Disclaimer: I am aware that NBA All-Star weekend was over a month ago. However, I believe these recommendations are still worthy of an audience:

After a relatively lackluster past couple of NBA All-Star Saturday nights, the 2023 events in Salt Lake City definitely “elevated” the energy inside of Vivint Arena. Get it, because Utah is way above sea lev…ugh. I’ll give myself a 4.3/10 for that one. I’ll be better next time. 

The Kia Skills Challenge saw the hometown Team Jazz emerge victorious. Tyrese Haliburton put up a glistening 31-spot in the first round of the Starry Three Point Contest, only to lose by one to Damian Lillard in the final round. The AT&T Slam Dunk Contest was a lot better than the past two competitions, as Trey Murphy III, Kenyon Martin Jr. and Jericho Sims each had some admirable throwdowns. 

But the star that shined the brightest was Mac McClung, a former high school phenom and last year’s G League Rookie of the Year who signed a two-way deal with the Sixers just days before the contest. McClung’s max vertical of well over 40 inches combined with his unique in-air creativity made him a viral sensation at Gate City High School in Gate City, VA. 

Despite being the shortest contestant in the field, McClung showed out, putting together another mixtape of highlight slams en route to an electric Dunk Contest victory.

McClung became just the ninth Dunk Contest participant to ever have three dunks score a 50 in one night. While this year’s events were definitely more fun than some years in the recent past, however, there’s still a lot of room for improvement. Let’s go on a journey to the past. Get out your DeLoreans and flux capacitors!

For me, it all started when Blake Griffin soared over a Kia Optima to win the 2011 Slam Dunk Contest. Considering the relative ease of the slam, however, the dunk isn’t as cool in retrospect. While the height of a 2011 Kia Optima is listed at 57.3 inches tall (which seems humanly impossible to clear), that’s from the very top of the car to the bottom; Griffin jumped over the hood, which is a shorter obstacle to clear. If someone owns a 2011 Kia Optima and could measure the distance between the bottom of the car and the hood, let me know. 

Nevertheless, when Griffin threw down the contest-clinching two-hander, Spike Lee was flabbergasted. Kenny Smith was caught in a tornado of jubilance (as he always is, which I appreciate). As Ludacris blared inside of a charged up Staples Center, six-year old me and my friend Jake were stunned as well watching from home. Forget the fact that Griffin cleared the automobile with little effort; seeing a human (small) jump over a car (big) was the cherry on top of an epic inaugural NBA All-Star Saturday Night for us two. 

After that magical Saturday night, Jake and I made sure we watched each year’s events with intent. We made our own Dunk Contest scorecards, predicted who was going to win each event like our lives were on the line and re-created the contests in whoever’s basement we were in. For us (and likely many others), it became a joyous annual routine. It became a spectacle. 

However, that magic seems to have worn off in recent years, although there have been plenty of memorable moments over the past decade. Zach LaVine and Aaron Gordon have put on iconic dunk shows. Buddy Hield won the 2020 Three-Point Contest on the last ball, and Stephen Curry did the exact same thing in 2021. Heck, even the Skills Challenge has had some moments, including Jayson Tatum winning the 2019 event on a halfcourt shot. 

But something’s missing. There’s a special kind of energy that’s been absent that sort of returned on Saturday night. Sure, COVID affected the 2021 events, but so did the slightly underwhelming dunking in that year’s Dunk Contest. 

Today, I’m here to fix a night that’s supposed to be a delicious appetizer for Sunday’s All-Star Game. All-Star Saturday Night should be a showcase of the league’s premier talent in fun and unique ways. There’s potential for something amazing here. To the drawing board!

Reforming the Dunk Contest

The NBA Dunk Contest is like a really bizarre dream, except it lasts for at least a couple of hours. It’s a place where Aaron Gordon, Chance the Rapper and Charli D’Amelio can share the same space at one time. It’s where you can see a man that’s 67 inches tall do a pirouette 120 inches in the air. The limits of human athleticism are tested by superhuman athletes like Michael Jordan, Dominique Wilkins and Mason Plumlee, who did a dunk over his brother, Miles, who recorded a maximum vertical jump that was 4.5 inches higher at the NBA Combine than Mason’s. I bet that was a lovely dinner table conversation. 

