According to Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports, Roger Mason has asked to be traded and the Spurs are looking to accommodate him.

“Roger had a terrific season last year after the Spurs had a bunch of injuries, and now that everyone is back healthy and his minutes are limited, the Spurs are trying to do the right thing and find a good spot for him,” Mason’s agent, Mark Bartelstein, told Yahoo! Sports on Monday.

According to the report, there is strong interest in Mason from other teams. Especially because he has an expiring contract which make him an even more attractive piece to make a trade possible.

This comes just days after Mason told Jeff McDonald of the San Antonio Express-News he wanted to stay in San Antonio for the remainder of his career and try to win a championship.

His minutes and numbers are down from last season. Last season he averaged 30 minutes a game and 12 points.  This season, he is averaging 19 minutes a game and averaging 7.4 points. Mason is asking to be traded to a team where he can play a significant role.

With the trade deadline coming this Thursday, Project Spurs will keep an eye out on this and stay tuned to Project Spurs for all the latest Spurs' trade rumors.

Congratulations to Spurs guard George Hill as his college jersey will be retired by his alma mater, IUPUI, this Thursday.

The IUPUI Athletics Department will bestow one of its highest individual honors upon former basketball standout George Hill on Thursday when his No. 3 jersey is retired following the game with UMKC. Hill will be just the second former IUPUI men's basketball player in the program's history to have his jersey retired, joining Carlos Knox's No. 34.

Hill, in his second season with the San Antonio Spurs, is expected to be in attendance as the Spurs are scheduled to play the Indiana Pacers at Conseco Fieldhouse on Wednesday night.

"This is truly an honor for George and all of his accomplishments," IUPUI Head Coach Ron Hunter said. "You're talking about a kid who's the first in his family to attend college and he's going to go down as one of the best players in our league's history. I'm just as proud of the fact that he's going to get his degree; that's something he's set out to do and I know he'll get it done.

"It's only fitting that his number three is honored with this retirement."

Hill was the first player from IUPUI to be drafted in the NBA when the Spurs drafted him in 2008 in the first round.

Hill has come a long way for the Spurs. After an ominous start in his first Summer League in 2008, going scoreless for two games straight, he is now a proven NBA player and a more than adequate back-up to Tony Parker. He even has drawn praise from Coach Pop who he considers his favorite Spur.

Our very own staff writer, Lance Fell, had the opportunity to attend the 2010 NBA All-Star game in Dallas. Here is his recap of the sights and sounds of the game, his quest for a Tim Duncan jersey, exclusive photos from Dallas and fan interviews. Enjoy!

Being the die-hard Spurs fan that I am, Dallas has always been the last place I’ve ever wanted go. Countless times I’ve told myself I would never step into Dallas County, but with Tim Duncan’s hall of fame career winding down and talented forwards like Kevin Durant and Carmelo Anthony heading into the prime of their careers; this could be Duncan’s last start as an All-Star, and there was no way, Dallas or not, I was going to miss this.

My two friends and I arrived in Dallas late Friday night and stayed at my cousin’s place right smack downtown. The next day, with no tickets to the Jam Session or to All Star Saturday night, we jumped on the Dallas Dart Rail and headed to the home of our bitter rivals, the American Airline Center (AAC). Now, as a Spurs fan, I’ve done my fare share of hating on Dallas, but as I rode the Dart through downtown Dallas, I was blown away by how beautiful it really is. I actually felt bad for talking so much trash about a city that is actually incredibly stunning.

Riding through Dallas, it was like a riding through NBA heaven. Every corner was plastered with pictures of All Stars. Dwight Howard was on every street sign, and the entire side of one building was covered with a picture of LeBron James and Dirk Nowitzki. But for all the pictures of Brandon Roy and every other All Star, I had not seen a single picture of Tim Duncan. How could this be? I thought I probably just missed them while I was looking at all the different things and brushed it off my shoulder. Surely, we would see portraits of Timmy at the AAC.

