5 best dunkers of all time

The slam dunk is the highest percentage basketball shot. Moreover, it is a crowd-pleaser. Thus, the maneuver is often extracted from the basketball game and displayed in slam dunk contests such as the NBA Slam Dunk Contest held during the annual NBA All-Star Weekend.

While most NBA players can perform the dunk, there are some who added more to it to make it an art. Here are the 5 best dunkers of all time:

#5 Shawn Kemp

Before LeBron James, there was Shawn Kemp with his athletic, powerful, and unthinkably dominant dunks, that left defenders sprawling to the floor in search of their pride and dignity. The tandem of Kemp and Gary Payton reinvented the alley-oop dunk, they had no regard for mankind.

He relied on his athleticism to outrun and outjump his competition for show-stopping dunks, blocks, and easy put-backs.

While he never won a Slam Dunk Contest, the Reign Man participated for four years and missed a fifth due to injury, finishing in second place to Dee Brown in 1991. He was unstoppable with his eye on the rim. Alton Lister became famous after being stripped of his pride by Kemp.

#4 Dominique Wilkins

Dominique Wilkins,Atlanta Hawks — Dominique Wilkins, Atlanta Hawks

Dominique Wilkins threw down dunks in traffic that almost always ended with a windmill. He didn’t care if it was a close game or a blowout win. It was always showtime.

He was crowned NBA dunk contest champion in 1985 and 1990. In the 1988 dunk contest, he was narrowly defeated by Michael Jordan amid claims that Wilkins was given an abnormally low score for his breath-taking third dunk, a 45, which allowed Jordan to win it by 2 on the back of his perfect 50.

To this day, the allegations of "home cooking" still float around surrounding the event (it was held on Jordan's home court; one of the judges was former Chicago Bears star Gale Sayers; and another judge, former NBA star Tom Hawkins, is a Chicago native) and is considered arguably the most controversial of the slam dunk competitions ever.

#3 Michael Jordan

Air Jordan excelled in all aspects of scoring and always had jaw-dropping dunks that are still talked about today. Jordan won back-to-back NBA Slam Dunk Contest titles that included an epic duel with great dunker, Dominique Wilkins in 1988. Jordan scored a perfect 50 dunk from the free-throw line for his third dunk to win the contest.

He posterized top shot blockers and defenders with insane in-game dunks that had them think twice about trying to block his shots. His most notable dunk for me was the one where he exploded over hall of fame center Patrick Ewing of the New York Knicks.

#2 Vince Carter

Nicknames like “Half Man Half Amazing” and “Air Canada” don’t just come by without an exceptional reason. Vince Carter performed all sorts of dunks with power, flair and with career-ending intentions to whoever was being dunked on.

His performance in the 2000 NBA Slam Dunk Contest during the NBA All-Star festivities will forever be one of the greatest performances at the competition.

While on international duty with team USA in the 2000 Olympics, Carter displayed to the world the most inhumane dunk by exploding over 7ft 2in Frenchman Frédéric Weis.

#1 Julius Erving

You can’t mention the dunk without the godfather of the modern above-the-rim game. Dr J, as he is known, helped legitimize the American Basketball Association (ABA) and was the best-known player in that league when it merged with the National Basketball Association (NBA) after the 1975–76 season.

While in his younger years it was against regulation to dunk, it’s amazing how he was still able to wow crowds with the high-flying moves. The way Erving utilized the dunk was more as a high-percentage shot made at the end of maneuvers, generally starting well away from the basket and not necessarily as a "show of force" helped to make the shot an acceptable strategy, especially in trying to avoid a blocked shot.

Although he never won an NBA Slam Dunk contest, his in-game heroics filled arenas with fans dying to watch him finish at the rim with flair. He dunked over great shot blockers like Bill Walton and Michael Cooper just to mention a few.

Edited by Yash Matange