Since the All-Star reserves will be announced tonight on TNT, I thought I’d try to come up with some sort of formula to calculate who should make the All-Star Game.

What’s important in an All-Star? Well, to me, it comes down to two things: stats and wins. So I took my favorite (and flawed) all-encompassing stat, efficiency, and calculated it on a per-game basis for each player. Then, I multiplied each player’s efficiency with his teams win percentage to come up with a new stat: Win Efficiency. (Please note that rebounds are easier to come by than assists, so big men tend to do better in overall efficiency than guards do.)

From there, picking the All-Stars would be simple. Take out the five starters for each conference, and fill out the roster with three guards, three forwards and a center. Surprisingly, the results came out pretty well. (By the way, I put an arbitrary minimum of 35 games played.)

Here’s a look at the top 20 players from the Eastern Conference:

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He doesn’t get the press that Griffin gets (for obvious reasons), but DeAndre Jordan is quietly having a solid third season. Here are three dunks he had against the Bucks on Monday night.

Jordan is averaging 7.0 points, 7.3 rebounds and 1.7 blocks in 25 minutes of playing time, and the 6-11 center is only 22 years old.

Hornets fans are going to cringe when they read the title of this post. I get it — the Hornets are a solid 31-18 and the Chris Paul trade talk has died down considerably since last summer.

But these facts remain: 1) New Orleans is not a legit contender, 2) the team’s second-best player (David West) is getting older (30) and approaching free agency, and 3) Paul can become a free agent in the summer of 2012.

After some trade rumors were floating around last summer, Paul met with the New Orleans newly-hired braintrust and has since kept his mouth shut, playing the role of good soldier. He’s having a good season (16.7 points, 9.7 assists, 2.6 steals) and the Hornets are having a nice year. But virtually no one believes that they’ll be representing the West in the Finals this summer. One online casino’s long-term market shows the Hornets as a 19-1 longshot to make the Finals. That’s pretty telling considering how inconsistent the Lakers have been this season.

So what does this have to do with Blake Griffin? Well, I went to see my beloved Bucks take on the Clippers last night at the Staples Center and got to see Griffin in person. He went for 32-11-6, and generally killed Milwaukee with a plethora of post moves, drives and long jumpers. The Bucks are a good defensive team, but they had no answer for Griffin who flat-out dominated the game offensively for the Clippers.

Griffin is a special talent. He can jump out of the gym, but he has the ability to channel his athleticism into effective basketball talent which is not always easy for someone so athletic. The 31-year-old Baron Davis is serviceable at point guard, but if the Clippers could somehow acquire Paul (25), and surround the dynamic duo with a couple of shooters and a defensive center, Griffin and Paul could lead the Clippers to the Promised Land.

How do the Clippers acquire Paul? I doubt the Hornets are going to listen to trade offers right now, but if I’m Clipper GM Neil Olshey, I’d call up Dell Demps and make a standing offer of Eric Gordon, Chris Kaman and the Minnesota Timberwolves unprotected 2012 first rounder. The deal would net the Hornets a future All-Star in Gordon, as well as cap relief and solid post play in the form of Kaman. With the direction the T-Wolves are headed, that 2012 draft pick will probably be in the Top 5. Gordon would be a steep price to pay, but if you want a Top 2 point guard in a point guard-dominated league, you’re going to have to give something up.

Paul and Griffin would be devastating in the pick-and-roll and Griffin’s ability to post up would take the pressure off of Paul and allow him to take over in the clutch if the situation warranted it. Paul would also love playing with D’Andre Jordan, who has already shown a Tyson Chandler-like ability to finish alley-oops with outstanding power.

Worried about L.A. being a Laker town? Kobe is starting to show his age and if Paul and Griffin are headlining the Clippers, it won’t take long for a good portion of the Laker “faithful” to switch sides and start rooting for the city’s other team.

I’m not suggesting this is likely to happen, or even remotely possible. I’m just saying that it should happen. Even if Donald Sterling is the worst owner in the league.