When we arrived at the AAC I wasn’t disappointed. As soon as I stepped off the Dart, there was a banner with Duncan, Dirk, Kobe Bryant and Steve Nash. Finally some Timmy D. in this town. Outside the AAC, huge portraits of Paul Pierce, Dwayne Wade and the other All Stars hung from the sides of pillars surrounding it. We took pictures with the LeBron, and Dwight Howard portraits, but the one portrait I wanted to take a picture with, we couldn’t find. We walked a complete circle around the AAC and saw not one portrait of Tim Duncan. Not one portrait of the 12 time All-Star and four time NBA Champion could be found.

So we walked into the gift shop of the AAC, and immediately I went looking for a Duncan jersey. If this is Timmy’s last start, I’m definitely getting this jersey. So I walked through the fan shop in my Tim Duncan shirt surrounded by Mavericks fans. I could feel their eyes glaring at me, and I loved every second of it. The walls were covered with Mavs gear, but not one shirt had the image of the Larry O’Bryant trophy on it. That image, sorry Mavs fans, is on Spurs gear. I walked up to the All Star jersey wall and began my search for the coveted Duncan Jersey. I sorted through what seemed like a million Dirk and Kobe jerseys, but no Duncan. Really? I thought to myself. In fact, the only item in the entire store with any picture of Timmy was an All-Star shirt with every All-Stars face drawn like a cartoon on the front.  Needless to say, I was beginning to get a little annoyed with this theme of anti-Duncan going on.

So we left the AAC and headed to the Dallas Convention Center (DCC) to see if maybe they had a Tim Duncan and Chris Paul jersey. My friend Tara is obsessed with Chris Paul, but I let it slide because he went to Wake Forest. While riding the Dart to the DCC, my other friend Nathan shouted, “Duncan!” and pointed out the window. And there it was, hanging from a street pole, a picture of Duncan posting up. It was only the second picture we had seen of him all day, but it was worth it. We arrived at the DCC, but unfortunately since we didn’t have tickets we couldn’t get in. Maybe it was the DCC that had our elusive Tim Duncan jersey. I guess we’ll never know.

Our Saturday was over and we headed back to my cousin Adair’s apartment to watch what was sure to be an eventful All-Star Saturday night. But as we all know, All-Star Saturday night was on the dull side, and the highly anticipated dunk contest lacked not only high profile players, but creativity and excitement.

We woke up the next morning, put on our Spurs gear, and made our way to Cowboys Stadium.  Arlington is not far from Dallas at all, but when you’ve been waiting for something for months and the excitement and anticipation is at an all time high, a 20 minute car ride can seem like two hours. We took the wrong exit but thankfully Cowboys Stadium is bigger than the spaceships from the Will Smith movie Independence Day, so we just drove towards it. The quest for parking had begun, and I had been told to except high prices for parking, but nothing could have prepared me for what was in-store. Parking at Cowboy Stadium was one hundred dollars. Yes, hundred dollars! Did we pay one hundred dollars? Of course not! I already gave Jerry Jones 60 bucks for this ticket. There’s no way I was going to give a billionaire any more of my money.

We found parking about a mile away for thirty dollars that offered a shuttle and it dropped us off at the stadium. And as soon as we stepped off the shuttle there it was, two stories tall, like it had been dropped down from the sky above, a giant Tim Duncan banner. It was magnificent. And to make it even better, there was one the exact same size of Tony Parker next to it. Yes, Tony Parker. It was amazing.

The doors to the stadium were scheduled to open at 5:30 pm. I wish we had known that because we arrived at 3:30 and had to wait outside in the freezing cold for two hours. Standing in line I tried to remember if we were in Texas or Alaska.

