There are not many reasons to watch a Dallas Mavericks game this season, as they are simply just not that good enough to even be considered a playoff team. If you are among those Mavericks-averse NBA fans, however, then you probably missed seeing one of the rarest occurrences in the history of basketball: a Dirk Nowitzki dunk.

During the second quarter of Saturday’s home game against the Los Angeles Lakers, Nowitzki turned on his 39-year-old boosters and levitated for a soaring two-handed slam off an assist from Mavericks guard Kyle Collinsworth. Okay, maybe “soaring” is not the right way to describe Dirk's dunk, but anytime the big German goes up for a jam, it’s always an event.

Dirk Nowitzki has scored over 30,000 points in his illustrious NBA career, but only a very few of them came via slam dunks, as he is never known to be a leaper. Instead, he has carved out a Hall-of-Fame career by sinking jumpers and three-pointers – the kind of shots players of his size are not supposed to make, especially during his prime, when it was very rare for big men to take shots from the perimeter, let alone drain them.

Nowitzki, the 2007 NBA MVP, is averaging 12.2 points and 5.7 rebounds per game so far this season.

Nowitzki is set to be a free agent at the end of this season, and there are rumors that this could be his last year in the NBA. Hopefully that’s not going to be the case, as the NBA is a much better league when Dirk is around – and dunking.