LOS ANGELES (AP) -- After eight years in Orlando and six months of recovery from back surgery, Dwight Howard returned to an NBA court Sunday night on a new coast and wearing a new gold uniform.
Howard debuts for Lakers in loss to Sacramento (Yahoo! Sports)
21 Oct
2012
2012
Lakers: Dwight Howard set for preseason debut (Yahoo! Sports)
21 Oct
2012
2012
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Dwight Howard is set to make his debut with the Los Angeles Lakers in a preseason game against Sacramento on Sunday night.
Spin Doctors: Pau Gasol v. Marc Gasol
18 Oct
2012
2012
The Gasols are the closest thing the NBA has to the Mannings of the NFL. And similar to how Eli has elevated his game into Peyton's class, no longer is the Gasol comparison dominated by the older sibling.
In our initial fantasy rankings for the '12-'13 campaign, Pau topped Marc by a slim margin, though two of the three experts actually preferred Marc. Andy Behrens' was the bullish backer of Pau, so I'll let him get this Spanish inquisition started...
Behrens gets the Boom Boom Pau: If there's going to be a new Alpha Gasol this season, then either Marc will need to make serious gains in scoring and rebounding, or Pau will have to decline significantly. Last year, these two were separated by 2.8 points and 1.5 boards per game. Pau also shot better from the line and from the field, plus he delivered more assists. He's missed just one game over the past two seasons, and he's been a 37-minute-per-game player forever.
What's not to like?
Perhaps you're uptight about the arrival of Dwight Howard and Antawn Jamison in L.A., but let's not forget that Memphis gets Zach Randolph back at full strength. Z-Bo is obviously no small addition; he's just a year removed from a 20-12 season. I'm anxious to see Pau and Steve Nash playing together with the Lakers, a pairing that should lead to plenty of high-percentage looks. And I'm not at all convinced that Pau will lose a pile of rebounds to Howard — you'll recall that Bynum averaged 11.8 boards per game last season, while Gasol brought down 10.4. There's a very good chance that L.A. will simply increase the rebounding differential this season, while both Dwight and Pau average double-digits.
Pau is an uncommonly reliable fantasy asset, a player who can afford to lose a bit of ground in his core stats yet still maintain his edge over his brother. He also offers PF/C eligibility (like half the player pool).. For me, the elder Gasol remains a plausible second-rounder, a few slots ahead of Marc.
Funston is on the Marc: Marc has yet to match his brother on a per game fantasy basis in his four seasons (although he's been pretty close, and they have similar roto skills), so I'm letting Andy argue from a position of strength. But there are factors at work this season that lead me to believe that this is Marc's year to lay claim to the Gasol fantasy crown.
Last season, Pau averaged the fewest points and free throws of his career, and had his second-lowest averages in blocks and field goal percentage. At 32, nearly five years older than Marc, Pau is at a point in his life when numbers more easily decline than improve. And with Dwight Howard and Antawn Jamison in the fold, that's two new players on the court that will demand the basketball — Jamison's 16.1 FGA from last season was more than both Howard and Gasol. Also, let's not forget, the offense is now triggered by Steve Nash, who has a tendency to hog assists. In his past seven seasons, only one starter that Nash has played alongside has managed to break the 3.0 APG barrier (Boris Diaw). Pau could have problems reaching his usual 3-plus assists per night, especially if you figure Kobe is very likely to finish second on this team in helpers.
I also worry about Pau's rebounding totals. Yes, he was able to carve out double-digit boards with Andrew Bynum, but the rebounding prowess of Bynum and Howard is not a wash. Howard averaged 14.5 boards last season, 2.7 more than Bynum. And Jamison's expected glass-cleaning contributions can't be ignored, either.
If Pau drops an assist and, say, 1.5 rebounds off of his line from last season (a definite possibility), he doesn't finish ahead of Marc's fantasy value of a year ago. And remember, Marc's still at a stage in his career where improvement is expected. Those that think that past returns guarantee the same future returns are going to go with Pau in this debate. But, of course, this is fantasy, and nothing is ever exactly as it was before.
Lakers F Jordan Hill returns to practice (Yahoo! Sports)
18 Oct
2012
2012
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. (AP) -- Forward Jordan Hill has returned to practice with the Los Angeles Lakers, but will sit out their next preseason game alongside Dwight Howard.
J.J. Redick gets angry about the NBA’s market disparity, an Orlando columnist gets angry about everything else
09 Oct
2012
2012
Grab a pull quote, and run with it. Pump it up to 700 or so words, and file away. We do it every day at Ball Don't Lie; but if we feel like we're punching the clock and writing just for writing's sake, we pull back. We're not going to insult you as readers and knowledgeable NBA fans by pretending we can churn out double-digit posts on a day where absolutely nothing is happening in the NBA. Better to just give you a few things, as you scroll around, than to insult you with a lot of noise produced just for the sake of producing.
