NBA All-Star weekend is upon us, and while the midseason event isn’t as iconic as it once was, we still hope to see some amazing things come from it. One thing we didn’t see is Ja Morant doing some crazy midair acrobatics for the NBA dunk contest.
Ja Doesn’t Do Dunk Contests
Ja Morant told the media he would not be participating in the dunk contest … something we already knew from before. But Morant is arguably basketball’s most electrifying skywalker, and you can’t help but ask if he’d be blessing us with his air supremacy, but Morant isn’t budging.
This is stemming from the 2021 dunk contest that featured Cassius Stanley, Obi Toppin, and Anfernee Simons, and it was very underwhelming, to say the least. Ja’s issue though is that when there were some good rim rattlers, the judges were very conservative with their grades.
Cassius Stanley performed a between-the-legs dunk while walking in midair, and it was absolutely stunning. He did this in the first round and only got a measly 44 from the judges.
Following the literally underrated dunk, Bleacher Report’s Taylor Rooks tweeted out “The dunk contest scoring is literally never right.”
To which Ja replied, “Yeahhhh reason I’m not doing it.”
It looks like he’s holding firm on his promise.
The Ja Threat Is Nil
I bet the likes of Yutu Watanabe, Jalen Smith, and plenty of other Morant poster victims can breathe a sigh of relief hearing that from Ja.
Morant is currently averaging 27.3 ppg while shooting 46 percent from the field. He’s also adding eight assists per game, six rebounds per game, and he’s definitely putting up MVP-caliber stats. He’s doing all of this while leading the Memphis Grizzlies to a 35-22 record, and the second place in the Western Conference standings as well.
In just four years at the helm of this Memphis Grizzlies team, Morant is already a top 10 player in the league. We’re only lucky that we’re treated to his dunks and posters that he’s done in the game.
But there are debates as to whether Morant is even the NBA’s best dunker right now. Many fans love to dream about a potential dunk-off between Ja, Zion Williamson, Zach Lavine, and Aaron Gordon. That is basically your Mount Rushmore of current NBA slammers.
After newly acquired Sixers guard Mac McClung completely dominated Saturday’s dunk contest, Ja Morant might be old news, at least until he catches another body on national television.
Regardless of that, McClung is the dunk contest king right now, and if Ja wants his title back he might have to step into the arena with McClung and others.
Maybe, just maybe, this showing from McClung and the number of high grades these dunks received over the course of the contest will be enough to satisfy the likes of Morant, and, hopefully, lure him back into the contest. McClung already agreed to come back to the dunk contest next year if available, so Ja might already have a good opponent lined up and should participate.
After McClung won the dunk contest, Reggie Miller said “Somewhere Ja Morant is saying ‘hold my beer.’”
Hopefully, Reggie is right.
