Kemba Walker: Still a Tough Path to Deserving All-Star Bid

Kemba Walker still needs help despite being worthy of an All-Star berth.

Fan voting for the All Star Game is almost over and Kemba Walker of the Charlotte Hornets needs your help. Walker is stuck amongst a rather stacked group of backcourt members in the Eastern Conference. With five days to go his vote total is well back at around ninth. Jeremy Lin, his former backup, has more votes at the moment.

Walker has stepped up his level of play this season to become one of the true scorers in the league. He is averaging over twenty three points and a game with five assists and four rebounds. He is a big reason the Hornets are in play for the first four seeds of the Eastern Conference playoffs.

Walker could surely use your support, but the NBA did change the rules for All Star selection this year. The fan vote will only be fifty percent of the consideration. That will leave the media and the players with the responsibility for the other half.

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Will this be a good thing for Walker? It is possible that the small market star has a better reputation among his fellow players than the fans. However there are also a lot of intrateam politics that could potentially go on. Players may be more likely to vote for teammates rather than players they think are deserving. Try to imagine a LeBron James ballot that doesn’t have Kyrie Irving on it.

So Walker’s true hopes may lie with the members of the media. These are the people who should have a pretty clear picture about who is worthy and at the same time feel less pressure about homerism. Or we would hope anyway.

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There is one check on the process that is not based on pure numbers. That is the bench. The bench remains the domain of the coaches, and they get to decide on those final members. This might be Kemba’s best chance. He just needs a coach to decide to carry an additional guard or beat out other highly considered guards.

By all rights Kemba should be in New Orleans playing in the big game. Let’s hope the system works out for him whether it’s fans, players, media, or coaches.