Spud Webb remembers getting on the bus after winning the slam dunk contest during NBA All-Star weekend 35 years ago and being offered a quick piece of advice from Doc Rivers, one of his Atlanta Hawks teammates at the time.
The message: Your life just changed forever.
"He wasn't joking," Webb said. "Everywhere I go, even today, people are talking about it."
That's what happens when someone who's 5-foot-7 - a height that was perhaps generously listed - captures imaginations by winning the dunk contest, which was just in its third year. Webb returns to the dunk contest this weekend in Atlanta as one of the judges, when first-time competitors Anfernee Simons of the Portland Trail Blazers, Cassius Stanley of the Indiana Pacers and Obi Toppin of the New York Knicks will face off for the title.
With the general public not allowed to attend All-Star festivities this year due to COVID-19 concerns, the schedule has been compressed by moving the competitions typically held on Saturday night to Sunday. The skills challenge and 3-point contest are set for 6:30 p.m., with the dunk contest at halftime of the 8 p.m. main event between Team Durant and Team LeBron. TBS and TNT will televise it all.
Simons, Stanley and Toppin are not big NBA names yet, but that might be about to change.
"Hopefully, these guys put on a show for everybody and leave them talking," Webb said. "I guess that's really what it's all about. If people don't believe in you, then you can go out and prove that you are one of the best dunkers in the NBA."
He knows a little something about that.
Webb was an NBA point guard from 1985 to 1997, averaging 9.9 points and 5.3 assists in a career that included two stints with the Hawks and time with the Minnesota Timberwolves, Orlando Magic and Sacramento Kings.
He won his dunk title in Dallas, his hometown, where the NBA rookie had to beat Hawks teammate Dominique Wilkins to get the trophy. Even now, the 57-year-old Webb sees his win as the ultimate underdog moment because he still insists the 6-foot-9 Wilkins is the best dunker of all time. A nine-time All-Star who was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2006, Wilkins won the dunk contest in 1985 and again in 1990.
On Feb. 8, 1986, though, Webb stood tall.
"There were only 20,000 people in Reunion Arena," Webb said. "I've had 100,000 people in Dallas tell me they were there."
That will be a tough claim for someone to make this year. Only about 1,500 guests - mostly vaccinated health-care workers on the front lines of the pandemic - have been invited to watch Sunday's events at State Farm Arena.
The dunk contest will be a two-round event. The three competitors will perform two dunks each in the first round, and then the two with the highest combined score from those will get one dunk each to decide the champion. Those final dunks won't get a score; the winner will be determined as the judges raise cards that have the dunker's name on it.
"I was going to try and do stuff that hasn't been done yet in the dunk contest," said Toppin, who led major college basketball with 107 dunks last season at Dayton. "But I've seen a lot of great dunks, so I might have to bring out one of the old dunks that someone did."
Webb - part of a five-judge panel this year, all of them former dunk contest champions - isn't opposed to that approach. He'll be joined by Wilkins, Dee Brown (1991 winner), Jason Richardson (2002, 2003) and Josh Smith (2005) - another former Hawk - to choose this year's champ.
"I think even if they repeat a dunk, it depends on the artistic and creative parts of it," Webb said. "I like the power dunks. I'm just excited to see what these guys are going to do."