After two hours of waiting and stitching my ears back to my head after they had frozen off, the doors opened and the hunt for the Tim Duncan jersey went into full effect. Walking to the fan shop was an amazing experience. People were everywhere in all sorts of jerseys. And Spurs fans were definitely representing. Spurs fans were predominantly wearing Duncan and Ginobili jerseys, but every once in a while there would be an older gentleman in a David Robinson jersey.

We were able to fight our way through the world record crowd of 108,713 people and get to the fan shop. All I wanted was something with Duncan on it. I went through the jerseys and All-Star gear and found nothing. Not a single thing. This was getting ridiculous. Tara bought a shirt and when she was paying for it she asked the cashier, “Why aren’t there more players in your jersey section?” The cashier replied, “Well we have Dirk. What are you looking for?” I immediately interrupted, “Tim Duncan.” He just looked at me, held his hand out, and put his thumb down. I looked at him, held my hand up, and showed him four fingers. The hunt for the Duncan jersey had failed. There would be no Duncan memorabilia. I would have to fulfill my quest for Duncan with the one place I knew I could find him -- as starting forward for the West All-Stars.

With Spurs fans from every corner of the world converging in Dallas, I thought this would be a great time to learn about some fellow Spurs fans and see what they’ve thought about the season so far. I asked San Antonio native and die hard Spurs fan Chris Kafflin his thoughts on the Richard Jefferson deal:

“I think the jury’s still out.  Don’t think it’s just him. I mean, we overhauled our whole bench. We’ve gone through so many starting lineups; it’ll be interesting who they decide to go with. I think they should keep the line up as is.” When asked what other player he came to see besides Tim Duncan, he replied, “There’s no other Spur, so it’s all for Timmy.”

Spoken like a true Spurs fan.

I asked Gerald Strickland of Boston for his thoughts on the RJ trade and he said, “There was a lot of pressure put on Richard to be great right from the get go. He’s not our problem. We haven’t been playing Spurs defense.”

Mike Johnson of Winston-Salem, North Carolina has been a Tim Duncan fan forever. “I’m here to see the great Tim Duncan. That’s my man. I grew up right down the street from Wake Forest. That’s my guy.”

It seemed all Spurs fans had one thing in common this weekend. I asked everyone which player they came to see besides Tim Duncan, and instead of hearing LeBron or Dwayne Wade, they all replied with something that shocked me, yet amazed me. When I asked this question to George and Sam Gonzalez of San Antonio, they replied, “DeJuan Blair.”

Finally it was game time. Now I can see Tim Duncan and a plethora of future hall of famers take the same court. But as much as I wanted to see Tim Duncan play, I didn’t. Part of me wanted to see him rest. Just knowing he’s an All-Star is good enough for me. Knowing that he’s there representing my home is fine by me. Spurs fans can’t expect him to play 33 minutes like in 2000 when he and Shaq both won the All Star MVP. In that game Duncan had 24 points and 14 rebounds on 12-14 shooting from the floor.

I knew this game would be completely different. It’s a new era in the NBA. The “Platinum” age as some call it lead by stars like LeBron James and Dwight Howard. Duncan only played 13 minutes and finished with 3 points and four rebounds, and yet, it was still the best game I’ve ever been to. LeBron played 32 minutes and finished with 25 points and the MVP, Dwayne Wade, finished with 28 points in 31 minutes.

Even though Tim Duncan only played 13 minutes, this was still one of the most amazing things I’ve ever been a part of. Soon, we’ll no longer see Duncan out there, in a red west jersey, pigeon-toed at the free throw line. The Duncan Era is winding down and to be able to see him play as an All Star starter is something I’ll never forget. I finally found my Duncan shirt. While we were walking back to our car, a man was selling All Star shirts out of the back of his truck, and in the corner of the shirt was a picture, not a drawing, of Timmy, clutching a basketball. So I bought the shirt for fifteen dollars. Take that Jerry Jones. I want to end this story with something my friend Nathan said. We made it into a sign, and I think it perfectly sums up Tim Duncan. Tim Duncan will be an All-Star until all stars fade.

