Milwaukee's Giannis Antetokounmpo is the early leader in fan balloting for the NBA All-Star Game, and the Lakers' LeBron James is well on his way toward extending his record and getting picked for a 21st time.
The first update on AllStar voting for this season's revised game was released Thursday, with Antetokounmpo the overall leader with about 1.7 million votes. Denver's Nikola Jokic is second overall with about 1.4 million votes, which is tops among all Western Conference players.
The 10 players on pace to be selected as starters, at least based on the fan balloting: Antetokounmpo, Boston's Jayson Tatum, New York's Karl-Anthony Towns, Charlotte's LaMelo Ball and Cleveland's Donovan Mitchell from the Eastern Conference, and Jokic, Phoenix's Kevin Durant, Oklahoma City's Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Dallas' Luka Doncic and James from the West.
The Feb. 16 event will have a new format with three games. The 24 AllStars will be drafted into three teams of eight players apiece. Those three teams will be entered into a fourteam tournament, with the remaining squad being the team of NBA rookies and second-year players that wins the Rising Stars event on All-Star Friday. There are two semifinal games, followed by the winners meeting in a championship game -- with the first team to reach 40 points the winner of all three games.
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