NBA Slam Dunk Contest Revisited

Congratulations to Nate Robinson in winning the 2009 NBA dunk contest with his final dunk coming by jumping over his rival, Dwight Howard. 

The classic match-up of big vs small.  Nate cannot only get up, but he also has a great deal of showmanship. 

A terrific dunk and very entertaining.

Watching  the 2009 dunk contest at this year’s All-Star weekend  brings back fond memories of the first ever dunk contest. 

It occurred during the 1976 ABA All-Star Game in Denver. 

Of course, this was in a different era, a different time. Nobody had experienced a dunk contest before this, as a fan or as a participant.  Sure, players had been dunking for a long time, but nobody had thought to have an official contest. 

I know that seems strange now, with all the dunk contests that have occurred since then, but there has to be a first time for everything.   Once the dunk contest had been announced, there was a lot of anticipation on what it would be like.  No one knew exactly what to expect, but there was a lot of excitement and buzz about it.

The two main competitors were the “Doctor“, Julius Erving and the “Skywalker“, David Thompson.  There were others involved, like George Gervin and Artis Gilmore, but everyone knew it would come down to Erving and the hometown favorite, Thompson. 

Adding to the drama was the talk of Julius thinking about attempting to take off from behind the foul line and then dunk the basketball.  There had never been an “official” sighting of a player taking off from behind the foul line and dunking, though some people said they had seen it done. 

Believers and non-believers, there was a lot of trash talking  and arguing going on  amongst the players and coaches if it could be done or not.  This eventually got into the press and, eventually, the fans were involved. 

Would Julius try it or not?   Could he do it?   Would he take the risk?  A miss, under the rules at the time, was devastating.  And everyone knew how competitive Julius was.  We all knew, above all else, he wanted to win.

As the contest evolved, it was obviously coming down to the two favorites.  Julius was down to his last dunk, and when he went down to the other end of the court, stepping off his approach to the foul line, the crowd stood up and roared in anticipation.  As Julius began his run from the opposite foul line to the take off from the foul line, the roar became even louder.  It was deafening.   

Could he do it?  Could he do it?  As everyone rose as he approached, except for a few of us on the bench (unfortunately I was not competing  due to an injury...and a lack of jumping ability) who crouched down to get a true bird’s eye view of that barrier line, Julius took off from the area of the line and soared through the air, finishing with a thunderous dunk. 

The crowd went wild, and of course, there was the immediate arguing if he actually left from behind the line or not.

Sadly, at least for me, Julius did not.  I was one of the believers, for after playing with the “Doc” for two years and against him for four more, I thought he could do just about anything on the court. 

He had stepped over the line by a couple of inches.  It was a great dunk, but he did step over the line.  Did it matter? Sure it did, especially for those who had more bet on the dunk than trash talk.

Julius won that contest after David Thompson missed on a spectacular attempt on his last dunk attempt.  David knew he had to take the risk, after Julius’ dunk. 

The publicity, popularity, and overall success of that dunk contest led to the NBA adding a dunk contest to its All-Star Game activities, and then dunk contests started to appear just about everywhere, ad nauseum. 

There have been great matchups and displays through the years involving players like Erving, Jordan, Wilkens, Webb, Nance, Bryant, Richardson, to name a few, and culminating with this year’s David versus Goliath.