When you look back on it, Stern set this up really good.
This dude messing with a good formula already and he has insane players from around the world.
Ain't nothing wrong with East vs West. Sometimes you have lopsided conferences, but even then many times modern games are close because players are playing loose anyways and take turns with the highlights.
Plus you get the underdog factor, like when Iverson/Marbury carried vs the stacked West.
East vs West keeps things orderly and easier for the casual fans to track connections like who's on what team.
Most people follow teams, from the NFL to e-sports. You'll have your standout individuals sure, but most "superstars" outside of around 3-5 people aren't household names anyways.
When you try and have people stand on their own away from associating with a team (the more recognizable brand) they're going to come up short because more times than not they're not a household name.
Cats going to be put under Team LeBron rather than the Western/Eastern Conference.
The lesser connections, the less memorable and that's a proven fact.
