Thursday, February 16th, 2012 at 11:00 am  |  95 responses

2012 NBA Dunk Contest: Shumpert, Budinger, George, Williams


by Marcel Mutoni / @marcel_mutoni

Once considered the showcase event of All-Star Weekend, the NBA Dunk Contest has lost much of its luster over the years.

The League’s biggest stars don’t want to participate – they usually only take part in it before they truly become superstars – and fans are often disappointed by the selected competitors.

But, it’s all not all bad news this year. Jeremy Lin is here to save the day! Well, sort of.

Lin has been tabbed to “assist” teammate Iman Shumpert in the dunking exhibition:

Sources with knowledge of the league’s plans told ESPN.com that Knicks rookie Iman Shumpert — one of four dunk-contest entrants alongside Houston Rockets forward Chase Budinger, Indiana Pacers swingman Paul George and Minnesota Timberwolves rookie Derrick Williams — will be enlisting Lin to “assist” him in a manner similar to the help 2011 champion Blake Griffin got from then-Los Angeles Clippers teammate Baron Davis [...] The New York Daily News reported Wednesday that the NBA is expected to make Lin part of the field for the Haier Shooting Stars competition during All-Star Saturday night, which would enable him to join Shumpert’s dunk routine as well. NBA commissioner David Stern told USA Today earlier this week that Lin will not be a special late addition to the annual Rising Stars game featuring rookies and second-year players All-Star Weekend.

Griffin is not defending his dunk title, but sources said that the annual dunk contest has a new format which will consist of only one round and in which the winner will be solely determined by fan vote. All four competitors in the 2012 dunk field are first-timers and will be formally announced later Thursday, sources said. Each entrant will get three dunks, with fan voting to open after the foursome completes their first dunks.

The new format for the competition – tweet your votes! – is an attempt by the NBA to get fans excited about the event, and though noble, it doesn’t change the fact that no marquee names are taking part in this year’s NBA Dunk Contest.

No offense, Jeremy Lin.

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  • SwissArmyKnife5

    One on One tournament single elimination winner gets 1 million dollars.

  • startown

    Williams from MN has explosive hops, only Blake Griffin or Lebron would hit his head on the rim conistently and Williams has been eye level on at least two dunks that I have seen

  • Kadavour

    too many of you are into names and not talent.

  • EJ

    Whoever gets help from Lin wins.

  • EJ

    Fan voting sucks

  • AQWORD

    Williams will win.

  • AQWORD

    LONG LIVE THE LIN !!

  • AQWORD

    I support SwissArmyKnife . 1 on 1 would be Sic as.

  • LaKid

    Lot of people are hatin’ on this lineup (I’ve seen idiots who know nothing about basketball posting on facebook and twitter all day saying Who,Who, Who and Who?) but I’m not mad at it. These are young fellas who have been throwing down some pretty nice dunks and clearly have some hops. I’ll take PG FTW with Budinger as the dark horse.

  • http://www.michaelcho.com M Cho

    1) Chase has got some hops. 2) where the hell is Jeremy Evans on this list?? 3) if Lin is assisting Shump and fans are voting…the bandwagon is gonna steamroll the votes.

  • bike

    Budinger should get the white vote majority if he can pull off his patented payroll tax cut dunk.

  • http://www.optimabbc.be Max

    I mean, I think they can all do better stuff than last years winner did.

  • Heals

    Bummed by the final list cause it lacks creativity and that wow factor. Shump and Williams can dunk, but can they Dunk-dunk? Chase is the white-hope and PGeo is in the JSmith mold, but I haven’t seen him do the in-game stuff that J-Smoove does. Here’s hoping I’m wrong…

  • Paul H

    @Kadavour, More often than not the names have talent.

  • http://nbasobrietystrike.blogspot.com/ CoolWhip

    They really need to have non-NBA participants get a shot. Either an amateur (ie. winner of the Sprite Dunk Contest), or the winner of the D-League Dunk Contest.
    People love underdog stories, isn’t that right Mr. Lin?

  • underdog

    Man, fan voting sucks. This means Shumpert is going to win because Lin is his lob-man. Imho George is the best in-game dunker in the lineup.

  • R. Deahn

    We’ve lost gorgeous George….