After being introduced to some cheers and some boos in Dallas, 12 time All-Star Tim Duncan looked ready to represent the Spurs in the 2010 NBA All-Star Game.

With big men for the West starting such as Amar'e and Dirk, it would be tough for Duncan to get touches. Plus during pre-game interviews with some of the West guards, they all said they would like for Dirk to receive MVP honors. 

So how did it go for Duncan? This is how it went down in Dallas for him.

In the first quarter, Tim Duncan lined up for the West team for the tip-off and won the tip over Dwight Howard. He grabbed a couple of rebounds and on one play, he got the step on Kevin Garnett but had his reverse lay-up blocked by Garnett.  Duncan then took it outside of the paint and hit a jump shot for the West.

It was reported Duncan did not want to play heavy minutes in the game but did tell West coach George Karl he wanted to be out on the court when he went to a four point-guard look. Karl was reported to say he would play Duncan with four point-guards. Though it never happened in the game.

Duncan did not play much in the first quarter but at the end of the first quarter, Duncan had two points, two rebounds, shooting 1-3 from the floor.

Duncan started in the third quarter.  He grabbed a rebound at the 10:37 point of the quarter and missed a jump shot.  He then received a pass from Carmelo Anthony and Duncan got fouled on the reverse lay-up attempt.  He made one of two foul shots.

In the end, the East defeated the West. The final score from Dallas was 141-139.  Duncan ended the game with three points on 1-4 shooting, 1-2 from the free-throw line and four rebounds.

Though Duncan did not play much in the All-Star game, I am sure Spurs fans were OK with that seeing how they would prefer him to rest and not risk injury. I am sure Coach Pop felt the same way.

Overall, Duncan and DeJuan Blair represented the Spurs proudly in the 2010 NBA All-Star Weekend.  Blair with his monster performance in the Rookie/Sophomore game and Duncan's performance tonight.

Now let's hope for a Spurs resurgence in the second half of their season and a strong finish heading towards the 2010 NBA playoffs.

Photo by Jennifer Pottheiser/NBAE/Getty Images

• NBA.COM - David Aldridge answered questions from NBA bloggers, our very own Jeff Garcia asked him a couple of questions.
• ESPN - Henry Abbott spitballing the playoffs
• Yahoo! Sports - Adrian Wojnarowski says that the Spurs’ patience with Jefferson is running low.
• KENS 5 - Dan Oshinsky wonders what kind of week has it been for the San Antonio Spurs.
• San Antonio Express News - Jeff McDonald believes that Manu Ginobili is almost himself again. That's good news for the Spurs.
• Bleacher Report - Brandon Land tells us that the Spurs should be in panic mode.
• 48 Minutes of Hell - Timothy Varner is agitating for a Spurs trade.
• NBA.COM - David Aldridge thinks that Manu Ginobili might not be a Spur next season. I hope he's wrong!
• SLAM Online - Dan Ilika feels that the Spurs are on the brink of a bad breakup.
• 48 Minutes of Hell -  Graydon Gordian discussed about closing one championship window and then cracking open another.
• San Antonio Express News - Jeff McDonald: Popovich says Bowen not answer for Spurs.
• 48 Minutes of Hell - Timothy Varner talked about the Spurs and takes a look at the team's chemistry and shooting.
• Hoopsnotes - Nando De Colo was named Player of The Week in Liga ACB.
• NBA Playbook - Sebastian Pruiti breaks down some plays from the Lakers-Spurs game.
• Bleacher Report - Kent Calhoun gave us reasons why the Spurs will not make it in this year's playoffs.
• Ball Don't Lie - J.E. Skeets takes a look at the All-Star 2010 by the numbers.
• ESPN - Rookies break Sophomore hex in Dallas. Tim Legler gave grades to the Rookie and Sophomore class.

