D-Wade lights up Dallas... Again

In last night's NBA All-Star Game at Cowboys Stadium, Dwyane Wade turned in his second most impressive performance to receive an MVP award in Dallas. The last time he did it was 2006, when the Miami Heat came back from a 2-0 deficit in the NBA Finals to win the championship on the Mavericks' home court. Of course the stakes weren't nearly as high this time around, but I'm sure seeing Wade's face on the world's biggest JumboTron left the hundreds of thousands of Mavericks fans in attendance with a bad taste in their mouths. A bad taste that they've been trying to get rid of by eating Texas shaped sirloin steaks smothered in A1 sauce for the past three and a half years.

Although I haven't watched that many All-Star Games, last night's was by far the best I've ever seen. Typically there are a lot of highlight worthy plays, but it often ends up in a blowout, usually at the hands of the West. Last night had the usual amazing plays, but it was actually close throughout the whole game and competitive down the stretch. The ending could have been more spectacular, as last second fouls caused both teams to try to win it at the line. And Melo's potential game winner lacked suspense, as you could tell it was a brick the moment it left his hands.

Despite some great plays by several players on both teams, Wade and LeBron clearly stole the show. In addition to an alley-oop to himself off the glass, Wade had some jaw-dropping assists for LeBron who made Wade's set-ups look even better with spectacular finishes. Wade also found Dwight on a fast break for an unreal oop. Dallas native Chris Bosh and Deron Williams, who grew up near Dallas, both turned in entertaining performances as well.

Even the half-time show was worth watching. I can't really handle Shakira's overly produced (read Timbaland produced) peculiar pop music, but, y'know, she's easy on the eyes. As for Alicia Keys, she's both easy on the eyes and an incredible musician, singer, and performer. Her spoken word stuff at the beginning was sorta weird, but she killed it otherwise.

Lastly, take a moment to watch last night's Top 10 Plays. They don't get much better than these.