The list of props that have been used throughout the Dunk Contest’s history look like a seven-part Broadway production. There have been cupcakes, stuffed animals, blindfolds, more blindfolds, giant paintings, ”Black Panther” masks, glow-in-the-dark jerseys, stickers, hoverboards, drones, cars, motorcycles, model airplanes, airline crews, head passes, cartwheels, multiple baskets, taller baskets and numerous Superman appearances. 

Unfortunately, the dream is very imperfect. The Dunk Contest has experienced long stretches of ineptitude, but it’s been saved by transcendent performances. The event was left for dead until Vince Carter single-handedly resurrected it in 2000, and the contest endured a prolonged lull until Zach Lavine and Aaron Gordon revived it in the latter half of the 2010s. 

There are a few reasons for this. One is the advent of the Internet and people specializing in dunking. Supreme leapers such as Jordan Kilganon and Isaiah Rivera have essentially become professional dunkers; while their throwdowns are jaw-dropping, it extends the limits of dunking, which makes everything below that limit not as cool. It’s not that all dunks are now boring, but most every dunk that will be done from now on will have likely been done before. It’s also not just because of professional dunkers; it’s also because of NBA players evolving into better athletes than they were in the past. What made Carter’s performance in 2000 so electric was that he pulled off dunks that many people had never seen before. That might not be the case anymore. 

For example, Murphy III did a 360 windmill in the final round of the contest, which was a very impressive dunk. If it was 1993, that dunk would’ve likely received a perfect score, and the crowd would’ve likely gone feral. However, since that dunk has been done many times before (including in an actual NBA game by Paul George), it eliminated a large chunk of hype that it may have received 30 years ago. 

The second one is that a lot of the NBA’s most recognizable leapers aren’t competing in the contest. It’s completely understandable, as the cons (potential injury) heavily outweigh the pros (looking cool). However, that has inevitably made Dunk Contest rosters a little worse. With all due respect to Juan Toscano-Anderson, he was definitely not one of the four best dunkers in the league last season, and although he made it to the finals of the 2022 contest, none of his dunks scored higher than a 44/50. The NBA even had to reach into the G League this season to get a fourth participant (although McClung had signed a two-way contract with the Sixers and also performed exceptionally in the contest). 

Finally, a dunker can only be so creative. Humans have limits, although some people would sometimes like to think otherwise. Even for someone like Shaedon Sharpe, who has a near-50-inch vertical, there are only so many dunks he can pull off within reason. While a back handspring 360 Eastbay over a Kia Telluride would be pretty epic, I’m not sure if any NBA player has the capacity to accomplish that feat.  

So how do we fix this? How can we make the night’s main event feel like the main event again? Here are some ideas. 

Make the Dunk Contest a combined fan/player/media vote

Just like All-Star voting, I think it’d be a good idea for both the fans, players and media to have a vote for the Dunk Contest participants. After all, we live in a democracy, which is my personal favorite form of government. The fan vote would count for 50% of the vote, while the players and media would each account for 25%. This would increase the chances of consumers getting what they ask for. 

Here’s the unique part: everyone would be able to vote for up to 25 players, and at the end of the voting, the players who finished in the top four would all be invited at once, then the next group, then the next group, until four players have accepted. 

For example, let’s say Ja Morant, Shaedon Sharpe, LeBron James and Zion Williamson finished one, two, three and four, respectively. They’d be offered the first four spots in the contest. Let’s say Sharpe accepts, but the other three decline. Then, the next three players on the list would get invited, since there are only three spots left. Let’s say one of the three accepts; the next two players on the list would then be invited. The process would continue until the contest had four participants. 

If the NBA gets through the list of 25 without getting four players to accept, then the league would invite other players who didn’t make the initial list of 25 one-by-one. However, I think that’d be very unlikely to happen, which means that it’s definitely going to happen, and we’re going to see Talen Horton-Tucker in the Dunk Contest at some point in the near future because no one else would have wanted to compete. 

However, there’s a way we can fix that problem, too. Well, maybe not fix, but make the problem less of a problem. 

Create an incentive to compete 

As mentioned previously, there’s little reason why a player (especially a superstar) should compete in the Dunk Contest…unless there’s a real incentive.