We kind of wish the Orlando Sentinel had done the same thing with Magic guard J.J. Redick's pull quote from the other day. Here's Redick's frustration, as his afterthought Magic head into what is surely going to be a disastrous year in the wake of the team's bungled attempts at supporting, coddling, and eventually trading Dwight Howard:
"There's like five teams that matter in this league," Redick said last week during media day. "If you're in a small market ... right now it's the Oklahoma City Thunder ... but if you're in small market, you don't matter. That's frustrating. You want to compete, you want to get your recognition, you want people to respect you. So in a sense, that's frustrating."
Probably not the most accurate take, but a general enough one to send semi-fans and general columnists through the roof.
Like, say, Orlando Sentinel columnist Shannon Owens. Owens mixed a batch of well-researched complaints about nearly two decades' worth of defensive rule changes (three different modifications to the hand check rule, relaxed zone restrictions before the 1999-00 and 2001-02 seasons; though she's off on a few of the dates) with the same noise about how the league only thinks personality-first, while somehow blaming star-aligning defensive rule changes with the fact that all the big names are in big cities (or, in Miami's case, nice cities) right now.
Here's Owens' take:
You can blame the collective-bargaining agreement for allowing players to flee for the big lights. Or you can blame bad coaching and management on the part of some small-market teams for their stagnant growth.
But none of that gets to the heart of the matter, which in this case, happens to be the matter of the heart.
The NBA isn't in love with basketball anymore. It's in love with the production of stars.
To the last part? Yes. Has been for nearly 70 years, now. "Geo Mikan v/s Knicks."
To the first part? The last three collective bargaining agreements have made player movement tougher and tougher, while handing more money and more incentive for players to stick with incumbent teams. The collective bargaining agreement is your ally here, pal. It's (read: $$$) why Dwight Howard was talking up loyalty while opting into his deal with the Magic just 6 1/2 months ago.
Owens goes on:
Basketball wasn't designed for one player to dominate the basket. In its purest state, there is ball movement, screens on and away from the ball and defenders challenging the great scorers every step of the way.
Maybe we can get back to more of that if the NBA would kindly remove a few road blocks.
Oh, come off it. Even lower-level college and WNBA teams have trouble getting good shots off the majority of the time, mainly because defenses are so athletic, so well-researched, and players are willing to commit to both sides of the ball in ways that just didn't happen a few decades ago.
It's worth reminding everyone that the NBA wasn't responding to those old defensive rules with five-man action and screens set off the ball. The NBA wasn't playing like Hickory High as it attempted to work through the strict man-to-man rules and legal forms of hand-checking.
No, the league responded with dull-as-Jim Nantz's-dishwater screen and roll play. It isolated two players on the wing extended for a pick and roll or two-man game, and sent three spectators to the other side of the court. Hell, the only thing that kept the league appealing during those eras was the influence of stars, and local rooting interest. Few would be entertained by those Indiana/New York games (either in the mid or late 1990s) unless they weren't compelled by Reggie Miller and Patrick Ewing's star power, the Latrell Sprewell forgiveness saga, or the fact that you were from either Indiana or New York.
The NBA wasn't adding these rule changes to trump up the presence of its stars, not when the no-hand-check-can-stop-him Allen Iverson was leading the league in scoring and filling up stadiums. No, it added these things in order to help everyone else. Because, for long stretches in the post-Jordan era, the NBA was a miserable watch. The NBA would put Phoenix and Toronto on NBC on a Sunday afternoon in 2001 — Jason Kidd! Vince Carter! — and watch as Scott Skiles and Lenny Wilkens would take the air out of the ball on their way to a game with an over/under of 170.
To say that the NBA is trumping up stars, just now, is ridiculous. Not when your parents got to see Magic and Larry's mugs previewing a Sunday afternoon game on CBS during a Friday night "Dallas" showing. Not when the NBA on NBC's extended theme made a point to feature a dozen All-Stars, never once showing a screen away from the ball. It's a throwaway take that pleases the pissed-off punters but doesn't hold up to scrutiny. Especially when the source of Orlando's problems are less easy to digest.
Do you know why Dwight Howard is not in Orlando?
For one, Dwight Howard is a selfish, immature brat with a lot of growing up to do.
Secondly, the Orlando Magic blew their chance at creating a winner around Dwight Howard.
