1: LaMelo Ball, Charlotte Hornets
Damian Lillard is a deserving All-Star who should merely be slotted behind Darius Garland in the pecking order. LaMelo Ball seems headed for an All-Star Starter selection and probably doesn't deserve to be an All-Star at all.
His numbers look like they come from a video game, and the fact that he is the first face you see when you sort All-Star East guards by either "name" or "fantasy points" or "scoring" is surely driving many of his votes. The "Big Baller Brand" name certainly carries a lot of weight, and many young people are enamored with Ball and his fast-paced, shoot-from-anywhere approach.
All of that being the case, LaMelo Ball does not deserve to be leading all Eastern Conference guards in fan voting, but he is - and by a mile. He has roughly 350k more votes than Donovan Mitchell in second place, and unless players and media perfectly lay out their ballots he will likely be named a starter alongside Mitchell, leaving 2-4 slots for the rest of the East guards.
LaMelo Ball has never met a shot he doesn't like, and unfortunately he takes all of them. He is averaging a whopping 29.5 points per game, plus 7.5 rebounds and 5.3 rebounds. He is also shooting just 42.2 percent from the field and 33 percent from 3-point range. He is everywhere on the court and takes a ton of shots, but he is neither efficient nor obviously driving winning for his team.
That's true on a team level - the Charlotte Hornets are just 10-28 on the season - and for the Charlotte offense, which ranks just 28th in the league in offensive rating. Ball leads the league in usage rate, but is just middle-of-the-pack in points per shot attempt.
This isn't to heap on LaMelo Ball; the Hornets may be bad with Ball on the court, but they are inexplicably bad without him. He makes the offense significantly better by playing and taking every shot; "better" merely means below average, but that's a huge difference for the Hornets.
That doesn't mean he deserves an All-Star nod, certainly not over a player in Garland who is involved in driving the best team in the East, playing efficiently and intelligently. Ball's selection as a starter will eliminate a spot that should be going to Garland, to Cade Cunningham, to Jalen Brunson -- and instead at least one deserving guard will be left out in the cold.
That player, unfortunately, might be Darius Garland.