Not everyone in Gainsbridge Fieldhouse for the NBA’s 2024 Slam Dunk Contest at All-Star Week’s Friday night festivities was feeling star Boston Celtics forward Jaylen Brown‘s dunks. But then, most Indiana Pacers fans are a bit biased against the Celtics star on a normal basis, so we see little reason why that would change in a dunk contest.
But Brown got solid grades in an article by ESPN’s Kevin Pelton, who gave the Boston forward a B+ grade for his solid dunk package put on display in the contest. “The judging panel seemed more enamored of Brown’s dunks than outside observers were,” writes Pelton.
“He reached the finals with a dunk which saw him take a lob from teammate Jayson Tatum and jump over a sitting Kai Cenat … in … a tribute to Dee Brown, who won the 1991 dunk contest for the … Celtics.”
Celtics Lab 141: Breaking down the good, bad, and irretrievably broken of All-Star Week with Clemente Almanza https://t.co/1p4SPh5j59 pic.twitter.com/htIsVR2fBK
— The Celtics Wire (@TheCelticsWire) February 19, 2024
“Alas, Brown’s effort to cover his eyes as Dee Brown famously did on his final dunk came only after the ball had gone through the net,” says Pelton. “A couple of Brown’s dunks … were the kind occasionally seen during game action.”
“Brown did stir emotions with the latter dunk by paying tribute to the late Terrence Clarke, a Kentucky star who died in a car accident while preparing for the 2021 draft,” remembers the ESPN analyst, who notes that Brown has called Clarke, a Boston native, his “little brother'”
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