This team was the talk of the NBA in 2009. Fresh off of a trip to the Finals, the franchise smartly declined to spend big money on Hedo Turkoglu, instead orchestrating a trade for Vince Carter that most of us applauded at the time. Carter, for whatever reason, fell off significantly the next season in ways that couldn't have been predicted by his production and age to that point. The team won just as many games in 2010 as in 2009, but fell in the conference finals against a Boston Celtics team that matched up expertly with Orlando.
The franchise then panicked with a series of resulting trades, Dwight Howard didn't like the attention that came from having to lead a team by himself (he craves attention, just not all of the attention all the time), and the squad created a bloated payroll that even by then the big-market New York Knicks were laughing at. Before the Knicks started listening to Isiah Thomas again, that is.
Rashard Lewis' massive deal turned into Gilbert Arenas'. Vince's deal turned back into Hedo Turkoglu's contract, the one they didn't match a few years before, and Jason Richardson and Glen Davis were signed to nutty deals as the Magic bid against themselves. Hell, even Redick was brought back in 2010 as a superfluous backup luxury, when the Magic matched Chicago's offer for the restricted free agent just because they could.
The Magic, like the Knicks and Trail Blazers before them, played big-market ball and lost. At least they got a Finals and conference finals appearance out of it.
The Los Angeles Lakers have a massive payroll because they can afford it, unlike many other NBA teams. But the reason the Lakers have Howard, Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol and Steve Nash on their massive payroll is because they're equal amounts lucky and smart. The team took advantage of Memphis and Orlando after years of Memphis and Orlando passing on better trading packages for Gasol and Howard. Same with Nash, after the Suns finally realized they were going to lose Steve for absolutely nothing last July. Same with Bryant, when the Charlotte Hornets accurately felt that they were one great 7-footer away from the second round of the playoffs back in 1996.
Luck, talent in the front office, and potentially another round of championships for Los Angeles. For the opposite of that, save for the similarly sized payroll, look toward both New York and Brooklyn.
It's not the hand-checking. It's not the vicissitudes of the big versus small market clashes. It's just a league full of teams trying to win — same as it ever was, while still changing every day.
One would hope that the Magic, having learned their lesson, fully commit to letting new GM Rob Hennigan study his way through this mess, and let the basketball people make the calls. Given some smart moves and a few strokes of luck, the team and its surrounding media won't have to fall back on excuses when things don't go as planned.
Dwight Howard participates in Lakers’ 1st practice (Yahoo! Sports)
02 Oct
2012
2012
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. (AP) -- Dwight Howard participated in his first practice with the Los Angeles Lakers on Tuesday, going through a lengthy workout with no apparent concerns about his surgically repaired back.
Dwight Howard ready to learn from Kobe with Lakers (Yahoo! Sports)
01 Oct
2012
2012
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. (AP) -- Dwight Howard flattened the creases across the chest of his brand-new gold jersey and joined his teammates for a group photo, joking around and laughing even while saying cheese.
Andrew Bogut dismisses the Lakers’ big ticket deals as ‘kind of the way it is’ in the NBA
21 Sep
2012
2012
The rumble isn't exactly a new one, fans and media have been complaining about the big-market superstar mashups for a few years now, but you get the feeling the noise is going to grow louder and louder throughout the 2012-13 season. Dwight Howard and Steve Nash just joined the Los Angeles Lakers, with one era's best point guard and another era's top center teaming up with the next-generation version of Kobe Bryant and a player in Pau Gasol that is far and away the most talented and versatile big man in the game. If it seems like an embarrassment of riches, it's because it is — possibly overshadowing that other embarrassment of riches, the 2012 champion Miami Heat, along the way.
And fans of just about every other team in the NBA are just left to vent, and complain. Same with coaches, GMs, and apparently starting centers. Starting with starting center Andrew Bogut, who started up on the Lakers in an interview with the San Jose Mercury News' Tim Kawakami:
-Q: You bring up Howard. What'd you think when Dwight and Nash end up in LA?
-BOGUT: (Shakes his head.) The rich get richer. That's generally how it is in the NBA. Grown accustomed to it the last five-six years. The rich get richer and the poor have to kind of scrounge and find other role players to fill it in. That's kind of the way it is.
This is the way it is, with four potential All-Star starters dotting Los Angeles' lineup, and talk of 73 wins in the air. But can we cut the complaining out now, please? Not to pick on Bogut, who was merely offering a mild bit of frustration sent Kawakami's way, but we need to get a few things straight.