Incentives matter. It’s a core principle of economics. As a kid, you probably weren’t mowing the lawn or washing the family car for free; if there’s a crisp $20 hanging over your head, however, those old sneakers are likely getting put to use. 

I think the best option would be some sort of donation to a charity of choice. It’s a big reason why the All-Star game started to matter a lot more starting in 2020. While this wouldn’t guarantee that any of the big-name dunkers would compete, it would lessen the weight of the cons. 

Now, regarding the actual contest…

Change the scoring system

The current Dunk Contest scoring system has five judges (with all of them usually being former basketball players), and they all score dunks from 0-50 (the scores usually don’t go lower than 40, however, unless a player misses all of their dunk attempts). Their five scores are then added up for a cumulative score. 

I think the change here would be to allow decimal scores (48.5, for example) and average out the five scores. 

Allowing judges to give decimal scores gives leeway for a necessary middle ground of scoring dunks. I like how they changed it from 0-10 to 0-50, because 0-10 was unnecessarily constricting. There have been plenty of dunks throughout the history of the contest that were better than a nine, but weren’t quite a 10. 

For example, when Aaron Gordon leapt over Tacko Fall in the 2020 contest, I thought that was a solid 9.5. Getting even close to clearing the 7’5” Fall was wildly impressive, let alone dunking the ball. However, Gordon didn’t fully clear Fall; he whacked Fall in the back of the head with his right leg.

Not having a middle ground for scoring also devalues a perfect score. To me, a perfect score implies that the dunk that was just pulled off was one of the greatest we’ve ever seen, one that belongs in the pantheon of all-time throwdowns. However, since there was no other choice other than a nine or a 10, that put judges in an unnecessary bind to give a score they might not truly believe is the right one. 

While judging is obviously subjective, and we can’t change how each individual brain works, the judges would now have a lot more scoring freedom simply because we added an extra number.  

Change the definition of an “attempt”

Right now, dunkers have three “attempts” per round. An “attempt” is defined as a player “controlling the basketball and moving it toward the rim.” For example, in last year’s contest, Cole Anthony’s first dunk was a left-handed windmill. However, Anthony’s first attempt saw him pull back at the last second; since he didn’t actually get his hand on the rim, that didn’t qualify as an “attempt.”

This needs to be changed for a couple of reasons. One, the overall energy tends to get sucked out of the crowd after around the second or third try at a dunk, even if it’s something as minute as messing up the pass. Last year, Jalen Green tried his first dunk (an off-the side-of-the-backboard between-the-legs) eight times before he tried a different dunk and made it on the first try. The reason why he could keep going beyond three is because a chunk of those “attempts” saw either a bad pass from Josh Christopher or Green not catching the ball cleanly, which don’t qualify as an attempt under the current rules. 

I believe the new definition of an “attempt” should be any motion that implies an attempt at a dunk, even if a player doesn’t touch the rim. This includes botching the pass or pulling back at the last second. That may sound a little harsh, especially considering that a bad pass is often not the dunker’s fault, since the pass is often coming from someone else. 

Even if it’s the passer’s fault, too bad! Either get a passer you know won’t mess up, or have your dunk just involve yourself. A huge reason why McClung’s dunks were awesome was that he did them all on the first try. Almost all perfect scores have been given to dunks that were done on the first attempt. When a dunk is missed on the first try, it eliminates an element of surprise that hits viewers like a tidal wave, and it vanquishes a large chunk of the energy the crowd can provide. 

Reforming the 3-Point Contest

There’s not a whole lot I think needs to be drastically changed about the 3-point contest. 3-pointers are fun, and watching a player heat up from downtown is entertaining. I’m also all for any event that gives a guy like Larry Bird a chance to tell everyone they’re going to lose beforehand, then back it up in the coldest way possible.

However, there are a few small changes I’d like to make. 

Invite the (statistically) best 3-point shooters to compete

I understand the desire to have as many widely recognizable players competing in these competitions as possible, but if we’re going to have a competition that tests a certain basketball skill, I don’t think it’s all that crazy of an idea to have the players who are best at that skill compete in that competition. 