  • IAMORANGE4EVER

    Shump should have been invited to the Rising Stars Challenge based on his defensive ability alone, but at least he’ll get to shine in the dunk contest with Lin. When I think about it, the Knicks have been fortunate finding some nice young talent for their team of late, with the additions of Lin, Shump, and Jorts. Even J.R. Smith who can play 2 and 3 is only 26 years old. Bottom line, Knicks are loading up on young talent. I like it.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=542782613 The White Steve Smith

    Wheres Metta World Peace? This is a travesty. I wont be tuning in.

  • http://idunkonthem.blogspot.com albie1kenobi

    why didn’t they just get Lin as a participant? he’s gonna win even if he misses all the dunks.

  • http://idunkonthem.blogspot.com albie1kenobi

    but the rating (aka revenue) will be through the roof.

  • http://hibachi20.blogspot.com Moose

    Chase will win this.

  • D12FSU

    will rubio be assisting williams?

  • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCJwoEHRU_A&feature=related TheKid

    First of all Budinger has been in league the same amount of time,if not longer, than Paul George. AND Budinger used to be a WORLD CLASS volleyball play and if you know anything about sports, you’ll know volleyballers can jump out the gym…Shumpert can also get up. He has vids on youtube. I believe this will be a good contest besides the point of only being one round…SMGDH

  • Jose

    You know Jeremey Lin is going to win it with the Asian population/vote Behind him : just like Yao In every all-star game. . lol

  • http://www.nba.com VanCityBBall

    budinger? seriously??? id rather see a dunk contest with CP3, Steve Nash, Ricky Rubio and JJ Barea

  • Jerome

    Why not let fans pick the participants? Seems like there would be more viewers and all-important Tweets.

  • Eli

    ONE ROUND? With THAT cast of dunkers? wow. snoozefest. does anyone see the reasoning behind the new format? there used to be 8 dunkers and 3 rounds. now it’s down to 4 and 1.

  • Youngindy21

    So its safe to say that Paul George will be winning this contest. He is the only one worthy of being in the contest besides Derrick Williams.

  • Mike Jones

    Shumpert is the man in 2k12, can dunk over any one at any time and i expect the dunk contest to be no different.

  • hushabomb

    How about getting back to the old school. $100000 on the line. 8 players. 3 dunks per round. Winner take all.

  • http://www.nba.com VanCityBBall

    they spelled DeMar DeRozan wrong… 4 times

  • http://idunkonthem.blogspot.com/ albie1kenobi

    Lin’s gonna get no rest this all-star weekend.
    AWESOME for us fans.

  • Dma

    Jose you mad Latinos didn’t get a representative this year?

  • http://www.nba.com Red

    Yeah George SHOULD win it but won’t.

  • AQWORD

    They were going to use Brandon Jennings last year & hes a pretty wack dunka. Just the way it goes. Man up!

  • http://tempdog1 Tempest

    Shumpert’s got this! Dude can get up. Plus he’ll get a few billion votes from Jeremy Linn fans

  • Klemperer

    I guess in a lockout year everything is cut in half

  • http://blogspot.com LLC#12

    I dislike the guy, but I’d like to see Nick Young in a dunk contest..

  • Liam

    Lin will win this.

  • EJ

    @Klemperer, Kobe’s wife got half of the dunk contest too.

  • Myung

    Interesting that 3 of the 4 play on teams that had dunk contest winners before (JR Rider, Nate Robinson, and Fred Jones) so maybe they’ll pay homage to those guys like Josh Smith did with the Nique jersey in 2005. And even though Kenny Smith never won, he did compete as a Rocket so maybe Chase can pay homage to him. There’s so little creativity remaining that homage dunks are just about all that’s left.

  • Myung

    Oh, and 49th birthday, Michael Jordan. Not that I remember your birthday or anything. Or named my son Jordan. Or named my dog MJ. Or have all your DVD’s, books, 20+ pairs of Air Jordans, 2 of your replica jerseys, and a big painting of you in my house.

  • Myung

    “Happy” should’ve been in there somewhere.

  • Smecham

    I think Jeremy Evans would dunk circles around each of these guys… He just is in a small market with limited minuets…

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