Dwight Howard free agency watch: Bracing for Evil Superman
Dwight Howard is one of the most lovable players in basketball. A 7’0″ physical specimen who bounds around the court with a giant smile while playfully calling himself Superman, Howard just exudes charisma and appeal.
Entering the league as an exuberant mass of basketball potential, Howard has matured into the dominant low-post player scouts dreamed of when he was drafted first overall in 2004. Often criticized for his inability to do anything but out-muscle defenders on his way to thunderous dunks, Howard’s offensive repertoire has been fleshed out by a now mythical three days with Hakeem Olajuwon last fall.
Whereas once Howard would fling his body wildly in the hopes of drawing a foul, he now unleashes skyhooks and dreamshakes that effortlessly glide into the hoop.
Howard also takes naturally to self-promotion, which has helped him parlay his physical gifts into a highly marketable image. His Superman persona is enjoyably egotistical, the type of little kid stunt that we’d like to imagine ourselves doing if roles were reversed and it was us instead of Howard who was so athletically gifted that we routinely embarrassed some of the most elite players in the world.
In some ways, Howard is the ideal professional athlete, attractive to the men for his ruthlessly dominant play; attractive to the ladies for his cute cuddly persona and chiseled, broad shoulders.
Rumors of Howard’s departure from the Orlando Magic reached a fever pitch during the frenzy of the Trade Deadline maelstrom. Enterprising NBA muckrakers volleyed rhetorical firebombs on the deadly new trend of “Superteams,” and people who were paid to imagine such things began forecasting possible combinations of superstars, each more fiendishly devilish than the next.
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The looming free agent class of 2012 (next-next summer) became a flashpoint for fears of an imbalanced league infected by a host of once-proud basketball cities reduced to Cavalier-like levels of misfortune by ego and greed.
Dwight Howard’s contract with the Orlando Magic expires in 2012, and like presidential candidates, speculation about Howard’s plans has run rampant. He, like every good diplomat, remained delightfully vague about his future plans when dealing with the media, instead gently reminding everyone that there is still a season and a half to be played before he makes his decisions, and also that he was a spokesman for Gatorade if any of his interviewers happened to be dehydrated.
So while NBA pundits migrated away to topics like Jerry Sloan’s gunplay and the Heat’s masculinity, the fact remains that Dwight Howard will “soon” be entering into the most delicate part of his career.
Coming off your rookie contract is like having an NBA bar mitzvah, the day you become an NBA man. Dwight may be 26 when his contract expires, but he’s only 13 in NBA years, old enough to start making decisions about who to take to prom.
Like LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony before him, as the date of his free agency nears, scrutiny of Howard’s actions will intensify. By creating such a lovable caricature of himself, Howard may have placed even more untenable expectations on his behavior. We expect the average NBA superstar to refrain from whining about employment circumstances. They are, after all, paid millions of dollars to entertain us, so we trend towards being unsympathetic to their possibly real life grievances. By selling us an image of unrelenting positivity, Howard’s threshold is even lower.
Becoming an NBA villain happens fast. Upset a vocal minority and the zeitgeist joins against you in a show of solidarity. Once the mantle of Evil gets placed upon your head, no amount of smiling and dressing up as a superhero can redeem you. As the stakes of Howard’s decision rise, so too will the likelihood that he comes out the other side perceived as a disloyal backstabber.
The equation might not be fair, but NBA arenas charge $8.50 for foot-long hotdogs; life isn’t fair.
The last ingredient in the Dwight Howard Stew of Intrigue is that he currently leads the NBA in technical fouls. Critics call this a remnant of Howard’s immaturity, a sign that he still hasn’t crystallized into the superstar he thinks he is.
Howard’s companions on the list tell a different story. Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett and Carmelo Anthony join him as players who have 10 or more technical fouls this season. Like Howard, Garnett, Anthony and Bryant are also perennial All-Stars and championship-caliber players.
Tellingly, though, those three also rank high on the list of NBA public enemies, players who have passed through the crucible of public opinion and have emerged as classic NBA heels. All three have reinvented themselves as thick-skinned, ruthless players with a take-no-prisoners approach to basketball. Melo has embraced love in New York and hate on the road. Kobe Bryant changed his number and dubbed himself the Black Mamba. Garnett barks like a dog and scares the shit out of young children.
All of which is to say, soon Howard may find himself in their company, once a hero, now a disgraced mercenary. He will have to reinvent himself, grow into his new role, and shut everyone up by winning multiple championships.
And if we’re lucky, he’ll look something like this.
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