• Michael De Leon and Jeff Garcia went live to recap the first two games of the Rodeo Road trip and previewed the game against the LA Clippers.
• Project Spurs helped to promote the "Don't Be An Asterisk". A campaign aimed at preventing young men and women from using steroids in sports.
• Michael De Leon answered a mailbag question about Manu Ginobili's contract extension.
• Jeff Garcia co-hosted this latest episode of the 8th seed podcast. Listen in, as they discussed Kevin Garnett's knee, the All Star Game and the state of the Spurs.
• Michael De Leon gave us a report about the Spurs' interest in Bulls' Tyrus Thomas and about the Spurs shopping RJ.
• Jeff Garcia talked about Hill's lapse in judgement.
• Spurscast: Michael De Leon and Jeff Garcia went live minutes after the Lakers thrashing of the Spurs without Kobe Bryant and Andrew Bynum.
• Talking about DeJuan Blair and George Hill's impact to the Spurs. Fans have some interesting suggestions at the comment section, discuss with us!
• Jeff Garcia decides to lighten up the mood and gave us the All-Spur Three-Point Shootout and All-Spur Dunk Contest.
• Arianné Villanueva is back in her fourth episode of the Spanish Spurscast. Check it out!
• Michael De Leon remembers great memories of San Antonio's only NBA All-Star Weekend.
• Looking at the remaining schedule, the Spurs a will be hard-pressed to make the playoffs. Will they make it this year? Tell us what you think.
• Michael De Leon and Jeff Garcia gave a quick report in the All-Star festivities as DeJuan Blair shines at the Rookie-Sophomore game.

DeJuan Blair had a monster game in the Rookie/Sophomore game last night putting up 22 points and 23 rebounds. Many fans felt he was the true MVP of the game and not Tyreke Evans of the Sacramento Kings.

Oh and he also did this. Who says you need ACLs to get up?

If Becky Hammon and Robert Horry in the celebrity game weren't enough San Antonio representation in Dallas for the opening night's festivities of All-Star Weekend 2010, DeJuan Blair was destined to change that.

Being overlooked is nothing new for the 6-7 Blair, who watched as 29 other NBA GMs passed on him on draft night.

A pregame poll on NBA.com asked which rookie would have the biggest impact on the game. Tyreke Evans, Stephen Curry and Brandon Jennings all made the list, but Blair was nowhere to be found.

But you didn't have to search for him once the game started. His presence was felt early with hustle points and rebounds. Of course that's no surprise to Spurs fans, who see him do the same thing on a nightly basis.

The highlights wouldn't elude him though as he picked off a pass and ran the length of a court. He was rewarded with a pass on the other end and with no one else in front of him, he threw the ball off the glass and slammed it through on the rebound. Needless to say the crowd went crazy!

It was more of the same in the second half as Blair seemed to tear down every rebound, even over 7 ft. center Brook Lopez. It almost seemed as if he was unstoppable, until he got hit in the face and had to be taken in for stitches. Luckily for Spurs fans it wasn't anything serious. Oh and Coach Pop was reported to have called Blair not to check up on his injury but to tell him to stop taking 3-point shots.

But Blair came back with a vengeance showing off his low post game against much taller, and even faster opponents. With seconds left in the game, he jumped out of bounds to save the ball, then came back inbounds for a pass, squared up against Lopez and put him on skates with a spin move. Lopez tried everything but a gang tackle to keep Blair from scoring, but it didn't work. It was fitting Blair got a rebound and a score before the final buzzer went off.

In the end, Blair scored 22 points and led both teams with 23 rebounds. Heading into the final vote, those on Twitter were unanimous, Blair was the MVP. However, in the end, the MVP went to Kings guard Tyreke Evans, who decided to share it with Blair as both players hoisted up the trophy.

So Blair was overlooked yet again, but this time it was by NBA fans. Blair might want to relish being off the radar for now, because this was certainly a night 29 GMs will remember.

Jeff Garcia contributed to this post.

