Article:When a Dunk is Not a Dunk

Am I the only one who saw that Dwight Howard's Superman dunk was not a dunk? Clearly he threw the ball through the rim. Why don't the judges get the benefit of seeing an instant replay before scoring it. Not that the dunk contest is that big a deal, but clearly something has to be done.

Is it just me or has some of the luster on Dwayne Wade worn off. He's at his lowest scoring output since his rookie season. The biggest reason seems to be that he is getting to the free throw line less then he has in the past. I know that he has little help, reminds me of Paul Pierce in Boston the last few years, but have some of his injuries robbed him of some of his explosiveness? Will he return to being the player he was 2 years ago?

Finalists for the hall of fame were announced friday. Of those waiting for enshrinement I would say that Pat Riley and Hakeem Olajuwon are easy choices. Dennis Johnson and Patrick Ewing are on the cusp but probably just over the line. Ewing was all NBA 1st team only once and was the 3rd or 4th best center in the game for most of his playing career. Hakeem, Shaq, and David Robinson arguably were better players. His finesse game was never what I envisioned he'd be after watching him at Georgetown. Instead of a monster defensive presence he had that borderline travel move in the lane that became his pet shot. New York only seemed to be a threat to win the title when Jordan left for baseball. In the finals against Houston, Hakeem outplayed Ewing and took home the title. So I see his eventual enshrinement as an accumulation of hr, rbi's, and runs scored on good but not great teams if you get my analogy.

Phoenix is just about the worst rebounding team in basketball and acquired Shaq to be that inside scoring and rebounding presence that they have sorely missed for sometime. The  only problem is that Shaq Fu's rebounding rate and ability to block shots has fallen to almost pedestrian levels in the past couple of years. It will be interesting to see if Shaq can get healthy enough and change his game to a more defensive oriented one.