I caught pretty much all of the festivities surrounding the all-star game as well as the game itself and I have a couple of thoughts after taking it all in. Here they are…

The Dunk Contest must be discontinued. Nate Robinson won for the third time. The fact that Nate Robinson has 3 dunk titles speaks volumes to the shape the event is in nowadays. To Nate’s credit, he gives the competition everything he has and is a tremendous athlete. More power to him for taking the crown as long as nobody else wishes to be serious about it.

What needs to happen to revive the event you ask? Lebron James needs to enter. There is no reason for him not to, other than the fact he is probably scared of losing. But he shouldn’t even care about that. All the great athletes go in and earn their stripes. Kobe, Dominique, Jordan, Carter, McGrady and now Lebron must. If he doesn’t then I think he loses some credibility. Nobody will think less of him as a player but one has to wonder why wouldn’t he? Between this and the attempted wiping of the footage of him being posterized from about a year ago paints a portrait of Lebron as someone who shies away from friendly competition and anything that may damage his pristine reputation as a supreme player. He needs to loosen up and go in. And if he does that then you know the best will try to go against him, just so they can say they beat him. Thus, the competition of the event would rise back to where it belongs.

The skills competition, 3-point shootout, and team event were all good. I can’t figure out why the female player for Team Sacramento no longer plays for Sacramento but other than that I think it continued to be an excellent event. I had a hard time understanding why the 3-point shootout didn’t have any three-point shooters in it. Steph Curry is about the only player who I would consider a three-point shooter. The others just shoot threes sometimes during a game. The event was still good though.

The NBA has the best all-star event without question. They have for a while and they probably will for the foreseeable future. They understand better than all the other major leagues the value of a strong fan experience. I think they’re biggest advantage is that they embrace the demographics of the league’s players and they leverage that to tap into the culture of the sport. David Stern does not try to make or present the NBA as something that it is not. Everything from the commercials that are run down to the music, performers, and merchandise are a reflection of its biggest stars.

If only he could force people to enter the dunk contest…

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 16th, 2010 at 8:10 pm and is filed under Sports.