Where does Heat’s Tyler Herro stand in first release of All-Star voting? Surprisingly low on list
Miami Heat guard Tyler Herro is in the middle of his best NBA season yet. In the coming weeks, Herro will find out whether his best NBA season will be enough to earn him a spot in the NBA All-Star Game for the first time in his career.
The initial returns of fan balloting for the 2025 All-Star Game released Thursday weren’t encouraging for Herro, but that makes up only a small part of the selection process. Herro (125,251 votes) ranks ninth among Eastern Conference guards in fan voting behind Charlotte’s LaMelo Ball (947,444), Cleveland’s Donovan Mitchell (718,084), Milwaukee’s Damian Lillard (704,914), New York’s Jalen Brunson (477,253), Atlanta’s Trae Young (353,452), Detroit’s Cade Cunningham (247,046), Philadelphia’s Tyrese Maxey (246,648) and Washington’s Jordan Poole (164,383)
“I would love to be an All-Star,” Herro said earlier this month, with the Heat hosting the Indiana Pacers on Thursday (7:30 p.m., FanDuel Sports Network Sun) to complete the back-to-back set after Wednesday night’s 119-108 home win over the struggling New Orleans Pelicans. “That’s been my goal since I came into the league. We’ll see. I got to get votes. I’m definitely worthy, though.”
Herro, who turns 25 on Jan. 20, entered Thursday’s matchup against the Pacers averaging career highs in points (24.3 per game), rebounds (5.6) and assists (5.2). He’s also shooting a career-best 47.7 percent from the field and a career-best 41 percent from three-point range on a career-high 9.7 three-point attempts per game while playing in each of the Heat’s first 31 games this season.
Including Herro’s 32-point performance in Wednesday’s victory over the Pelicans, he now has scored 30 or more points in six games this season. He also entered Thursday with the fourth-most made threes in the NBA this season (123) behind only Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards (129), Mitchell (125) and Detroit’s Malik Beasley (125).
In addition, Herro is one of only two players in the league who entered Thursday averaging at least 24 points, five rebounds and five assists per game while also shooting 45 percent or better from the field and 40 percent or better from behind the arc. The only other player in the league currently meeting those thresholds is three-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic of the Denver Nuggets.
“You get that energy when you see a guy really just performing at a high level every night,” Heat center Bam Adebayo said of Herro’s All-Star-caliber season. “We don’t take that for granted. A lot of times when we have low-energy games, we think about like: ‘Hey, we got a guy really competing to try to be in San Fran.’ For us, it’s going to be fun. I hope he gets it.”
As for Herro’s Heat co-stars Adebayo and Jimmy Butler, Adebayo is not among the top 10 vote-getters for East frontcourt players but Butler is.
Butler, who has been selected for the NBA All-Star Game six times in his career, ranks sixth among East frontcourt players with 257,901 votes behind Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo (1,710,630), Boston’s Jayson Tatum (1,385,851), New York’s Karl-Anthony Towns (1,099,966), Orlando’s Paolo Banchero (484,096) and Boston’s Jaylen Brown (433,636).
Orlando’s Franz Wagner, Philadelphia’s Joel Embiid, Philadelphia’s Paul George and Cleveland’s Evan Mobley make up the rest of the top-10 vote-getters for East frontcourt players. Adebayo, who has been selected for the NBA All-Star Game three times in his career, is not currently on that list.
This season’s All-Star Game will look a little different.
The NBA announced in mid-December that the 2025 All-Star Game will feature a new format. The Feb. 16 NBA All-Star Game, which will take place at Chase Center in San Francisco, will feature a mini-tournament with four teams and three games for the first time.
Two teams will meet in one semifinal (Game 1), and the remaining two teams will meet in the other semifinal (Game 2). The winning teams from Game 1 and Game 2 will advance to face each other in the championship (Game 3). For each game, the winner will be the first team to reach or surpass 40 points.
Each team will have eight players and be named for a TNT NBA analyst. The 24 NBA All-Star selections will be divided evenly into three teams, with the rosters drafted by TNT’s “Inside the NBA” commentators and honorary team general managers Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal and Kenny Smith. The three analysts will make their respective picks for Team Chuck, Team Shaq and Team Kenny live on TNT in the NBA All-Star Draft, which will be conducted on Feb. 6.
The fourth team will be the winning team from the championship game of the Rising Stars event on Feb. 14 during All-Star Weekend in San Francisco. Rising Stars is the annual showcase of top first- and second-year NBA players and G League standouts.
But the voting process to determine the 24 NBA All-Stars remains the same despite the format change.
Fans account for 50 percent of the vote to determine the five players honored as starters in each conference for the 2025 NBA All-Star Game. All current NBA players and a media panel account for 25 percent apiece of the vote, with every voter completing a ballot featuring two guards and three frontcourt players.
Voting for fans will conclude Jan. 20. TNT will reveal the NBA All-Star Game starters on Jan. 23 and the reserves on Jan. 30.
So, how exactly are the five All-Star Game starters from each conference determined?
After all votes are tallied, players will be ranked in each conference by position (guard and frontcourt) within each of the three voting groups — fan votes, player votes and media votes. Each player’s score will be calculated by averaging his weighted rank from the fan votes, the player votes and the media votes. The two guards and three frontcourt players with the best score in each conference will be named NBA All-Star Game starters. Fan voting will serve as the tiebreaker for players in a position group with the same score.
If no Heat players make it to this season’s All-Star Game as starters, they will still have an opportunity to get in as reserves. NBA head coaches will select the seven reserves from each conference.
The four NBA All-Star Game head coaches will come from the coaching staffs of the teams with the best regular-season record in each conference through games played on Feb. 2. The head coach of the leading Eastern Conference team and the head coach of the leading Western Conference team will each coach an NBA All-Star team. An assistant coach from one of those staffs will serve as the head coach of the Rising Stars champion and an assistant coach from the other staff will coach the remaining NBA All-Star team.
The four teams participating in the NBA All-Star Game will compete for a prize pool of $1.8 million. Each player on the championship-winning team will receive $125,000, each player on the second-place team will receive $50,000 and each player on the third- and fourth-place teams will receive $25,000.
Adebayo was the only player to represent the Heat in last season’s All-Star Game, getting in as an East reserve.
INJURY REPORT
The only Heat players ruled out for Thursday’s game against the Pacers are Josh Richardson (right heel inflammation) and Dru Smith (left Achilles surgery).
The rest of the Heat’s roster is expected to be available to play on the second night of the back-to-back set.
This story was originally published January 2, 2025 at 1:19 PM.
