Blake Griffin's Dunk Was a Dunk and it Made Kevin Durant Run For Cover Later in the Game
By now we have all seen Blake Griffin’s dunk on Kendrick Perkins about 80 times each. It was amazing. Griffin served Perk a Mozgov Cocktail of Embarrassment. As quickly as Twitter and the Staples Center blew up, people started to hate on the dunk. People are still saying it “wasn’t that good.” That’s fine because everyone is entitled to an opinion being wrong. My favorite argument against the dunk of the year is that it wasn’t actually a dunk. I have to say, that is some mighty impressive trolling.
Instead of just calling those people dumb trolls who are hating with sole intention of hating and trolling, I’ll simply point everyone to Merriam-Webster’s definition of a slam dunk – or “dunk shot.” And I quote:
“a shot in basketball made by jumping high into the air and throwing the ball down through the basket.”
What exactly are people arguing? That Griffin jumped high? It certainly looks like he jumped high. Or are people trying to argue that he didn’t throw the ball down through the basket? I’ll wait for your answer. While I’m waiting, let’s talk about Griffin’s final dunk of the night and how Kevin Durant saved himself from an experience similar to that of Kendrick Perkins.
This time Griffin does a pick and roll with Mo Williams and again gets the ball on a nice bounce pass. As Griffin takes off and cocks the ball behind his head, watch Kevin Durant. He runs away. He got the Hell out of Lob City. In Durant’s defense (of a lack of defense) he’s a slender 235 pounds while Kendrick Perkins is a solid 270. If Griffin could do that to Perkins, Durant could have been seriously injured by getting in the way of Blake. Durant had 36 points and 13 assists last night. He made a split-second decision that he didn’t need to add a chalk outline to that stat line.
Because of the sheer awesomeness of Griffin’s Mozgov-ing of Kendrick Perkins, you can’t even find a high quality video of his 4th quarter slam on YouTube. The Internet was still buzzing about Griffin’s previous dunk to even notice the beauty and power of the dunk that put the Clippers in triple-digits. Luckily, Getty has this gorgeous image of the dunk. I’ve included the biggest version I could download so you can feel free to blow it up and look at the reaction of every player on the court.
Update: I’ve seen some people argue that it wasn’t a dunk because Griffin didn’t touch the rim. He did. Next argument? Wasn’t a dunk because his jersey was white.
[Getty]