NBA makes big mistake with Steph Curry-Sabrina Ionescu shootout

Curry's Golden State Warriors are hosting the All-Star events, while Ionescu grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. For some reason, the NBA insisted on "raising the bar" on last year's popular Steph vs. Sabrina event, so instead, they're abandoning the contest entirely.

Ionescu and Curry wanted to expand the contest to include additional players, reportedly Curry's former teammate Klay Thompson and WNBA sensation Caitlin Clark. However, per The Athletic, Clark released a statement in January saying that she "wants her first three-point contest to be at WNBA All-Star in Indianapolis this summer," perhaps saving her star power for when her own Indiana Fever are the hosts.

But it's a huge mistake that the NBA had no backup plan rather than hoping to land Clark. It seems like its sole plan was hoping that Clark changed her mind, rather than reaching out to someone like three-time All-Star and 2024 gold medalist Kelsey Plum of the Los Angeles Sparks or legend Diana Taurasi. Clark may be the most popular WNBA player, but she's not the only star.

Last year's contest was a thriller, with Curry not catching the New York Liberty star until the penultimate ball of the contest, narrowly defeating her, 29-26. It ended up providing more drama than the regular Three-Point Contest, where Damian Lillard defended his title — with a final-round score that was worse than what Curry achieved.

Perhaps that's the real reason behind the NBA's failure to bring back its best All-Star event. Curry battling Ionescu was more compelling than the traditional Three-Point Contest, stealing too much thunder from the NBA's event.

But with the NBA constantly tinkering with the formats to every part of All-Star Weekend, it feels like commissioner Adam Silver and his team tried to fix something that wasn't broken — and ended up breaking it entirely.