NBA All-Star Weekend: 5 Ways to Improve Dunk Competition

Feb 15, 2014; New Orleans, LA, USA; Washington Wizards guard John Wall (2) celebrates with Toronto Raptors guard Terrence Ross (31) and Indiana Pacers forward Paul George (24) after the 2014 NBA All Star dunk contest at Smoothie King Center. Mandatory Credit: Bob Donnan-USA TODAY Sports /

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3. Announce and show dunks ahead of time

Feb 15, 2014; New Orleans, LA, USA; Sacramento Kings forward Ben McLemore (16) dunks over Shaquille O /

In the Olympics, we know the kinds of jumps that the figure skaters are going to try. In snowboarding, we generally know what tricks the athletes are going to attempt as well. Why not do this in the dunk contest? Why not announce exactly what the dunk is going to be? This allows for the crowd to get excited and really ramps up the anticipation.

Imagine this: Ben McLemore steps up to the microphone to announce, “I’m going to do a 720, between-the-legs, double-pump dunk.” You don’t think the entire arena would snap to attention? Even better — use video games to simulate what the dunk is supposed to look like.

We do simulations in Madden and NBA 2k14 all of the time for stuff. Why not do it for this? The crowd would be frothing at the mouth waiting to see a human do a dunk like that. Also, it would make for easier scoring as opposed to the horrible non-scoring method from last night. How would we score? Glad you asked!