Chapter 123 Slam Dunk Contest
This year's All-Star Game is held in the gambling city of Dallas, which is also the city where the Mavericks are located.

When Zheng Yang appeared here, many local fans recognized him. Even some people who did not watch the NBA could recognize him because of Dallas' overwhelming publicity for Zheng Yang when they won the championship that year.

They all knew that this was the guy who helped their city win its first championship trophy.

Zheng Yang also continued to respond to their enthusiasm. The enthusiasm of these fans really touched him. If Zheng Yang still had something he missed about this city, it would only be this group of fans.

……

On the first day of this year's All-Star Weekend, Zheng Yang sat in the stands in a suit and tie, watching the group of young people playing below the stage. Jordan also appeared on the sidelines tonight, not far from Zheng Yang, but neither of them took the initiative to say hello.

After watching this group of young people play, Zheng Yang went to a nearby casino with Wade, Anthony and others to have fun that night.

Dallas is a famous gambling city. Although Zheng Yang has no interest in gambling, since this year's All-Star Weekend is held here and he has nothing to do, it would be nice to go out and have fun with Anthony and the others.

The three brothers stayed in the casino all night, and then walked out of the casino with gloomy faces at dawn.

All three brothers lost all their money, and not one of them won any money.

“I feel like I’m about to make a comeback!”

Anthony couldn't stop playing and kept muttering as he walked out the door.

Wade glanced at him.

"Last time I took you to a casino in Miami, you said the same thing..."

"That time is different from this time. This time I'm really going to flip over..."

"Come on Cameron, I've never seen you win..."

"Okay, stop arguing, let's go back to the hotel and get some sleep. I'm so sleepy! I have a slam dunk contest tonight!"

Zheng Yang interrupted their bickering with a yawn. The other two thought the same thing. Zheng Yang still had to participate in the dunk contest tonight. If he didn't get any rest, how could he jump up at night?

"By the way, Zheng, have you thought about your dunk moves for this year? Everyone has high expectations of you now. They all want to see you save the dunk contest!"

Wade asked curiously again. In fact, he was a little curious and wanted to know in advance what kind of dunking moves Zheng Yang would perform and whether there was anything original.

But Zheng Yang just smiled at him and kept it a secret!
"Hey, you'll know when you get tonight!"

……

This year's All-Star Challenge and Slam Dunk Contest are both star-studded.

In the skills challenge, the participating players include Chris Paul, Kobe, Wade and James.

These four are currently the core players of their respective teams. Except for Chris Paul who is still relatively unknown, the others are all star players in the league.

Therefore, this skills challenge has received more attention than in previous years.

The competition was quite intense. In the preliminary round, Kobe won first place, Wade ranked second, and James and Paul were eliminated.

In the final stage, Wade took the lead and passed all the stages in one go, while Kobe failed to pass the ball four times. In the end, Wade won the championship of this year's skills challenge.

Next was the three-point contest. There wasn’t much to say about it, after all, the contestants were not very famous, and no memorable stories happened in this contest.

The final championship was won by a player named Jason Capono. It is worth mentioning that in the original history, he was still the champion of the three-point contest next year.

After the skills challenge and the three-point contest, there was a short break and the most watched dunk contest of the year was held.

As mentioned before, this year's slam dunk contest is full of stars, and this star power mainly comes from the judges of this competition.

The rumors that were previously circulated were true. The judges of this year's dunk contest really included the God of Basketball Michael Jordan, "Peter Pan" Kobe, and "Demi-God" Vince Carter.

In addition, there are "Dr. J" Irving and "Human Highlight Film" Wilkins.

This group of judges is definitely the most valuable dunk contest judges in NBA history.

Of course, the players in the dunk contest are also very strong, including Nate Robinson, who is less than 1.8 meters tall.
This guy has won the Slam Dunk Contest three times in total.

He won the Slam Dunk Contest for the first time last year and this year is his journey to defend the title, but according to the original history, he would eventually lose to Gerald Green.

