Among the striking sights of last year’s N.B.A. All-Star Game — the dunks, the no-look passes and the general tomfoolery — was the final score.
The Eastern Conference beat the Western Conference, 163-155, in regulation at the Smoothie King Center in New Orleans. It was the highest combined score of the 63 All-Star Games. The East’s total was the highest by a single team, too.
Retired professional athletes have long been known to consider their game superior to the one played today. Whether or not that is the case, former N.B.A. All-Stars said that at the very least, there was more defense.
“Back when we were playing and even before me, the first three quarters were like the show and the last quarter it was like all serious,” said Penny Hardaway, 43, who made four consecutive All-Star teams from 1995 to 1998 with the Orlando Magic. “I think they never really got to that in the last couple of years.”
Hardaway said, “I think that for three quarters it’s cool, but in the fourth quarter it needs to turn up a little bit.”
All-Star weekend, which is taking place in New York for the first time since 1998, is a multiday bonanza. The game itself is only one of the entertainment options. Players seem to spend more time recuperating, attending parties, doing promotional events and conducting business meetings than thinking about or playing basketball. The game Sunday night, naturally, takes on an air of nonchalance.
It was not always this way, former players say.
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Even so, players from the 1980s said the game then was still much more competitive than now.
“Guys really played,” Wilkens said. “If you looked at some of the All-Star Games back when we played, guys took it personal because you’d have bragging rights for the summer, the East against the West.”
The one constant seems to be that players find the amount of defense played in their All-Star games to be perfectly sufficient.
“You have the top guys from most of the teams in the league, so they lead their teams and get guys going,” said LaMarcus Aldridge of the Portland Trail Blazers, who is making his fourth All-Star appearance. “You have a bunch of guys who are overly competitive.”
Well, maybe not too competitive. When peppered with questions Friday about what he was looking forward to most during All-Star weekend, Russell Westbrook of the Oklahoma Thunder said, “I’m just trying to find a way to get some rest.”
A version of this article appears in print on February 15, 2015, on page SP9 of the New York edition with the headline: Evolution From Modest Start to a Bonanza . Order Reprints| Today’s Paper|Subscribe