The 3-point contest this year featured competitors that were good 3-point shooters, but none of the statistically best ones. Out of the eight participants, none of them were in the top ten in 3-point percentage amongst qualified shooters at the time. When Anfernee Simons pulled out of the contest due to injury, the league decided to replace him with Isaiah Joe Kentavious Cladwell-Pope Luke Kennard Julius Randle, a sub-34% career 3-point shooter. 

This is like if the MLB put Jonathan India in the Home Run Derby, or if the NFL put Daniel Jones in a “longest throw” contest. It’s like, yeah, they can do it, but…there really weren’t any better options? Also, Randle proceeded to put up the second-worst score in round one. If only he could jab step a couple of times before shooting…

Now, this isn’t a call to have just the statistically best 3-point shooters in the contest; Haliburton, Lillard and Buddy Hield each putting up impressive scores was fun to watch. However, I think it’d be right to invite the players who stand at the top of the 3-point shooting mountain at the All-Star break (get it? Utah? Mountains? I think I’m improving!). 

Have players be passed the ball instead of taking balls from the rack

My goal here is to make the contest feel as natural as possible from a shooter’s perspective. In my lengthy career getting shots up during a practice or during a workout, not once have I used a rack to retrieve the basketballs, nor have I seen anyone do it outside of a contest setting. Getting passed the ball is a far more natural process of preparing for a shot. It’s what happens in games, too, after all. 

This would be a little bit like batters in the Home Run Derby choosing who pitches to them. We could get really sweet moments similar to Robinson Cano winning the 2011 derby with his dad pitching to him. Could you imagine Stephen Curry winning the contest with Dell passing him the ball? We could also get moments similar to Bryce Harper’s dad hitting Bryce with a pitch during the 2013 derby. The NBA version of that would be something like De’Aaron Fox airmailing a pass to Kevin Huerter, which I think would be quite funny. 

I also understand that this change would involve rebounding effectively. Right now, there’s no need for a rebounder, as all of the basketballs are put on the five racks before the shooter begins their round. Now, the passers would also have to rebound the ball, which adds a new fun wrinkle to the contest. What if a shot clanks off the rim and goes way out of bounds? What if a pass goes way over the shooter’s head? What if the pass is catchable, but slightly off the mark in such a way where the shooter is affected by it?

We’ll minimize chaos by putting five basketballs under the rim for the rebounder/passer to have in case a shot goes careening far away. We’ll also add ten extra seconds for each shooter per round (shooters currently have 60 seconds to get through five racks and the two Starry shots) to compensate for the extra time spent rebounding and passing.

Swishes should be worth two points

A swish is the coolest way you can hit a jumper in basketball. It’s like bowling a strike without needing the gutter rails. It’s like, you shot the ball with such incredible accuracy that you didn’t even need the league-provided rim to help the shot go in. 

For that, I think contestants should be awarded an extra point. A referee will be present to determine whether a shot properly swished or not. For a regular ball, a swish would be a two-point basketball. For a money ball, a swish would be worth three. 

Let the shooter who had the highest score in the first round choose where they want to start in the final round 

Right now, the top three scorers from the first round of the contest advance to the final round. The player with the highest score shoots last amongst the three contestants in the final round, while the lowest-scoring finalist shoots first. At least to me, it seems like this is a reward of rest for the player who scores the highest in the first round. 

Instead, I think a better reward would be giving the highest scorer in the first round the option of shooting first, second or third in the final round. Some people like setting the tone immediately; others prefer to know what score they have to beat in order to win. It’s like giving someone a Visa gift card versus, I don’t know, a Chili’s gift card. They can use the reward however they’d like. 

Replace the Skills Challenge with a One-on-One competition 

I wish I had more insightful analysis than this, but the Skills Challenge is simply not a good competition. Any competition where players can go half-speed and still win is not one that I feel should be held on a night that’s supposed to display the NBA’s vast collection of superb talent. 

The contest has several major flaws, especially the obstacle course. During the passes, floaters and jumpers, contestants can move to the next obstacle even if they haven’t completed the initial one as long as they hit the maximum number of attempts. For example, Jordan Clarkson missed all three floaters during the relay (after going half-speed on the dribbling portion), but he still got to move on to the corner jumper. I will simply not stand for this, which is why I’m currently sitting down writing this column. 

Insured, I think a far better use of that time slot would be a one-on-one competition. It’d be a chance for players to show off skills not just on offense, but on defense. It’s also a competition that would likely see all the contestants giving their best effort. 