Gerald Green is the player who dunked blindfolded after leaping over Robinson in the dunk contest.

Of course, his blindfolded dunk is not the same as the "blindfolded dunk" by Celtics player Brown this year. One is done by blindfolding during the jump, and the other is done by waiting until after the dunk to remember his action and the blindfolding.

Another player is Howard, who also participated in this year's slam dunk contest, but he will win the championship next year. By then, he will wear his Superman suit and win the championship, becoming the tallest dunker in NBA history.

Needless to say, the last contestant is Zheng Yang.

After the host introduced them, the competition began immediately.

The NBA Slam Dunk Contest is divided into two rounds. In the preliminary round, each player needs to show two dunks of his own. The two players with the highest scores in the two rounds will enter the finals, and the other two will be eliminated.

The first player to appear today is Gerald Green of the Celtics.

This guy stood in the right corner with the Celtics' core player Pierce. Pierce ran in along the baseline and smashed the ball towards the side of the basket, and Green followed up from behind.

After catching the rebounding ball, he jumped high and made a pulling rod motion, then slammed the ball into the basket.

The move was quite entertaining to watch, and it was completed in one go, so the five judges gave it a high score of 48 points.

The second person to take the court was Dwight Howard, a center who came to participate in the dunk contest... Before the game started, many people were optimistic about him.

However, this guy's first dunk was a bit mediocre. It was a windmill dunk. Although it was a bit difficult, this difficulty was nothing to the five judges in the audience. In addition, there was no innovation in the move, so he only got 43 points in the end.

It is worth mentioning that the current Howard is different from what everyone remembers. He now has a bald head and looks ferocious.

Then it was Nate Robinson's turn to come on stage. This guy was able to win the Slam Dunk Contest with his height. It can be said that except for his height, his physical talents in other areas are maxed out.

The move he chose was a one-handed slam dunk, although due to his jumping limitations, the move was not very beautiful.

But being able to complete it was beyond everyone's expectations, so he also got a score of 45 points.

The last person to appear was Zheng Yang. When he greeted everyone on the sidelines, the audience gave him a round of applause. Most people watched this game just to see Zheng Yang's dunk.

This guy always gives people something unexpected. I wonder if he can surprise everyone again this time.

After Zheng Yang greeted them, he asked Anthony to hold the basketball high one step away from the free throw line. The latter had just been informed of this. Worried that he would ruin Zheng Yang's performance, he repeatedly asked, "Is it okay to hold it so high?"
Zheng Yang patted his shoulder and said, "Relax, Cameron. Just keep your hands here and don't move."

Then Zheng Yang took a few steps back, then stopped and waved to the audience on the sidelines, signaling them to give more applause.

Everyone cheered in a very respectful manner. Jordan, who was sitting on the judges' bench, looked at him with a bit of indifference. He was just a guy who liked to attract attention...

Zheng Yang didn't pause for too long. After adjusting his condition, he strode towards the free throw line.

After jumping sideways at the free throw line, Zheng Yang grabbed the basketball in Melo's hand with his right hand, while spinning upwards, and finally dunked the basketball in his hand into the basket when his body was aimed at the basket again.

This move was extremely difficult, innovative, and very entertaining to watch, which immediately drew cheers from the crowd.

The fans who brought their own signs to the sidelines immediately showed "10" to the camera to show that they were very satisfied with the action.

"OMG! Is this a move a human can do? He seemed to be flying in the sky just now...

Is that Chinese Kong fu? "

Barkley in the studio had a look of shock on his face. Although his expression was exaggerated for some show effect, it was enough to show his surprise at the moment.

It is not easy to amaze everyone in a dunk contest, because it requires the moves you perform to be difficult and innovative, and the visual effects must be maximized to meet people's inner fantasies.

And Zheng Yang’s action just now fully meets the above points.

I won’t talk much about the difficulty and innovation, just look at the visual effect... Zheng Yang’s body shape itself looks very comfortable, neither thin nor fat.

