The Difference Between 1985 Dunk Contest Participants And 2022 Dunk Contest Participants: From Michael Jordan, Julius Erving, And Dominique Wilkins To Jalen Green And Juan Toscano-Anderson

With All-Star weekend on the horizon, fans are very excited about all the events that take place. One of the most popular events at All-Star weekend is the Dunk Contest. Each year, some of the best young dunkers of the NBA are pitted against each other to crown the NBA's dunk champion.

This year's lineup features a lot of young stars, as Jalen Green, Cole Anthony, Juan Toscano-Anderson, and Obi Toppin will compete against each other for the prize. This young lineup, as pointed out by Slam Studios, is a stark contrast to the 1985 NBA Dunk Contest lineup.

In 1985, the NBA Dunk Contest featured some absolute legends in the making. The field included Michael Jordan, Julius Erving, Dominique Wilkins, Clyde Drexler, Darrell Griffith, Larry Nance, Terence Stansbury, and Orlando Woolridge. Clearly, the difference between the field today and from 37 years ago is quite different.

NBA fans reacted to the difference between the two dunk contest lineups. Most fans pointed out how different these lineups are in hindsight. But there were other fans who quickly defended the younger players, noting that the players in the 85 Dunk Contest were also in the same place that these young players are now.

LeBron the reason star players stopped being in it

NBA fans so damn self entitled omg

The dunk contest seems worse bc people don’t actually watch the games anymore, they just go on HoH & look at stat sheets on google lol

Hating for no reason

Why this years one getting so much hate

Its better than last year

i fw the contestants i think it going to be good

Bro tosca had 1 dunk against javale and they put him in the dunk contest

These are good contestants, questioning JTA though

Green?! I'm done bro 😂

Ate it’s better than last year tho

Stars ≠ Good Dunkers

LeBum just don't want to lose and get embarrassed he should have participated in one by now since he's supposed to be the king of nothing and that's another reason why he doesn't take the last shot he doesn't want to be in a paper for losing the game and that's another reason why they're putting all the blame on Westbrook can't stand LeBum and he's never going to win another title or ever be the 🐐 in my eyes😂😂😂😂 he's done

The dunk contests haven’t been the same since 2016

Dunk contest keep taking L’s

LeBron isn’t a creative dunker…. He just jumps high. He wouldn’t have given the event anything other than his name

Lets go home! Lets go home! 😂😂

Dunk contest needs more star power

Who cares if they all stars, it’s about the quality of dunks.

In all fairness, Michael Jordan, Dominique Wilkins, and Clyde Drexler were very young stars are the time, and there was no guarantee with regards to their star power. That could be the case for players like Jalen Green and Cole Anthony, who have been considered future stars in the NBA.

In fact, fans must remember that both Zach LaVine and Aaron Gordon, who put on one of the best dunk contests of all time at 2016 All-Star weekend, were very young players at the time, and didn't have notoriety. Perhaps this dunk contest could be the launching point for these players going forward.