It is the dream marriage. The one thing most NBA fans want to see. The union of freakish athleticism with artistry and power. The return of the league’s premier event during All-Star Weekend. The one event many look forward to but the one event that has ultimately disappointed.
Long gone are the days when stars like Michael Jordan and Dominique Wilkins threw their names into the ring and dueled for dunking supremacy. Dwight Howard tried to revive interest from the superstars for a brief three-year run. Nobody followed.
Miami Heat’s LeBron James has long been the dream entrant.
Powerful. Graceful. Athletic. Creative.
He continued to stoke those fires after the 2009 contest when he threw his hat into the ring for the 2010 contest. He did not enter. Neither did Dwight Howard. The contest faded into obscurity again with upstarts who simply could not live up to expectations — anyone remember Jamario Moon or Shannon Brown’s supposedly crazy dunks? Me neither.
Blake Griffin brought some excitement back to the contest last year. Not to mention some much-needed star power to the contest.
As the defending champion, you expect him to be in this year’s contest in Orlando. Could we expect to see LeBron James there too? James once again is thinking — THINKING — about throwing his name into the ring for the 2012 Slam Dunk contest.
“I have thought about it before and a few times in the past I kind of had an ankle injury that kind of kept me out of it and a couple of times I was just like, ‘You know what, I’m going to go in here and rest my legs for this weekend and then get back to the regular season,” James told Ethan J. Skolnick of The Palm Beach Post. “But, I mean, they say a lot of the greats have done it and I’ve watched it over the years.
“I don’t know, I’ll be on the fence every year about it. It’s always a fence year for me. I know they’re getting tired of me, though, so I’m not even going to start up nothing.”
Too late, Mr. James. Too late.
I am sure fans are tired of this will-he-won’t-he when it comes to the premier event of Saturday night. And it seems doubtful James will actually go through with this.
Then again, James did do what he did to John Lucas III in what was the best dunk of the year… until Blake Griffin flew over Kendrick Perkins. Maybe that was enough for James to challenge Griffin to some sort of dunk-off. Or maybe not.
All-Star reserves get announced next week and then the Saturday night competitors will come shortly after that. Whether James will continue his flirtation with All-Star Saturday Night’s main event, that will have to be decided in the coming weeks.