His facial features are still strong, so when he dunks, it gives people a feeling of explosion and also gives people the feeling of a handsome young man.

The visual effect is fully maximized!

Several judges nodded in response. In the end, except for Jordan who scored 9 points, the other four gave high scores of 10 points, for a total of 49 points.

Seeing this score, Zheng Yang excitedly bumped his chest with Anthony to celebrate.

In the second round of the preliminaries, Gerald Green chose to jump over Robinson with his legs apart, then blindfolded himself with one hand and dunked the ball.

This move helped him get a high score of 47 points, and he should have no problem getting into the top two.

Howard jumped and then stuck his head to his own head. Although this move was a bit innovative, it was of average difficulty, so he only got 42 points.

As for Nate Robinson, he also scored 45 points in the second round. In the past, he should have no problem advancing with this score, but today with Zheng Yang and Gerald Green, whether he can advance depends on whether his score can be higher than Zheng Yang.

Zheng Yang's second dunk today was a jump from the free throw line, with a spin slam dunk. Unlike the previous jump with a sideways step, this time Zheng Yang jumped on one foot facing the basket.

This action is much more difficult than jumping from the free throw line. After all, jumping from such a long distance from the basket and rotating at the same time requires very strong jumping ability and core strength of the player.

In previous practice, Zheng Yang’s success rate for this action was not high, but today he was in good shape and had good luck, so he completed it in one go.

A 10-point sign was also put up on the sidelines to cheer for Zheng Yang.

After several referees glanced at each other, in the end only Jordan scored 9 points, while the others all scored 10 points.

The total score of the two rounds was 98 points, the highest in the game, and Zheng Yang successfully advanced to the next round.

Joining him in the group is Gerard Green.

After a short break, today's final officially began.

In the first round of the finals, Pierce threw the ball high from behind the backboard, Green jumped into the air, caught the ball with both hands, slid for a distance and then dunked it into the basket.

However, the movements were not very innovative and somewhat aesthetically tiring, so it only received 41 points.

The camera turned, and everyone's eyes were on Zheng Yang. Everyone wanted to know what Zheng Yang's third dunk would be today.

Zheng Yang's third move was a 720-degree rotation dunk under the basket.

This move was demonstrated by streetball player Ford Knight in a street game in 06, and immediately attracted countless people to imitate it.

But there are only a few who succeed.

After all, this move is too difficult. Rotating 720° on the spot can make people feel dizzy, let alone rotating while dunking?
But Zheng Yang still chose this move as his third dunk.

In the first attempt, the basketball hit the rim and failed to be dunked, but Zheng Yang successfully dunked it the second time, lighting up the court again.

The other four judges on the panel gave full marks without any hesitation, and Michael Jordan also gave full marks after hesitating for a moment.

After all, this move is extremely difficult. Although Zheng Yang took two attempts to succeed, its merits outweigh its flaws, and it is still a perfect move.

If he still scores 9 points under this circumstance, he will probably have another black spot on his body.

Zheng Yang's full score put tremendous psychological pressure on Gerald Green. After adjusting his mentality, he started his final dunk.

This time he placed a large box under the basket and then slammed the ball into the basket with a windmill dunk, which gave him a score of 46 points.

In fact, in the original world, Gerald Green got full marks for this move, but because Zheng Yang's performance in the previous few times was so good, the tastes of several judges were spoiled.

In this case, Gerald Green's action seemed somewhat mediocre.

Everyone's attention was once again focused on Zheng Yang. After Zheng Yang came on the court and took a look around, he finally pulled Shaquille O'Neal from the sidelines and asked him to raise the ball over his head under the basket.

Everyone was stunned by his move, and Barkley was even stunned.

“Is Zheng preparing to leap over Shaq?

That guy is 7 feet 1 inch tall. Does he really want to fly over this mountain?
This really does sound like a mission impossible!"

(End of this chapter)