1). NBA players want to be in flashy cities. Miami may not boast the biggest market, but the entire area is a spectacle of sorts, and most players want to embrace those sorts of things. The same goes for both teams in New York, Los Angeles, and potentially Chicago. This is how it has been for decades — players want a bit of flash at an age that they think will serve as the most vibrant and exciting part of their life.
2). Los Angeles did not get Dwight Howard and Steve Nash (and, while we're at it, Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol) merely because they're "Los Angeles." They acquired those players because they're lucky sons-of-you-knows, who also happen to be quite good at team -building.
There were reports around the 1996 NBA draft that Kobe Bryant would balk at the prospect of playing for New Jersey under John Calipari, and take his talents overseas, but even Bryant has admitted that these rumors were planted as a bluff; put in place once it became apparent that the Lakers were attempting to trade up in order to acquire Bryant's draft rights. Credit the Lakers for trading an All-Star level center in his prime for the rights to an 18-year-old that not everyone was sold on (peep the final paragraph in this 1996 feature on Bryant).
Gasol? He only became a Laker after the Memphis Grizzlies turned down significant overtures from several other teams for his services in the months leading up to the deal that sent him to the Lakers in February of 2008.
Yes, the Grizz lucked out that Marc Gasol worked his way into better shape while becoming an All-Star himself, but at the time the package that Memphis acquired for Pau wasn't nearly as good as the ones they had turned down in previous years from other teams. The Lakers just took advantage of Memphis finally deciding to sign off on rebuilding; years after the better cap space/draft pick/prospect packages Memphis had turned down from other teams had been frittered away.
Nash? Again, for years the Phoenix Suns turned down better offers than the relative pittance Los Angeles sent Arizona's way last July. The Lakers, as was the case with Gasol, just happened to be the ones left standing only after a middling team finally admitted that it was time to rebuild.
Howard? Yes, he's been living in Los Angeles since last spring, but the four-team deal that sent Dwight from Orlando to the Lakers was the end result of a needlessly convoluted and drawn out drama perpetuated by a selfish superstar and a franchise in Orlando that could not have handled things worse. The Orlando Magic ownership and front office made mistake after mistake with Howard before finally employing a new GM in (way too) late June to comb through the mess that they'd created, only to (if rumors are to be believed) overrule the well-respected young GM now in charge as they dealt Howard for pennies on the dollar and little cap relief.
And the Lakers, who took a chance on a 17-year-old Andrew Bynum in 2005 in the heart of Kobe's prime, had the piece in place to make it work. We've spent endless hours moaning about the Buss family and their mercurial ways, but theirs is a bottom line that they've created. This team took chances, and those chances have paid off. And by sheer luck with timing (trading a would-be All-Star in Caron Butler for Kwame Brown … only to turn Brown into Pau Gasol?), the Lakers have made it work.
This is a team that is 5 1/2 years removed from nearly turning Bynum into Jason Kidd. They waited, much to many people's chagrin, and now they have Dwight Howard to show for it. If only for a year.
These alternating strokes of genius and luck won't change the notion that NBA players only want to be in four or five cities — because NBA players do really want to be in only four or five cities. Given most North Americans' druthers, with the wealth in place to make it happen, a healthy percentage of us would do the same.
This won't stop the chorus, especially if the Oklahoma City Thunder has to pass on paying James Harden because of luxury tax concerns, and if Howard commits to Los Angeles with a contract extension next July.
It's going to be hard to root for the Lakers because of Howard's petulant act. We're over a month removed from the deal that sent Dwight to Los Angeles and the anger and frustration toward the immature 26-year-old (who turns 27 five weeks into this season) hasn't abated. It's just fine for that to carry over into the season, and beyond. Few players deserve what he's been handed, and Howard most certainly is not amongst those few.
The Lakers have earned what they've gotten, though. This is a team that smartly cobbled together assets and dug through two embarrassing second-round defeats before pouncing at the right time as they climb back toward relevance. To slough them off merely because they get to play with bigger bills than everyone else would be missing the point. The Knicks have a big payroll and a lot of maximum salaries, along with some pretty significant names on the roster. Nobody's scared of them, though.
It's going to be hard, but for the sake of fandom we're going to have to find a way to cut the whinin' and moaning. Starting with the starting centers.
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It is very well known that the working relationship between star center Dwight Howard and head coach Stan Van Gundy did not end well in Orlando. SVG said that Howard was trying to get him fired, Howard issued several complaints that SVG would make his actions public, Van Gundy was fired, and Dwight left in trade. All things considered, it was pretty much the worst possible resolution to the issues.
