Cyclical wrote:Yeah, I agree Dawkins was a jerk to do that but the minute Gerald put the sneakers on that table I thought to myself, what? This 21 year old bench player is going to put an autograph on his stinky sneakers and put them right in front of Dawkins?!? I can see how Darryl could be put off.
See, I didn't look at it that way. My thinking was that he'd plan to give them to a fan after he was done with his dunk. The shoes looked brand new to me. If you watch it again. Gerald places them on the judges' table at the end nearest to him. Dawkins just happened to be at the end of the table. And Green wasn't placing them down and then looking at him and saying anything to him directly. He's a nice guy, I believe. He even came over before that, earlier in the event, and gave the cupcake to one of the judges I think. I know he took it over to them afterwards. The camera angles were awful overall in the entire contest, so he might have just walked in their direction to show it to them and then took it with him off court.
I'll also like to say that I'm of the opinion that they need to have these players judged by their peers. That is to say, the NBA could've current players or current players that were in past slam dunk contests (last year Carter and Bryant were judges) be the judges. Stop asking these retired players to do it every year it seems. Sorry, Dominique... Further, Johnson indirectly raised an excellent point: three out of the judges aren't as he'd said
creative dunkers. So I think to myself: Why in the hell was Malone's indifferent ass there? Talk about pandering to the home state fans. I understand he was born in Louisiana. But, Malone as an unbiased or even credible judge???
