Of the five other contestants named Wednesday to the field, only defending champion Jason Kapono is even close to Hamilton in attempts, taking 98 triples so far this season to Hamilton’s 92 before the Pistons took on Miami. But Hamilton has played 590 more minutes than Kapono - the equivalent of 12-plus games more than the Raptors’ gunner.

The four other participants - Kobe Bryant, Daniel Gibson, Steve Nash and Peja Stojakovic - have all taken well more than double Hamilton’s attempts and Stojakovic, with 264, has nearly tripled his triples. The inclusion of Bryant, whose rivalry with Hamilton dates back to their high school days in Pennsylvania, has given him even more motivation.

“I’m excited to be in the 3-point contest. (The league’s) been supposed to put me in for the last three years but they’ve been robbing me,” Hamilton said. “But the greatest thing about it is they put Kob (sic) in the 3-point contest and he can’t shoot better than me. He never could beat me in a shootout ever, so this is my opportunity to let him know he can’t shoot better than me.”

Hamilton has the best wishes of his coaches and teammates … sort of.

“He’s caught a lot of stuff from our players already,” Flip Saunders said. “Rasheed is hoping he doesn’t win because he thinks that’ll be bad for us - he’ll want to shoot 3s all the time.”

That Hamilton finds himself in the contest is a testament to his work ethic, because he was a long way from a 3-point marksman early in his career. In fact, in his first six NBA seasons, he shot below .300 three times. He went from a .305 3-point shooter in the 2004-05 season to a league-best .458 the following season. He slumped back to .341 last season when he attempted a career-high 129. He’ll almost certainly set a career high for attempts this season, on pace for 160 attempts.

“As a kid I always watched it but it wasn’t something I wanted to be in. Once people started saying I couldn’t shoot 3s since the [Larry Brown] era, I wanted to go out and prove the world wrong,” he said. “So now I get an opportunity to walk back and bring that gold ball back to Detroit, which I plan on doing.”

Hamilton prefers shooting his 3-pointers from either baseline, where the distance is at its shortest. In the 3-point contest, there are five racks of five balls each - one in either corner, one at each wing and one straight out from the basket.

“I told him he’s not allowed to just shoot out of the corners,” Saunders said. “You have to shoot out of those other spots, too.”

The last Piston to compete in the 3-point contest was Chauncey Billups, who finished last in 2004 and has warned Hamilton how difficult it is to take 25 shots in the one-minute allotted. But Hamilton said he's not listening to Billups or assistant coach Terry Porter, who was the 3-point contest runner-up in 1991 and 1993.

“I said I’m not going to take advice from a person that didn’t win the event,” Hamilton said, tongue in cheek. “I’m going to go out and do my job and hopefully I can win.”

The Foot Locker 3-Point Shootout will be nationally televised as part of the NBA All-Star Saturday Night, which will also feature the Haier Shooting Stars, Sprite Slam Dunk and PlayStation Skills Challenge. TNT and ESPN Radio’s coverage starts at 8 p.m.