On the bright side, not all has been lost in the relationship between the two men. Currently, they're teaming up to do substantive good for Florida schools. From Mike Bianchi for the Orlando Sentinel (via EOB):
If you read my column last week, you know Van Gundy is the chairman of a political group in Seminole County called Citizens for Preservation of Property Values. The goal of the group is to increase property taxes in Seminole County to help preserve the area's traditionally strong public school system — a system that has been decimated by $73 million in budget cuts over the past five years. In the Nov. 6 general election, Seminole voters will decide whether to approve a 1-mill increase in property taxes for four years beginning a year from now. The increase would bring in as much as $25 million annually to the school district.
Van Gundy says Dwight, who was recently traded to the Lakers, is going to lend some financial backing to the cause. "Dwight has pledged his support," Van Gundy said Monday during an interview on our Open Mike radio show on 740 The Game. "He's a resident of Seminole County, and he's keeping his house here. I think his history will show that he's had great concern for kids in the Central Florida community. With him still living here, we asked him to help and he didn't hesitate."
Surprisingly to some, both Stan and Dwight say they are on good terms and have been communicating regularly over the last several weeks. Van Gundy even texted Howard and wished him good luck after he was traded to L.A.
It is typically considered good form to forgive and forget, and so we must give credit to SVG and Howard for working together to help others. Still, it's surprising that they could put all this behind them after some truly ugly action in Orlando. On the other hand, both seem to be happier now, and maybe that's all that matters.
[Also: Orlando Magic fan sues franchise over use of her image in ads]
It's a cliche to say that squabbles like the ones Van Gundy and Howard had in Orlando are "just business," but that seems to be their point of view in this case. Personally, I'm not sure that I could have seen past the arguments of the past, particularly if I'd been fired as a result. It's unlikely that these two are best friends these days, but it's also genuinely impressive that they were able to move on and do good for others. Dwight Howard has often looked like a child during this ordeal, but he deserves credit here for putting the past aside and doing good for the kids.
Outside the Game from Yahoo! Sports:
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Dwight Howard reprises role as Rock Callahan on Disney cartoon ‘Kick Buttowski: Suburban Daredevil’ (VIDEO)
18 Sep
2012
2012
Great news, fans of Dwight Howard's voiceover work! The Los Angeles Lakers center is back, one would presume by popular demand (no Clipse and Cam), to lend his vocal gifts to the Disney XD cartoon series "Kick Buttowski: Suburban Daredevil" in a new episode airing this Saturday, Sept. 22, at 11 a.m. Eastern and Pacific.
The show follows the exploits and adventures of a pint-sized, 13-year-old Evel Knievel-type called Kick — although, like Papa Doc, his real name is Clarence — who patterns himself in part after actor Rock Callahan, a giant, muscly action star voiced by Howard. In the episode airing Saturday, Callahan not only inspires Kick, but actually portrays the young daredevil in a movie-within-the-cartoon (which, as Trey Kerby notes at The Basketball Jones, is a little confusing) in which he must defeat a villain known as The Dark One, voiced by "Around the Horn" host Tony Reali, which is obviously completely reasonable and sensible. (Reali is following in the footsteps of his "Pardon the Interruption" colleagues Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon, who previously portrayed police officers on "Kick Buttowski.")
Howard first appeared on the show in the premiere episode of its second season, which aired back in April 2011 while Howard was still a member of the Orlando Magic. While not a regular on the show, his Rock Callahan has become a recurring character, a distinction also held by the likes of comedian Maria Bamford, former "SNL" cast member Will Forte, the great Brian Doyle-Murry and, of course, Fergie.
During an appearance at San Diego Comic-Con to promote the cartoon last year, Howard said he helped "shape the Rock character," according to Doug Williams of ESPN.com, investing himself deeply in the creative process by making sure the cartoon Dwight had broad shoulders, too:
"He's a laid-back superhero," said Howard. "He's just so cool. Actually, I got it from 'Shaft,' because that's one of my favorite movies. You can kind of see the resemblance between Rock Callahan and Shaft. They're just so cool."
Maybe it's just me, but I'm not sure I hear or see either Richard Roundtree or Samuel L. Jackson in Rock Callahan ... if anything, with that extend-o-goatee, I'm seeing Kendrick Perkins more than anything else. (It is perhaps worth noting that the show features a female character named Kendall Perkins, who is described as one of Kick's primary rivals and also perhaps a love interest, which is, it seems to me, a very clear allusion to the contentious and familiar relationship that Howard and Perkins developed in their myriad Eastern Conference battles in the latter half of last decade.) Maybe now that Perk has jettisoned his long, pointy chin hair, Howard can grow his own and bring Callahan to life. I'm sure that'd go over big in his new Hollywood home.
Video via espnfrontrow.
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