The rules

The competition would be exactly like “King of the Court”: one player starts with the ball at the top of the key with another player guarding them. The other contestants would be standing along the baseline, with the line order being determined by a lottery. If the offensive player scores, they stay on, and the next player in line is now the defender. If the defender gets a stop, that same process is repeated, except the defensive player stays on and gains possession.

The offensive player will start behind the three-point line, but they’ll have a choice whether to start with the ball at the top of the key, right wing or left wing. When the defender gets to the offensive player prior to the possession starting, they’ll check the ball, just like at the park. The offensive player will have ten seconds to get a shot off, with the clock starting once the offensive player receives the checked ball. It’s a one-shot possession, so a miss would automatically give the ball to the defender. 

The scoring system would also be fairly simple. You get one point for a shot inside the arc and two points for a shot outside of the arc. As a defender, you can get a point for either a block or a steal; however, you have to score your last point on offense. The first three players to reach seven move on to the Finals, where the first player to five wins the competition. The order of the final round would be based on the previous round’s scores. For example, the player with the most points at the end of the first round would get the ball to start the final round. 

There will also be a running game clock that will be 20 minutes long. The clock will run like an NBA regulation clock does.The clock will stop for any kind of play stoppage (foul, travel, out-of-bounds, etc.) and for changes of possession. Unlike regular NBA (and NFL) games, however, we’ll allow for player-enforced challenges in the final two minutes. 

In terms of calling fouls, we’ll have a referee. If a foul is called on the defender, the offensive player will get the ball at the top of the key with a fresh 10 seconds on the shot clock. If a foul is called on the offensive player, it’s an immediate change of possession. I thought about having players call their own fouls, but I feel like that could go badly. 

If a player disagrees with a call, we’ll give them one challenge for the entire contest. If a defensive player challenges a foul call and it turns out there was no foul, the offensive player will get the ball at the top of the key with just three seconds on the shot clock, and the player will keep their challenge. If they’re wrong, and there was a foul, the offensive player would get the ball at the top of the key with 10 seconds on the shot clock, and the player would lose their challenge. 

The incentive

Just like the All-Star Game and our hypothetical Dunk Contest, there would be some sort of charity money up for grabs. We can have each basket or steal/block be worth a sum of money towards a charity of the player’s choice. 

Ideally, we’d have the league’s best players competing, in which we would get some legendary mono-y-mono matchups that would create some of the cooler basketball pictures in recent memory. Imagine LeBron James posting up Kevin Durant, or Nikola Jokic being guarded by Giannis Antetokounmpo. Those posters would cover a lot of bedroom walls. 

This could also be an opportunity for teammates, rivals or guys with beef to go head-to-head. A Luka Doncic-Devin Booker battle? Dillon Brooks versus Draymond Green? What if LeBron and Bronny are able to duke it out in front of a national audience sometime in the near future? That would literally be must-see TV.  

While the above scenario of having the best and most entertaining players competing would be the dream, that’s probably not a realistic goal year after year. Let’s say that the contest was being held this year, and none of the NBA’s top echelon players wanted to compete (again, totally understandable). Here’s a hypothetical group of eight that could compete:

Jose Alvarado

Paolo Banchero

Jalen Brunson

Bol Bol

Lu Dort

Kyle Kuzma

Alperen Sengun 

Collin Sexton (we’ll always have at least one player from the host city participating)

You’re telling me that serious NBA fans wouldn’t watch that? There are so many fun players here! Imagine Alvarado annoying the absolute crap out of everyone, Dort putting on a defensive masterclass or Bol committing some nefarious basketball act on offense. Picture elite shot creators in Banchero, Brunson and Kuzma hitting the toughest buckets imaginable, or Sengun putting on a clinic in the post. I feel like Sexton would take this competition extra seriously, which would be a refreshing switch-up from the effort levels that have been seen in the Skills Competition. 

Once again, these are intended to be reformations, not fixes. These events will always be imperfect; however, there’s still plenty of room to grow. Hopefully, we can return to the days where electricity surged throughout the arena, where everyone genuinely seemed invested into the competitions that created electricity in the first place. That would be All-Star Saturday night nirvana. Until next February.