Cleanse Your Palate With Some Dunk Contests That Were Actually Awesome

Nathaniel S. Butler. Getty Images.

I don't want to take too much away from my internet pal Clem and his big victory last night

There certainly hasn't been a lot of bing bonging going on lately when it comes to the Knicks after their opener, so I say let them enjoy this moment. The rest of us? Meh. I think it's getting a little played out to keep saying the Dunk Contest is dead and it sucks, but the problem there is it keeps sucking. I don't think it's a situation where all the cool dunks have been done before either. If you can do a cool dunk people will love it if you pull it off flawlessly. Who cares if we've seen it before. Cool dunks are cool dunks. The issue is more star power related in my opinion. We're just not seeing the best dunk contest dunkers perform anymore. Ja Morant flat out refuses to do it. Zion will never do it. Aaron Gordon is on strike because he keeps getting snubbed. The list goes on and on. What happens then is you get situations like this

Nothing kills the energy of a dunk contest more than someone missing all their dunks. That shit is deflating as hell. I think many of us walked away from last night with a similar feeling to Donovan Mitchell

So you know what? Let's just pretend last night didn't happen (outside of Knicks fans) and instead relive some times when dunk contests were actually awesome and must watch stuff

You're telling me that if someone was able to pull off those LaVine dunks in 2022 that people wouldn't go nuts just because we've seen it before? Of course they would! Especially if they were pulled off on the first attempt. You don't need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to the dunk contest in my opinion. You just need big names and clean dunks. That's it. 

Also, and I think this goes without saying, it's time to flip the dunk contest with the 3 point shootout. End with the night with the shooting. A moment like this

would have been a much better way to cap off the night. Will they? Of course not, because that makes too much sense. I can't see the league ever convincing some of the bigger names to do this event, even if there was a huge massive cash prize. It has the league in a bit of a pickle because they love to treat the dunk contest like their crown jewel of All Star Weekend and sadly it ends up being a dud after dud. It's kinda sad when you think about it. It used to be such an awesome event and now….