In the NBA, it was all star weekend:

On Saturday night, we got to see the always anticipated Sprite Slam Dunk Challenge.  There has been some criticism of this contest in year’s past for (A) having too many props, and (B) for not having stars like LeBron and Kobe participate.  It’s usually the young guns of the NBA showing what they can do, except… nobody’s really heard of them.  Last year, Blake Griffin jumped over a car to win the dunk contest — could someone top him this year?  This year’s participants:  Chase Budinger from Houston, Jeremy Evans from Utah, Paul George from Indiana, and Derrick Williams from Minnesota.  The Knicks’ Iman Shuppert was supposed to participate with Jeremy Lin throwing him the ball (with a prop of Lin sleeping on a coach and lobbing it up) but  Shuppert was injured and couldn’t be involved.  As for the actual contenders, they didn’t do anything THAT special — a lot of rehashed stuff.  The dunk of the night was Jeremy Evans taking a lob of not one but 2 BASKETBALLS from seated teammate Gordon Heyward.  Evans legitimately jumped over him, and dunked both balls. Truly amazing.  And with that dunk, the replacement slot (Evans) won the dunk contest.

Then, on Sunday, it was time for the actual all-star game.  It was LeBron/Dwight Howard/Dwayne Wade and the East vs. a starting 5 that featured 4 all-stars that all play in Los Angeles (Kobe, Bynum, Griffin, Paul — with Durant rounding out that line-up).  Remember, this game features absolutely NO defense until, perhaps, the last 3 minutes of the game.  The East soared out to a huge lead, getting a number of monster jams from LeBron.  But, in the second half, the West would come striking back between some incredible play from Kobe Bryant (now the all-time leading total points champ in NBA All-Star history), and some beautiful tandem play from Clippers teammates Chris Paul and Blake Griffin.  It all came down to the final play, and with 2 seconds left, LeBron tried to throw a cross court pass that was picked off by Blake Griffin.  He was fouled with 1.1 seconds left.  The East, down 3, would get one more chance.  Dwayne Wade got the 3-point shot off, but it wouldn’t go, and the West All-Stars won the game.  LeBron and Durant led both teams, each with 36 points.  West 152, East 149.

Finally, in some other NBA news, it looks like another person is apologizing for an accidentally offensive move surrounding Jeremy Lin’s “Lin”Sanity.  This time… it was Ben & Jerry’s ice cream.  In Massachusetts, Ben & Jerry’s began selling a flavor called “Taste The Lin-Sanity”.  That sounds harmless enough, and the move was only meant to honor the Harvard graduate’s accomplishments.  Ben & Jerry’s probably shouldn’t have added one simple detail though:  they put pieces of fortune cookies inside the ice cream.  And that definitely could be construed as offensive to a number of people.   Basically, in all issues surrounding Jeremy Lin’s stardom, you’re safe unless you include any Asian stereotypes.