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Brian WindhorstFeb 26, 2026, 06:16 AM<\/p>\n
Close<\/a>ESPN.com NBA writer since 2010 Multiple Authors<\/p>\n Suns<\/a> owner Mat Ishbia wants more star players participating in All-Star Weekend events when Phoenix hosts the midseason showcase next year.<\/p>\n To help, Ishbia has offered to pay a $1 million prize to the winners of the 2027 slam dunk and 3-point contests, with another $1 million going to charity in each event.<\/p>\n Editor’s Picks 1 Related<\/p>\n “Let’s get the best guys in,” Ishbia said Wednesday on “The Pat McAfee Show,” where he unveiled the idea. “Let’s make it awesome.”<\/p>\n The concept, however, would run into some red tape.<\/p>\n Officials from the NBA league office and players’ union told ESPN such a prize would not conform with the existing bonus structure.<\/p>\n Ishbia did not consult the league office before making the offer, sources said. But he is motivated to find a way to get more stars into the events.<\/p>\n The last time a current All-Star won the dunk contest was Blake Griffin in 2011. The Miami Heat<\/a>‘s Keshad Johnson<\/a> won this year’s event in Los Angeles. Damian Lillard<\/a>, a nine-time All-Star, won his third 3-point contest<\/a> in the past four years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brian WindhorstFeb 26, 2026, 06:16 AM CloseESPN.com NBA writer since 2010 Covered Cleveland Cavs for seven years Author…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":490467,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[355,99],"class_list":["post-490466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=490466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490466\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/490467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=490466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=490466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=490466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nCovered Cleveland Cavs for seven years
\nAuthor of two books<\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/nba_power_rankings_week17-1x1.jpg&w=130&h=130&scale=crop&location=center.jpeg\"){kind=spacer}
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