Yesterday, news broke that Atlanta Hawks guard Joe Johnson would miss the All-Star weekend festivities due to tendinitis in his left knee. Johnson was named an All-Star reserve, a participant in the 3-point shootout as well as the Shooting Stars Competition.
NBA Commissioner David Stern replaced Johnson in the All-Star game with Rajon Rondo, and Kurt Helin with NBC Sports is reporting that Oklahoma City Thunder forward Kevin Durant will replace Johnson in the 3-point shootout. Durant is shooting a little bit better than Johnson from three this season, but replacing Johnson with Durant just sounds so much more exciting. How excited will fans be if Durant and Kevin Love are slugging it out in the finals. Or Durant and hometown guy Ryan Anderson.
As Helin writes, the 3-point shootout has even more firepower than the Slam Dunk contest. The combination of adding Durant to the 3-point shootout and taking Knicks guard Iman Shumpert (and his assist man Jeremy Lin) out of the dunk contest makes that pretty clear. Perhaps the NBA should start demanding one All-Star in the dunk contest the way they seem to be demanding All-Stars take part in the 3-point shootout. Maybe then we’d finally get LeBron in dunk contest.
Also, it wasn’t made immediately clear who’s replacing Johnson in the Shooting Stars Competition. I’m as disappointed as you are.
