Please Don't Fake the Funk on a Nasty Dunk, I Don't Think My Heart Can Take It.

Yay dunk contest! It's this thing that happens during all-star weekend that used to be awesome, and is now just alright, but we still watch it because we replay J.R. Rider (yeah I called him J.R.) doing the East Bay Funk in our heads over and over ad nauseum, praying that someone will do something sweet and not wack or boring. Participating in the contest are the incumbent Gerald Green, Rudy Gay, Dwight Howard (Jesus Christ), and Jamario Moon, the lone rookie in the event.

Rudy Gay's been coming strong with his campaign; he's been all over YouTube having fans post suggestions for his dunks, and there's a bunch of them out there. Some are trash, some are GREAT, but we've seen a lot of acrobatics from him, and he has managed to make Luis Scola look less sexy, which is hardly a simple feat.

Dwight's been pretty quiet; he claims he's got some "tricks up his sleeve" and he did make a surprisingly unfunny campaign video, but we saw the highly underrated sticker dunk, we saw the kiss the rim dunk in practice, so we know what he's capable of, and there's been speculation about him raising the freaking hoop to dunk on a 12 footer (the NBA wouldn't let him last year).

Jamario Moon's sort of the wild card in this since he's the only rookie, but people are abuzz about him, and many have picked him to win. He's got a very natural, effortless looking flight, and his campaign video is my favorite out of all of them. Plus he was a freaking Globetrotter, and those dudes dunk terduckens while jumping over hookers snorting coke off of Meadowlark Lemon's chest; they're ready for anything.

Lastly but certainly not least, returning champ Gerald Green, is ready to make people remember why he won it last year. He's even responded to Rudy Gay's request for dunk ideas with a sick one of his own. I like Gerald Green because he's been pretty much invisible (12 mins a game?!) all year, and so far I haven't heard anyone say they think he'll win, even though he's the champ. Usually guys hear things like that and get mad and do crazy things, not Rae Carruth crazy, but crazy enough to win.

What's pretty fresh about this year is that in the Final Round, the fans will be able to vote on each finalist's 2 dunks, and that score will be combined with the judges' votes to determine the winner. Usually I'm against fans voting for anything, but in this case it's ok; dunks are pretty universal and people will vote for who they like. Right now, there's not a clear favorite to me, you have Rudy Gay, the cocky jock who doesn't even have to think up his own dunks, Dwight Howard, the clean cut straight man who will be victorious when the crowd starts playing little hand drums in rhythm, Jamario Moon, the mysterious bad boy with an attitude and a cold stare, and Gerald Green, the former champion that knows it's still his game to win, but can't stop grasping at the past. Oh my God do you see what I just did there? Somebody get John Hughes on the phone right now, It's a hit!

So who wins it? I personally like Dwight Howard, because it's hard to vote against the Messiah, but I digress. Now you can all thank me for forcing you to do YouTube searches for Harold Miner dunks!