NBA All Star weekend is coming up in a couple of days and the entire basketball world is once again casting all eyes towards the biggest showcase of basketball talent putting on the biggest show in the hoops universe. Phoenix is hosting this year’s edition of the annual event on Sunday February 15, as the lollapalooza shifts to the western conference for 2009.

Dwight Howard was the surprise top vote-getter of the event with 3,150,181, easily eclipsing the previous record held by Yao Ming. Ming drew over 2, 500, 000 votes at one time. Final results of fan balloting didn't exactly bring any major surprises at any of the other positions though.

Miami's Dwyane Wade (2,741,413) and Detroit's Allen Iverson (1,804,649) will be in the Eastern backcourt, alongside reigning All-Star MVP LeBron James of Cleveland (2,940,823) and Boston's Kevin Garnett (2,066,833), who beat New Jersey's Chinese forward-center Yi Jianlian for the starting job by 253,004 votes. Apparently the Chinese fan vote was not quite a factor for this year. Garnett is the senior citizen of the East being in his 12th All Star game.

Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers (2,805,397) was the West's top vote-getter, and will be joined in the backcourt by New Orleans' Chris Paul (2,134,798). At center, Yao (2,532,958) will start for the sixth time, along with forwards Tim Duncan of San Antonio (2,578,168) and hometown favorite Amare Stoudemire of Phoenix (1,460,429).

Nelson, Harris and Granger are all in their first All Star game. All three are among the most exciting perimeter players in the league today.

Thanks to a couple of niggling injuries and the fact that there have been so many great guards playing in the West, Phoenix’s heart and soul Steve Nash will not be seeing action in this year’s event. However the hometown crowd will still have Stoudemire and O’Neal to cheer, and O’Neal is in his 15th All Star game, four shy of another former Lakers great, Kareem Abdul Jabbar. “I guess I’ve still got enough juice in the old diesel,” said O’Neal in a recent post-game interview.

As big and as loaded as the West might seem, the East actually has the two best scorers in the league in their starting lineup with Wade and James. Wade is the top scorer of the NBA averaging nearly 29 points per contest with James close behind with nearly 28 markers per game. “It is always just such an honor to be chosen, to be considered among all of these great players,” said the self-effacing wave after his selection was announced.

Of course when it comes to scoring, Bryant isn’t too far behind his former Olympic teammates at the Number 3 rank with a little over 27 points per game. Bryant, as of this writing, just came off setting a new Madison Square Garden scoring record against the woebegone Knicks as he torched them with 61 points the game after teammate Andrew Bynum was diagnosed with a torn MCL and might be lost for the season. “We knew there would be hell to pay in New York with Kobe when Andrew went down,” said teammate Lamar Odom. He erased the previous record held for so long by some guy named Michael Jordan.

East fans also have the biggest vote-getter for this year in Howard, who leads the NBA in rebounds and blocks for the second straight season. Howard, who wowed fans last year with his Superman antics complete with the red cape, is averaging nearly 14 boards and over three rejections per game. "That's his element there. He's an entertainer. He loves it," Magic head coach Stan Van Gundy said. "I think sometimes people look at that kind of thing, where Dwight's out there having a good time, and they doubt the seriousness of a guy. That's not the case at all. He's very serious about winning and very serious about being a great player."

Van Gundy likened Howard's All-Star antics to what the NBA has come to see from another giant jokester — Shaquille O'Neal. Van Gundy also had the opportunity to coach O’Neal a couple years back when he was still across state in Miami. “He and Shaq are alike in that they are both just great showmen, just great entertainers,” he added.

Speaking of Howard, a lot of people are expecting the new generation showman to take his antics up another notch in this year’s all-star extravaganza. That does not necessarily sit too well with O’Neal, the long-reigning king of the All Star Weekend. "He's a good player, but everything he's done I've invented, so I'm not impressed," O'Neal said. "For me to get my eyes wide open about another big man, he'll have to do something that I haven't seen before or something that I haven't invented. Everything that he's done, I've invented it."

On a more serious note, Nelson’s All Star Game debut may have to be put on hold, as the guard suffered what could be a season-ending injury last week. As much as the fans over at Orlando are holding their breath, fans in general are now thinking about who ought to be the most worthy replacement for Nelson on the East roster. Boston’s starting backcourt of Rajon Rondo and veteran Ray Allen are making strong cases for themselves, as is Cleveland pointguard Maurice “Mo” Wiliams.

In a sort of impromptu audition for that All Star slot, Allen sank crucial shot after crucial shot in the end-game Tuesday night, including a difficult three-pointer from the baseline with 0.5 seconds left to give his Celtics a 100-99 win over the stubborn 76ers, their 12th straight victory.

"I think he's an All-Star," Celtics coach Doc Rivers said of Allen, who scored 23 points in the win. "If they make an injury substitution, I think those shots clinched it." Allen should used to coming in as a “replacement” All Star, having been added to last year's Eastern team when the Washington Wizards' Caron Butler was injured and couldn’t make the games. David Stern’s wish to have all three Celtics at the games came true last year, the first year of the new Boston Big 3.

Allen’s backcourt mate Rondo has also been playing superbly, perhaps the best basketball of his young career, and might be the other Celtic in the games. From a young punk pointguard, he has blossomed into a force on his own, able to win games just as well as the Big 3 superstars. Williams, an on again-off again star, has also been playing the best ball of his career. He’s a veteran who has made stops in not a few NBA cities, but he’s gotten into a good groove with King James and the Cavaliers.

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Boston’s Ray Allen will indeed replace Jameer Nelson of Orlando for the 2009 All Star Game in Phoenix. Nelson has been sidelined with a bad shoulder injury and might miss about four weeks of action. “He should have been on there, so it’s nice,” Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. “Having those three (Allen and teammates Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce) doing things together is nice, so I’m happy with the news.”

Allen is in his ninth All-Star Game, having also been added as an injury replacement last season when Washington’s Caron Butler went down with an injury. He scored 28 points in New Orleans to help the East to a 134-128 victory over the West—even outscoring game MVP Lebron James, who had 27.“If injury replacement gets you 28 points in the All-Star game, I’ll take it every year,” Allen said. “I wasn’t worried about it. But for three of us to represent the organization” is an honor.

In the Rookies-Sophomores game this could be the best time for the rookies to trounce the sophomores. They have the size, the athletic ability and the balance to take the fight to the sophomores and then some. Without a seven-footer in their roster, the Sophomores need to gang-rebound and hustle harder to get to the rebounds. On the other hand the Rookies have three legit and multi-skilled seven-footers in Brook Lopez, Greg Oden and Marc Gasol and should dominate inside against the relatively shorter opposition.

Neither can the rookies be considered slow and plodding with superb athletes such as top draft pick Derrick Rose and Number 2 overall pick Michael Beasley in tow. Sophomore Kevin Durant needs to step up for his side being arguably the best player on that lineup. As Durant goes so go the sophomores, so he has to be ready to lead and take charge.

For the record, although Portland’s Greg Oden was the top draft pick from last season, he essentially red-shirted his rookie year when he got injured and was lost before the season began last year. He is thus considered a rookie for this year, while the 2007-2008 second overall pick Kevin Durant of Seattle/Oklahoma City – Oden’s good buddy – is playing for the sophomores.