Definitive Dunks: What are your favorite NBA dunks of all time?
By Ian Levy
The slam dunk is the defining art-form of the NBA. We need your help building the definitive list of the greatest dunks in NBA history.
It can be beautiful or violent, unexpected and delicate, or as thunderous as an approaching freight train. The dunk captures our imaginations unlike any other play on the basketball court, perhaps because, for most of us, it is unreachable. Anyone can make a three-pointer, not everyone can leap and reach high enough to bring the ball above the rim.
Scores of revolutionary dunkers and countless individual dunks have become lodged in our collective memory. Shawn Kemp ending Alton Lister. Dr. J rocking the cradle. Michael Jordan putting Patrick Ewing on a poster. Over the next few weeks, here at FanSided, we mean to sift through them all and establish a list of the Definitive Dunks — the greatest dunks in NBA history. The first step is collecting as many dunks as possible which will be submitted to our panel of notable basketball expects (which includes both dunkers and wish-I-could-dunk-ers) to be ranked.
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Our panel:
Marquese Chriss (@Quese_22): Rookie forward for the Phoenix Suns, prolific dunker
Brent Barry (@barryathree): 15-year NBA player, commentator for NBA on TNT, studio host of NBA Gametime, 1996 NBA Slam Dunk Contest Champion
Ben Golliver (@BenGolliver): NBA Staff writer for Sports Illustrated.com
Jim Cavan (@JPCavan): Editor-in-chief of FanSided.com
Ian Levy (@HickoryHigh): Senior NBA Editor for FanSided.com
Josh Hill (@jdavhill): Editor for FanSided.com
Scott Rafferty (@crabdribbles): Editor for FanSided’s Hardwood Paroxysm
Matt Cianfrone (@Matt_Cianfrone): Editor for FanSided’s Friendly Bounce
Chris Reichert (@Chris_Reichert): Editor for FanSided’s Upside and Motor
Jared Dubin (@JADubin): Contributing editor to Hardwood Paroxysm, prolific NBA freelancer
To get this started, we need your help. We all have our favorite dunks. Chances are, many of you have favorites that we have either forgotten or never seen before. We want our panel to have as robust a collection of dunks to rank as possible and so we encourage you to submit your favorites. You can use the form below to submit your favorites, or send them to us on Twitter @HickoryHigh or @FanSided. Just a reminder that we are considering the dunk contest to be a separate category and are looking for in-game dunks only.
We will be collecting submissions for the next week and then giving our panel some time to review and rank. If everything goes according to plan, we will begin rolling out the results on Monday, September 12.