All-Star Saturday odds: LaVine to dominate the dunk contest again
This weekend’s All-Star Saturday events in Toronto offer the usual mix of exciting young players, big names, and time-tested formats. This year, we’re handicapping all three events — the Taco Bells Skills Challenge, the Foot Locker Three-Point Contest, and the Verizon Slam Dunk — so you know who to watch closest. Read on for a look at the favorite, the contenders, and the dark horses.
[Follow Dunks Don’t Lie on Tumblr: The best slams from all of basketball]
Favorite
Zach LaVine: The Verizon Slam Dunk is LaVine’s to lose. The Minnesota Timberwolves guard’s performance in Brooklyn a year ago established him as the best contest dunker of his era, an aerial artist capable of showing off previously unseen dunks and reinvigorating familiar ones with his mix of style, grace, and power. A win would make LaVine the fourth back-to-back winner in dunk contest history (alongside Michael Jordan, Jason Richardson, and Nate Robinson), and it’s hard to see which of his three challengers is especially equipped to stop him from achieving it. It will also help that he’s far and away the most anticipated dunker of the night — it’s not as if there’s a true superstar people are more exciting to watch.
However, it’s not as if it’s impossible to imagine a scenario in which LaVine does not win. The most likely is that he tries very difficult dunks and only makes them on the fourth or fifth tries, if at all, thereby losing himself some points from the judges and taking some of the excitement out of his mere presence on the Air Canada Centre court. The other, less probable outcome is that LaVine was a one-year wonder who does not bring the same level of creativity and show-stopping style.
So, yeah, LaVine will probably need to miss some dunks.
Bovada line: -300
Keep an Eye On
Aaron Gordon: The second-year Orlando Magic forward is the least heralded of this year’s contestants, an active reserve better known as an in-game tip-dunker than an especially creative or agile finisher. That element of surprise could help him, because he can surprise the crowd and judges with skills that most just didn’t know he had. He also appears to have an old-school sense of style — check out the dunk that opens this video — that can carry retro appeal against the reheated jams of the past few competitions.
More than anything, though, it seems likely that anyone who beats LaVine will have to provide an alternative to the springy athleticism he has in abundance. The 6-foot-9 Gordon appears most likely to play that role.
Bovada line: +400
Andre Drummond: The lone All-Star in this year’s main show is the least contest-ready dunker of the bench. Only one center has ever won the dunk contest, and Dwight Howard did it with the sort of goofy prop work that the league has thankfully outgrown. Drummond will probably only win on the merits if everyone else collapses, in which case the story of the night will be calls to retire the event.
However, Drummond does have one option for a potential title-winning dunk. The Detroit Pistons big man can play off his status as one of the league’s top intentional foul targets with a joke setup. Perhaps he can jump over 10 young children dressed as Houston Rockets designated fouler K.J. McDaniels? The options are endless, just like the fouling itself.
Bovada odds: +850
The Field
Will Barton: Poor guy. The Denver Nuggets wing, a dual Sixth Man of the Year and Most Improved Player candidate, is the best in-game dunker of the group, a hyper-athletic player who gets to the basket in a myriad of ways. Unfortunately, his best dunks are almost certainly going to look like worse versions of whatever LaVine does, to the point where judges will probably dismiss his dunks as underwhelming even if he completes more of them than the defending champ. He could be the best dunker of all and still not make the finals. The optics are not on his side.
Bovada odds: +550
More NBA coverage:
– – – – – – –
Eric Freeman is a writer for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
