The NBA All Star Weekend Was Kind of a Dud

As I promised yesterday, today I will break down all the other things from the NBA All Star weekend. Friday and Saturday, leading up to the game on Sunday, was kind of a bore, if I am being honest.

I, for some unknown reason, watched the celebrity "all star" game on Friday night. I don't know what possessed me to watch. Maybe it was the fact that my trip to Chicago was cancelled, maybe it was because my mom was injured, maybe it was because that was the only thing that was on at my folks house when we went to visit them that night. I will never be able to pinpoint why, but I watched. As it is with most of these celebrity games, it was a mess. The basketball was mediocre at best. When the pros got in, Tracy McGrady and Paul Pierce, they didn't care enough to even try, which is their right. They have played tons of NBA minutes, so they don't need to go all out in a dumbass game. But, when they were announcing who was on the floor, I didn't know who most of these "celebrities" were. Sure, I new Justin Bieber and Jaime Foxx. Those guys are bona fide stars. I also knew Candace Parker because she is probably the best female player right now. But, some names like Quavo, Katie DeMita, the K-pop singer, the little kid from "Black-ish", and many others, I had no idea. I think it is a mixture of 2 things. One, I am getting older, and I honestly do not know who younger kids look up to anymore. Second, the people involved with the celebrity game have a very loose meaning of the word "celebrity". I know that Winn Butler is in a very popular band, but would I call him a celebrity, absolutely not. That is how I felt with pretty much everyone involved except for Foxx, Bieber, Parker and McGrady and Pierce. Everyone else was non existent in my pop culture lexicon. After the game my only take away was that this Quavo fella can play a little ball. Besides the male and female pros, he was the best player on the court. The dude can play. The celebrity game was a complete waste of time. It was boring, bad and a rough watch.

I figured Saturday night would be better, and while it was, it wasn't that much better. I expected great things from the 3 challenges, and they all kind of ended up very blah. The night started off with the skills competition. I kind of like this game. I like seeing the big men weave through stations and make crisp passes and hit three pointers. It is even better when you see the guards do it. Well, the skills competition this year was very ho hum. I think Spencer Dinwiddie, of the Brooklyn Nets won, beating Lauri Markanen. I was not stoked to see those 2 guys in the finals. I would have rather seen Joel Embiid make it. Or Andre Drummond. Or Jamal Murray. Those guys are more widely known than Dinwiddie and Markanen. It was kind of boring.

The three point competition was better, but not by much. There were some big names this year in the three point contest. Guys like Klay Thompson, Paul George, Bradley Beal and Eric Gordon. Three of those 4 guys were all stars, and Gordon won sixth man of the year last year, and the three point contest last year. There were other guys, guys like Tobias Harris and Devin Booker. But, I was all in for watching the all stars. Paul George laid an egg. Eric Gordon didn't even come close to repeating. Brad Beal was ice cold in the last half of the first round. But, Klay did put up some decent numbers. So did Harris and Booker. The final came down to Thompson and Booker, and this was the best part of the contest. Both guys really showed out in the finals. Booker went first and got 28 points, hitting all of his "money ball" rack, and breaking a record. Thompson had his chance to win, and while he put up a great effort, he only got 25. Both of these guys proved why they are elite shooters and great deep threats in the NBA. This final was the one saving grace of the three point contest.

To end the night they had the slam dunk contest. This is the event I look most forward to every year during the all star break. There were four really good competitors this year. We had Victor Oladipo, Dennis Smith Jr, Larry Nance Jr and Donovan Mitchell. These are four young, hyper athletic guys that could easily be the future of the NBA. And, while 3 of them didn't disappoint, the judging was horrendous. First off, Oladipo tried a nearly impossible dunk in the first round and missed all three attempts. Then in the second round, he put on a Black Panther mask, which was cool as hell. But, he did, for him, a very easy dunk after missing his first attempt. He had 5 chances and only made one dunk. Dennis Smith Jr had an okay first round dunk. His second round dunk should have put him in the finals. He did a reverse 360, put the ball through his legs and dunked with his off hand. It was truly amazing. Donovan Mitchell did a very cool first round dunk, where he bounced a ball off a different backboard than he dunked on. His second round dunk was good too, he paid homage to Eddie Griffith, AKA Dr. Dunkenstein, and put down a solid dunk, but Smith Jr's second dunk was better. Larry Nance Jr paid homage to his dad, even donning his old Suns jersey, and that dunk was incredible. Then, he had his dad come out and throw him a pass and proceeded to windmill the shit out of the dunk. His first 2 dunks were better than anyone else's. He made it to the finals, deservedly, and his opponent was Mitchell. While Mitchell had 2 solid dunks, Smith Jr's were better. He should have made it. Then in the finals, both Nance Jr and Mitchell had solid dunks. Mitchell did another throwback, wearing Vince Carter's Raptors jersey from when he won the contest, but it wasn't as impressive as it could have been. Larry Nance Jr did a double tap off the backboard, which is insanely hard, but he didn't get the win that he deserved. That brings me to the judging. The fact that they felt they needed 3 other judges besides Lisa Leslie and Dr. J was astonishing to me. Those 2 were more than enough to judge dunks. But, to put Chris Rock, who I love but is admittedly not an athlete, Marky Mark, which why is he even relevant anymore, and the worst of the bunch, DJ Khaled, who should never, ever judge anyone doing something athletic, was just wrong. Those three had no idea what they were doing. It was kind of embarrassing. Donovan Mitchell ending up winning, even though I think Nance Jr deserved it. The dunk contest, while being the best part of the night, was very ho hum, much like the rest of the stuff leading to the all star game.

I usually look forward to all the stuff leading up to the all star game, but this year was kind of a dud. Hopefully it gets better next year.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast, and the greatest basketball writer on the internet. 

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