Oh, and if CP3 isn’t available, Deron Williams would work too.

This is a 6’10″ power forward, people.

Keep in mind that Simmons, a Clippers season ticket holder, made a similar case last year that LeBron should come to L.A. and look how that turned out.

Anyway, here’s his case:

Griffin is the most meaningful in-the-air player since Shawn Kemp. Throw in his competitive streak and he did the impossible — he made Baron Davis care about basketball again. As my friend Tollin said last week, “It’s amazing; it’s like Baron has a purpose again.” He’s Blake’s dunk muse. Now the Clips have the foundation of something special: Griffin, Davis, Eric Gordon (a future All-Star) and enough left to make a legitimate offer for Denver: lottery pick Al-Farouq Aminu, Chris Kaman, expiring contracts and the rights to Minnesota’s unprotected 2012 pick (nearly as valuable a trade chip as Favors) for Carmelo and Al Harrington’s horrendous contract that’s the Carmelo Trade Tax. Mrs. Anthony could live in Hollywood and make her next unwatchable reality show. And her husband could play with Griffin, Gordon, Davis, Eric Bledsoe and DeAndre Jordan … a situation that’s between five and 20 times more appealing than New Jersey. Even when you include Donald Sterling.

From a basketball/quality of living standpoint, you couldn’t do much better than the situation with the Clippers. Anthony-Griffin-Gordon would make an excellent trio to build around and I’ll agree that the building blocks the Clippers could offer (Aminu, Kaman and Minnesota’s unprotected 2012 pick) are almost as good as what the Nets can offer.

But there’s one thing that stands in the way: Donald Sterling. The Nets’ owner, Mikhail Prokhorov, a.k.a. the Russian Mark Cuban, is infinitely more impressive and Simmons notes that LeBron thought that the Nets meeting was right up there with the Heat’s last summer.

It will be nice for Chauncey Billups and Rip Hamilton land in New Jersey with Melo, but only for a year or two, as both players are past their respective primes. It’s really about Brook Lopez and Mikhail Prokhorov versus Blake Griffin, Eric Gordon and Donald Sterling.

J.A. Adande of ESPN.com suggests the Lakers as a possible destination for Griffin when he becomes a free agent in 2014.

From 1994 to 2004, the Clippers had 10 picks in the first 10 selections of the draft. The only one to stay with the team for more than five seasons is Chris Kaman, the center selected sixth overall in 2003.

Griffin could become an unrestricted free agent in 2014, which coincides with the expiration of Kobe Bryant’s and Pau Gasol’s contracts with the Lakers. Now that’s a franchise with a history of attracting and retaining star players, one with a low tolerance for down time. If the Lakers have to reset in 2014, who better for them to do it with than Griffin?

For his part, Griffin seems to be focused on the right thing — making the Clippers better.

“I would love to do that,” Griffin said. “I would love to be a part of it. I don’t think there’s a greater feeling than helping something, being a part of something bigger than yourself, being a part of something that changes the culture. If we’re really committed to winning, we’re committed to being better, I would love to be here. But there’s a lot of years, a lot of games to be played before any of that’s going to be decided.”

The phrase that caught my eye was “if we’re really committed to winning…”

That’s the rub with the Clippers, isn’t it? There have been a lot of good players come through the franchise and they hardly ever stay. Can Griffin and Eric Gordon turn this thing around quickly enough to convince themselves to stay? Can Clippers management surround them with enough talent to make the playoffs? If Gordon doesn’t re-sign in 2013, I doubt Griffin will re-up the following summer, but that’s just speculation.

The key is Donald Sterling. Widely regarded as one of the worst owners in sports, the Clippers’ bubble always seems to burst, and some have suggested that Sterling’s stink is the reason.

In Griffin they have a bubble. A very, very big bubble. Is it going to burst?

Here’s a neat look at one of Griffin’s dunks in super slow-mo.

Since the video I posted earlier was decidedly Griffin-less…

I think #4 was his top dunk of the year, but that’s just one man’s opinion.