Thursday, January 13th, 2011 at 3:29 pm  |  20 responses

Links: Ibaka the Dunker

Plus, I got that ‘Kast…

by Lang Whitaker | @langwhitaker

I’ve had a cold for about three weeks now…coming and going and coming and going and coming and going. Which is fun. And I will be treating it in possibly the worst way imaginable, by getting on a plane tomorrow and spending the weekend traveling to write a story for the issue of SLAM that we’re trying to finish up right now.

A few things before I hit the road…

• There’s been a lot of talk about the dunk contest this year, specifically the surprising inclusions of Brandon Jennings, Serge Ibaka and JaVale McGee. I knew Brandon used to dunk a lot in high school, and he’s an L.A. guy, and he’ll be the smaller guy that the crowd will hopefully get behind. So Brandon’s inclusion, I understand. And I know McGee and Ibaka are both crazy athletic, but I didn’t really know either was considered a dunker. Then we ran this video of McGee putting in work getting ready for the contest, which looks promising.

And my main man Pascal Giberne tipped me off to the video below of Serge Ibaka as a 19 year old competing in a dunk contest in Spain. Some nice stuff here…

• Last week I talked about the crazy animal deaths happening around the world. Well, they’re continuing. If you want to keep up with them, someone made a handy clickable Google Map listing them all…


View Mass Animal Deaths in a larger map

• Anyone watch the BCS title game? Oregon wore some crazy uniforms, and the story of why Nike designed them the way they did is here. By the way, I’m guessing Tostitos was really excited that there was a coach named “Chip” involved in the game.

• Couldn’t be more excited about season two of “The Ricky Gervais Show,” starting this week on HBO, and Discovery Science showing “An Idiot Abroad” here in the States, beginning next week.

• Finally, if you want some NBA talk, here’s this week’s NBA.com Hangtime Podcast hosted by myself and Sekou Smith. We talked LeBron, Carmelo Anthony and all kinds of other stuff. Sekou and I had a star-studded line-up of guests: TNT’s Steve Kerr, Yahoo’s Marc Spears and SLAM columnist and author Dave Zirin.

Listen here…

You can download the entire file here, or subscribe via itunes here.

OK. I’m gonna take some Mucinex now. Later…

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  • Enigmatic Posted: Jan.13 at 4:00 pm
    Damn, that map is crazy. I had no idea.

  • Tarzan Cooper Posted: Jan.13 at 4:55 pm
    Dont buy into any hype. Mass animal deaths happen with regularity. ……… Lang, did you see my story of your origin in the last links?

  • Michael NZ Posted: Jan.13 at 5:11 pm
    Jennings, Iblocka and Epic JaVale can practice all they want. It’s Griffs dunk-no-contest to lose.
    —
    Got the podcast loaded up on my ipod. Great guests Lang, look forward to it.
    —
    I pity the fool who gets seated next to the person with a cold on a plane – because, by journeys end, they too will be a-sniffin’ and a sneezin’. And you can tack on another three weeks to that cold after being in that 400 ton tube of air-conditioned swirling disease-fest clusterfu*kery.

  • Tarzan Cooper Posted: Jan.13 at 5:30 pm
    I liked that last part kiwi mike

  • Allenp Posted: Jan.13 at 5:42 pm
    Okay Ibaka. I thought he wasn’t fluid enough to be in the constest, but he looks fine in that clip.

  • Allenp Posted: Jan.13 at 5:46 pm
    False adverstising! I was expecting something OutKast related and I am pissed that there it not some new song or something in here. lol.

  • Jackie Moon Posted: Jan.13 at 5:53 pm
    Re: Griffin – powerful dunks without variation don’t always translate in dunk contests. Not saying he won’t have the variation, but he if does a standard dunk, only 10,000X more powerful, it might not come across as awesome to the viewers.

  • Tekno Posted: Jan.13 at 6:04 pm
    Hey Lang. Just finished listening to the podcast. You mentioned towards the end that you though Boston and LA initiated the emergence of the Big 3 concept and that Miami then validated it. I would have thought that the Spurs used the Big 3 concept before these teams.1

  • Noel Posted: Jan.13 at 6:35 pm
    co-sign Allenp. I got excited for some fresh ‘Kast

  • andrew Posted: Jan.13 at 6:54 pm
    this reminds me of old school random links..

  • Tarzan Cooper Posted: Jan.13 at 7:20 pm
    PodKast. Ha, uh ok…… Tekno, id assume lang meant the 80s celts and lakers.

  • Cheryl Posted: Jan.13 at 8:38 pm
    Get better, Lang. Stay away from dairy for a few days and I promise the cold will be gone. Trust.

  • Tekno Posted: Jan.13 at 9:42 pm
    @ Tarzan. Yeah you may be right.
    Alhough the context of the discussion was that since Jordan, teams thought you needed one megastar with a sidekick to get a championship. And then the Lakers and Celtics came along. And now the Heat. IF that was the context, then I think the Spurs actually pulled off the triumvirate strategy first. Anyways, thoughts and prayers to those affected by the floods in Queensland who may be reading this site. We’ve been watching earnestly 24/7 here in NSW.

  • Michael NZ Posted: Jan.13 at 10:00 pm
    @Tekno …and from here in NZ. Was in Brisbane a month ago, so seeing the flooded areas right where we were is scary stuff.

  • Tarzan Cooper Posted: Jan.13 at 11:20 pm
    Closin into the age of aquarius crazy weather floods tornadoes low jet streams not gettin better enterin a twilight zone activities grown every single day more people spottin ufos

  • Lang Whitaker Posted: Jan.14 at 12:56 am
    @Cheryl: I don’t really eat dairy anyway…so it ain’t that.
    @tekno: As soon as I said Lakers and Celts, I thought of the Spurs, but couldn’t work it into the conversation because we moved on. But yeah, good point.

  • Hursty Posted: Jan.14 at 8:12 am
    Ricky Gervais is hilarious. My favourite comedian of the last 2-3 years. Oh, and Karl Pilkingtons head is perfectly round. Like, legitimately round. And orange. It’s brilliant.

  • Ben Osborne Posted: Jan.14 at 11:03 am
    Real Links! Thank you sir.

  • JAM-O Posted: Jan.14 at 6:41 pm
    I like Ibaka… solid and servicable big man but I just cant see him doing well in the dunk contest… Why couldn’t they get Westbrook!?!?! He could’ve been in it in 08′ but didnt get voted in. Dudes got freaky quick ups as you can see here: Hopefully hes not as bad as Shannon Brown, Derozan, Gerald Wallace and Nate last year

  • SAB Posted: Jan.15 at 5:45 am
    that dunk contest clip is great, did he score 1005pts for each dunk?! ow!! i love the fan holding up “8/7″ while everyone else is holding “10″…

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