MLB All-Star Futures Game vs. NBA Rookie-Sophomore Game

Advantage: MLB. This game is a dream come true for hardcore MLB fans as they get a chance to see their team’s heralded minor league prospects, imagining them leading their team to a World Series one day. Minor leaguers are generally players that you’ve heard about, but never actually seen, giving them a mysterious quality which is unveiled in the Futures game. The NBA, without a developed farm system, doesn’t have this option. Instead, it produces an entertaining game usually with some good highlights and dunks, but these are all players we’ve seen during the season so we mostly tune in to see the highlights. It’s interesting to see who plays well and there is a good, healthy competition for the MVP award sometimes, but the game doesn’t quite have the intrigue of the MLB game.

MLB Home Run Derby vs. NBA Slam Dunk Contest

Advantage: NBA. This was a tough one. Both contests are very exciting and had fallen on hard times earlier in the decade, baseball with its steroid issues and the dunk contest with its lack of originality. The major advantage the NBA has here is the creativity element of the dunk contest. Both contests have the awe factor (whether its the awing power or hops), but the dunk contest allows, and actually requires, you combine that ability with creativity. You’re always wondering, “what’s he gonna do? what’s he gonna do?” before a player does his dunk. The home run derby is nice when you’ve got 1, or preferably 2, players putting up big numbers, but I’ll take the dunk contest.

MLB All-Star Game vs. NBA All-Star Game

Advantage: NBA. This is where being a huge NBA fan really shows its bias, but I think if you compare the NBA All-Star Game to an NBA regular season game, and do the same for baseball, the NBA has the more amped up event. The MLB All-Star game basically needs a close game for it to have much excitement. You might see some nice home runs or fielding plays, but not nearly the volume of highlights you’ll see in an NBA All-Star Game. I basically don’t want to take my eyes off the NBA game because you might miss a spectacular dunk, pass, etc. One advantage the MLB game does have though is that it now has more meaning to it now with the World Series home advantage. I wouldn’t say players don’t care at all about winning the NBA game, but let’s just say winning MVP is probably just a bit more important.

Overall

Advantage: NBA. So, taking 2 out of 3, the NBA gets the nod as having the better All-Star game. Of course those aren’t all the events. To make it a fair comparison, I had to leave out the 3-point shootout and Skills challenge so the NBA would probably win by an even wider margin. We could probably do without the Shooting Stars competition, but the NBA is doing pretty good when it comes to All-Star weekend.   MLB isn’t doing bad either, certainly a lot better than the NFL’s Pro Bowl (does anybody watch?)