Was Aaron Gordon robbed of the 2020 slam dunk contest during All-Star weekend? Perhaps, according to former Chicago Bulls star and six-time champion Scottie Pippen, who was one of the judges during the slam dunk contest.
Gordon participated in his third dunk contest as a pro, but came up short the previous two times, including the controversial 2016 contest when Zach LaVine edged the former Arizona Wildcat.
This season, Gordon displayed a number of impressive dunks, which included jumping over Chicago hip-hop artist "Chance the Rapper" and 7-foot-5-inch Celtics center Tacko Fall. The dunk over Fall was impromptu, because Gordon and Miami Heat guard Derrick Jones Jr. went into a dunk-off despite Gordon earning a perfect score (50) in the first four rounds.
Once Jones and Gordon traded dunks, the judge panel of Pippen, Dwyane Wade, Candace Parker, actor Chadwick Boseman and Chicago native Common, agreed to give the finalists the same score of 48, except Gordon received a 47.
Pippen went on ESPN's "The Jump" to explain why Gordon received the wrong score.
"We punched the scores in and they came up wrong ... We thought we were going to give them both a tie."—Scottie Pippen on scoring Aaron Gordon and Derrick Jones Jr.'s dunks pic.twitter.com/Cr1UVLeHNL
— ESPN (@espn) February 28, 2020
"There was a little bit of a pact, but somehow we punched the scores in and they came up wrong," Pippen said. "We just messed up ... and the reality of it is we thought we were giving them both a tie in the final round."
Pippen later added, "I tried to figure the numbers out and I didn't do real good in math."
Pippen scored a nine and once he discovered the numbers didn't add up to 48, he attempted to change his score to a 10, "but the machines locked us out and that was it."
"What are we doing, man? Who set the dunk contest up, who set this up? ... It’s a wrap. I feel like I should have two trophies. So it’s over for that," Gordon told the media after the dunk contest.
Despite coming up short in all three dunk contests, Gordon holds the record for the most perfect scores.
