Clippers star Blake Griffin, who won the 2011 dunk contest by jumping over the hood of a Kia Optima, says that he originally planned in jumping over an entire convertible.

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Clippers star Blake Griffin, who won the 2011 dunk contest by jumping over the hood of a Kia Optima, says that he originally planned on jumping over an entire convertible.

Joining Barstool Sports’ Pardon My Take podcast, Griffin said the motor company couldn’t grant his wish.

“I wanted to jump over a convertible, but I wasn’t allowed to. It had to be a Kia Optima,” Griffin said. “I wanted to have Baron Davis and some of my teammates roll out in a convertible, and then just toss it straight up and jump over the whole thing, instead of just the hood.

“I don’t know if you guys have stood next to a Kia Optima, but it’s a pretty tall vehicle, and there’s no way I was going to make it over the entire thing, over Baron Davis in the sunroof. So I opted for the hood, and then everyone was pissed that I jumped over the hood, like, ‘that was super easy,’ so it was just a lose-lose situation for me.”

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Griffin’s dunk was, indeed, met with some criticism, as he cleared the hood of the vehicle by a good amount.

He also mentioned that Kia reached out to him via email to ask why he named his son “Ford.”

“I was like, ‘It seems like a pretty common American name.’ It’s not like I named him Hyundai or Toyota,” he said. “That was actually a thing I had to deal with.”

Griffin endorses Kia, which is the official vehicle of the NBA. The Clippers forward won the dunk contest over JaVale McGee, who has said he thought he deserved to win, not Griffin.

– Kenny Ducey