Arianné Villañueva is back for the latest Spurscast in Spanish. In this episode she goes over the latest Spurs trade rumors, articles on Project Spurs and all the latest Spurs news.

Remember Project Spurs was the first Spurs blog to have a Spurs podcast and the first to have a Spanish podcast for Spanish speaking fans.

Arianné Villañueva esta detras para el mas nuevo Spurscast en Espanol. En este episodio ella discute el mas nuevo rumores del los Spurs, los nuevo articulos de Project Spurs, y todo el mas nuevo noticias de los Spurs. 

Y recuerdas que Project Spurs fue el primera pagina de internet a tener una podcast de los Spurs y el primer para tener un podcast espanol para los fanaticos de habla espanol.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Download

In just a few short days, the NBA All-Star game makes its return back to Texas. But 14 years ago, the NBA made San Antonio its stage.

I was a senior at Fox Tech High School in Downtown San Antonio at the time and it was as if my dreams came true.

Since I was about 10 years old, it's been my yearly ritual to set aside my entire weekend for All-Star Weekend. It's one of my favorite times of the year and it also usually lands around my birthday so I was always able to get away with being a couch potato for the entire weekend.

I always got home from school on Friday with plenty of time to carve my spot out on our living room couch and hopefully before everyone else so I could take control of the tv and remote for that night. I watched whatever All-Star programming the NBA had for me, whether it was the rookie game, legends game, celebrity game. It didn't matter, I was watching it.

On Saturdays, I woke up early to watch Inside Stuff and the NBA Jam Session and prepared for the night's festivities by begging for pizza. My parents usually obliged and I sat with eyes wide open as I consumed all of All-Star Saturday night and made bets with my brothers on who would win each event.

Then on Sunday, to end it all, I watched every minute of the All-Star Game, including pregame and post game. I remember one year I did something stupid and my parents punished me, taking away my television privileges the day of the all-star game. I told my Mom a few years ago that on that day I went to my room, closed the door, put my small 12-inch tv on the floor and watched the game laying on the floor with the volume turned almost all the way down. That was the year Magic and Isiah had an epic battle and it was also Magic's last All-Star game.

That's been my ritual now for about 22 years, going on 23 this weekend. Yes I know it sounds pitiful, but what can I say, I love the game.

So in 1996 I hear that All-Star weekend is coming to San Antonio and I'm ecstatic. While I would love to go to the game or even the Saturday night festivities, I know it's unrealistic. My dad was in and out of the hospital and what I didn't know then was that this was just four months before he passed away. My mom also left her job so she could take care of my dad and the last thing I expected was to have the money to go to any of the events and see all of the NBA stars.

But I got lucky the Friday of All-Star Weekend. The stars came to me.

It had been announced that morning that there would be a special presentation and one of the Spurs players would be in attendance. Only juniors and seniors could attend so I was set.

When we got into the auditorium and the emcee introduced Sean Elliott, I couldn't believe my luck. Sean Elliott was my favorite player and I had just seen him up close once. It was at an NBA Draft Party where he signed my rookie card. When he asked me how I was doing I froze and somehow got the word "okay" out.

So Sean spoke and I listened while I thanked my lucky stars. I was happy enough with Sean, but then he said "well, I don't want to take up too much of your time, let me let the real stars speak."

Following Sean were Vin Baker and Scottie Pippen. David Robinson's parents, Ambrose and Freda, closed out the event with a motivational speech. I left that assembly on such a high. I could not wait to see the players play at the All-Star game on tv and point to them and say that I got to see them up close.

As soon as school ended that Friday, my best friend and I walked through Downtown to get to the area around the Alamodome. All of the games were being played inside the Alamodome, but there were several smaller events being played in the area, where basketball courts had been erected. We got to watch a lot of the action, and stand outside of the Alamodome, then stand outside of where the Jam Session was going to be and just take in the atmosphere. It wasn't like we were new to San Antonio, but it just felt special. Maybe it was knowing media from all over the country were in town, or that so many NBA players were around, or just seeing all of the All-Star banners and posters hung around downtown and on the lamp posts. I don't think I got home until past 10 p.m. That was probably one of the only times I missed watching all of the Friday night events, but it was worth it.

