This is a pretty Knicks centric NBA All-Star weekend in Orlando this year. We can thank the resurgence of the franchise as well as Linsanity for the Knicks prominent role in the festivities.
Rising Stars Challenge (Friday 9 p.m est on TNT)
Jeremy Lin was a late addition to the player pool after the Commissioner of the game Kenny Smith (or realistically David Stern) allowed for an increase of the roster size from eight to ten players. Shaquille O’Neal selected Lin with the third overall pick and Landry Fields with the 21st pick for his squad which will face off against Charles Barkley’s team of rookies and sophomores. John Wall, last years MVP of the Rookie-Sophomore game was selected 12th out of 20 players and seemed pretty pissed off about it. I’m calling for a repeat MVP performances from the slighted Wall who has a more rounded roster to work with than Shaq’s stable of fantastic point-guards and Blake Griffin.
All-Star Saturday Night (Saturday, 8 p.m est on TNT)
Shooting Stars Competition
The Knicks will be well represented again on All-Star Saturday Night as Landry Fields will team with Alan Houston and the Liberty’s Cappie Pondexter during the Shooting Stars Competition. They will face off against a team from Atlanta, Texas and Orlando. The Atlanta team is by far the funniest, perennial Shooting Stars competitor Steve Smith returns as the Hawks alumni and will team with Lindsey Harding of the Atlanta dream and Jerry Stackhouse of the Atlanta Hawks! How Jerry Stackhouse snuck his way into an All-Star weekend competition is amazing, even if it was due to the injury to Joe Johnson, I can’t believe its real. Next thing you will tell me is that the Lakers signed Rasheed Wallace (wait a second).
Taco Bell Skills Competition
The best point guards in the league will once again face off in an obstacle course where they will have to show off their passing, shooting and dribbling skills. Kyrie Irving, Tony Parker, Rajon Rondo, John Wall,Russell Westbrook and Deron Williams will take part. I’m going with the crafty veteran Tony Parker with the upset win.
Foot Locker Three-Point Contest
Reining champion James Jones of the Miami Heat will defend his three-point contest championship against Ryan Anderson, Mario Chalmers, Kevin Love, Anthony Morrow and injury replacement Kevin Durant. The defending champion usually wins this thing, but I’m going with the Durantula who I’m pretty sure wouldn’t have entered if he didn’t plan on winning.
Sprite Slam Dunk Contest
Knicks rookie Iman Shumpert was supposed to be a participant in this years Slam Dunk but will have to miss the proceedings due to an injury. Shumpert had planned to include Landry Fields and Jeremy Lin into his big dunk attempt which would have included Fields wheeling out the couch Lin slept on at Fields apartment with Lin throwing the alley-oop to Shumpert from sitting on the couch. Shumpert was going to hop over the couch and do a windmill dunk and finish it by sitting on the couch next to Fields and Lin and drinking a Sprite. The dunk would have been voted on by the fans and Shumpert would have been a lock for the win. Instead we will be treated dunking escapades of Chase Budinger, Derrick Williams, Paul George and Jeremy Evans. Look for Evans to be your 2012 Slam Dunk Champion.
2012 All-Star Game (Sunday 8 p.m est on TNT)
Carmelo Anthony will be the lone representative for the Knicks in this years All-Star game as the Starting small-forward for the Eastern Conference as voted by the fans. The East’s roster is loaded, I’m feeling a blow-out over their Western contemporaries in a game that everyone will complain about and will garner little to no-interest as it goes up against the 83rd Annual Academy Awards!
O and here are Carmelo’s All-Star M8′s.
And here is Jeremy Lin’s very own Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream:
Which is less racist now that they have removed the Fortune Cookie Pieces and replaced them with waffle cookies (seriously, the world needs to lighten-up).
That will be all for STATandSTUFF till Monday, embraces the celebration of the Association this weekend people.
