NBA forced Blake Griffin to jump over Kia at 2011 Dunk Contest
By Tom West
Los Angeles Clippers forward Blake Griffin has revealed that he wanted to dunk over the entire length of a convertible in the 2011 Dunk Contest. But the NBA made him dunk over a Kia instead.
Blake Griffin has been one of the NBA’s premier dunkers since his rookie season with the Los Angeles Clippers in 2010-11. In fact, besides how he matches up against any other player right now, he’s one of the most athletic big men we’ve ever seen. So, when he got a chance to showcase that skill set and remarkable explosiveness in the flashy setting of the 2011 Dunk Contest, basketball fans everywhere were excited.
When he won the contest by simply jumping over the hood of a Kia Optima, though, he received his fare share of criticism. Sure, the presentation was great, but for someone who can take flight like Griffin, it was obvious he could have cleared something far higher than the hood of a dull family car.
However, as Griffin said on Barstool Sports’ Pardon My Take podcast, his plans for the contest were rather different, and would have involved a convertible if he had his own way:
"“I wanted to jump over a convertible, but I wasn’t allowed to. It had to be a Kia Optima. I wanted to have Baron Davis and some of my teammates roll out in a convertible, and then just toss it straight up and jump over the whole thing, instead of just the hood.I don’t know if you guys have stood next to a Kia Optima, but it’s a pretty tall vehicle, and there’s no way I was going to make it over the entire thing, over Baron Davis in the sunroof. So I opted for the hood, and then everyone was pissed that I jumped over the hood, like, ‘that was super easy,’ so it was just a lose-lose situation for me.”"
It’s safe to say that leaping over the entire length of a convertible, featuring some Clippers teammates inside, would have been a far better spectacle. Both in terms of athleticism and showmanship, it would have displayed Griffin’s talent in a manner that should have kept away such criticism.
Here’s the dunk itself if you want a reminder:
Of course, it was a move driven (sorry for the pun) by marketing for the NBA to make Griffin use the Kia. As such a major partner of the league, it’s unsurprising they wanted him to use one of their cars. To force Griffin into this, though, rather than letting him choose how to do his own dunk in his own Dunk Contest performance, is unfair.
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At least now we know why Griffin ended the contest that way. Sadly, we don’t have a YouTube video to immortalize him dunking over a convertible instead.