The next morning, of course I caught Inside Stuff and got to see Ahmad Rashad and Willow Bay with my hometown as the backdrop. It was really cool to see all the b-roll footage of San Antonio. That morning I also got a call from my eldest brother, Anthony, who said he was taking my nephew to the Jam Session and asked if I wanted to go. I probably responded with "hell yea I want to go."

So my brother, my nephew and I headed off for the convention center. After we parked and crossed the steet, a limo stopped right in front of us and we saw Rasheed Wallace, just feet from us, get escorted in.

My brother paid for our tickets and off we went. I was 18 years old at the time, but I wasn't too old to have the time of my life. We played just about every game, I stood in David Robinsons's footprints and stood next to a cutout of Michael Jordan. I even stopped at a both set up with a mic and a bunch of tvs to see if I could do play-by-play for a recorded game. I didn't do so well. Who would know then that I would be doing a weekly Spurs podcast and monthly NBA podcast now.

We spent probably a good four hours at the Jam Session. I must've spent an hour of it in the basketball card exhibition, looking to beef up my collection with more Spurs players. I ended up with another Sean Elliott card, two Cory Alexander rookie cards, a Doc Rivers card and a David Robinson card. I still have those cards to this day with the rest of my childhood sports card collection in a large tub in my garage.

I can't remember how many times I thanked my brother for taking me but it wasn't enough. That's one of my fondest memories in what amounted to a very hard year in my life. That day I got to be be a kid again and not have a single worry. After the Jam Session, we walked around downtown a bit to soak up a bit more of the atmosphere and check out some of the events. Planet Hollywood was opening so we went and stood outside with my nephew on my brothers shoulders as we took in a live concert with none other than Bruce Willis singing.

We got home in time for all of the Saturday night festivities, and in enough time for me to be outraged that some dude named Brent Barry did the same dunk twice to win the dunk contest. I understood that it was special that he was the only caucasian to ever win the dunk contest, but I thought there were more creative dunks that weren't repeated. Of course, when he became a Spur several years ago, I forgave him.

The All-Star game closed out an awesome weekend for me, even though I wanted to vomit when I saw the jerseys some San Antonio marketing agency came up with to represent the city. Seriously, a jalapeño with a basketball on the end with the ugliest colors ever and some weird triangle pattern for the trim. I wondered if maybe they let kids at some middle school draw costumes and the winner got to have their design used for the official jerseys. I'll never forget that, but I digress.

I loved watching my hometown guys, David Robinson and Sean Elliott, playing in the All-Star game and holding their own. I thought David Robinson deserved the MVP that year no matter what Shaq did to him, and not just because it was his hometown. Michael Jordan, the eventual MVP, had 20 points and four rebounds. Robinson had a more complete game with 18 points, 11 rebounds, two blocked shots and two steals. If Robinson wasn't going to get it, then Shaq, as much as it pains me to say it, should have won it.

My West team ended up losing to the East 118-129, but I still loved watching the game and I was proud hearing that it was the largest crowd in All-Star game history, with 36,037 in attendance.

That weekend was special for me, and it was special for San Antonio. 14 years has been too long to wait, and I hope that the NBA will bring it back to San Antonio soon. Then, nothing will stop me from taking it all in, hopefully this time from the AT&T Center.

But for now, I'll be more than happy to set part of my weekend aside to watch it all from someone's couch. Maybe now that I'm turning 33 and not 18, I'll choose something a little more nutritious than pizza for my game meal. Oh, who am I kidding? I'll take a half cheese, half pepperoni lovers thin and crispy. Care to join me?