Three-and-a-half years ago, Dwight Howard
slumped his shoulders inside Staples Center and responded sheepishly on the
issue of Shaquille O'Neal trashing him over and over.
"I can't tell you why he's said a lot of
discouraging things," Howard said to me. "I wish he wouldn't say it because he's
one of the few guys that we all look up to."
As a 23-year-old reaching the NBA Finals
against the Los Angeles Lakers, Howard was still an earnest young star searching
out the blessing that never came from Shaq.
For all the preaching Shaq had done about
paying respect to your elders, Howard never understood why his relentless praise
of Shaq was reciprocated with ridicule and scorn. Howard never understood why
Shaq didn't see it as flattering that an engaging, dynamic young center had
grown up idolizing, even emulating, him.
"Shaq played the game and he is done,"
Howard told reporters on Thursday. "It's time to move on. He hated the fact when
he played that older guys were talking about him and how he played. Now he's
doing the exact same thing. Just let it go. There's no sense for him to be
talking trash to me. He did his thing in the league. Sit back and
relax.
"Your time is up."
Howard doesn't need to respond to Shaq to
win over Kobe Bryant, because Bryant's already a believer in him. Bryant knows
that Howard will come to work every day, that he'll keep himself physically fit.
Those are things that Bryant could never count upon with O'Neal. Howard doesn't
need to stand up to Shaq for Kobe's sake, but his own.
Howard has come to the Lakers to win
championships, the way that Shaq did all those years ago. He's an iconic talent,
and Shaq's kidding himself to try to minimize Howard's dominance. The greatest
Lakers center before Shaq believed that, too – long before Howard made his way
to Los Angeles.
Outside the interview room that day
during the June '09 NBA Finals, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar shook his head, and told me
of Shaq, "Sometimes I wonder about his maturity. He doesn't need to do that.
He's achieved so much. I don't know why he stoops to that."
Shaq is a forever star in the NBA, and
gets paid to deliver his opinions on television now. Howard has earned
criticism, absorbed it, and yet his talent is too immense for Shaq to believe
for a moment that Lakers fans will be longing for him over Howard this
season.
Dwight Howard might not make his Los
Angeles Lakers debut in the team's Oct. 30 season-opener against the Dallas
Mavericks after all. Howard is now hopeful he can return from back surgery
earlier than expected and possibly play in the preseason.
"Hopefully, I will be back for some
preseason games," Howard said following the Lakers' first practice on Monday. "I
think we are going to need it for chemistry and all that stuff."
When asked if his optimism was reason to
think he would definitely play on opening night, Howard was more cautious with
his words.
"All I know is we had a great practice
today," he said. "I don't know the date when I will return. But I'm looking
forward to tomorrow's practice to see how my body feels when I wake up. We can
only go by time right now and how I feel after practice. We are not in a rush.
These guys need me for the whole season."
Howard had been playing one-on-one games
against assistant coaches Darvin Ham and Chuck Person prior to the start of
training camp. Lakers coach Mike Brown said Howard took part in the majority of
Tuesday's lengthy practice that lasted about four hours, but Howard was given a
break during a drill to give his feet a rest. The Lakers engaged in light work
on the Princeton offense with Howard taking part in each first-team exercise.
Howard said he had no setbacks.
The Lakers play their first preseason
game Sunday against the Golden State Warriors in Fresno, Calif. Howard isn't
expected to be in uniform. But even if Howard doesn't play in the preseason, the
Lakers still have 23 practices scheduled before the start of the season, giving
him and Steve Nash time to build chemistry with their new teammates.
"As long as he's in practice and able to
go through things offensively, go through our system and stuff like that, I
don't think it will be an issue," Bryant said.
Lakers assistant coach Eddie Jordan spent
time at the end of practice working with the players on implementing the
Princeton offense. The Lakers averaged 97.3 points per game last season, a drop
of more than four points per game from what they averaged in the 2010-11 season
while running Phil Jackson's triangle offense.
Bryant, who has met with Brown and Jordan
about the offense, is excited about the change.
"The more talent you have, the more
imperative it is to have an equal opportunity system where you let the flow of
the game determine which shots come for me," Bryant said. "You just work to get
the best shot possible and really just read the defense."
Terrence Williams has agreed to an NBA
minimum, non-guaranteed contract with the Detroit Pistons.
Williams will report to Oct. 1 to
Detroit's training camp.
He was drafted No. 11 overall in the 2009
NBA draft by New Jersey, but hasn't played up to his potential.
The 6-foot-6 Williams averaged 8.4 points
in 78 games, including nine starts, as a rookie for the Nets. They traded him to
Houston during his second season in the league after he repeatedly broke team
rules and played just 11 games. He averaged 8.8 points in 18 games last season
in Sacramento and 4.5 points over 12 games with Houston. The 25-year-old
Williams is from Seattle and was a standout for Louisville.
One of the things that earned Bruce Bowen
a reputation as one of the NBA's chippiest (and some, even former teammates,
might say flat-out dirtiest) defenders over the course of his 13-year NBA career
was his penchant for sticking his foot underneath an opposing jump shooter after
contesting a shot so that, when the shooter came back down to the floor, he ran
a serious risk of stepping awkwardly on Bowen's foot and turning his ankle (or
worse). The practice was at the heart of a November 2006 Sports Illustrated
feature on Bowen, in which most executives interviewed said they didn't think
the eight-time All-Defensive Team selection was intentionally trying to hurt
opponents with dirty pool.
And with that, we come to "The Jalen Rose
Show," a podcast on ESPN.com's Grantland Network in which the Fab Five member
talks shop and spins yarns from his playing days with producer Dave Jacoby. In a
clip from the show released Tuesday through Grantland's new YouTube channel (the
same outlet that gave us the stellar documentary on Houston Rockets rookie Royce
White's draft-day experience), Rose reiterates that not sticking your foot under
a shooter is basketball's "No. 1 unwritten rule" ... and then relates a story of
when, as a member of the Indiana Pacers, he himself did it on the sport's
biggest stage.
"NBA Finals, 2000," Rose says. "Kobe.
Bean. Bryant. Goes up for a jump shot on the right wing, I contest the jump
shot, Kobe lands on my foot. He hobbles off, and he actually misses the next
game."
Rose is talking about Game 2 of the 2000
Finals. After getting drubbed by the Los Angeles Lakers by 17 points in Game 1
thanks to a monster Shaquille O'Neal performance (43 points on 21-for-31
shooting, 19 rebounds, four assists and three blocks in 44 minutes), the Pacers
were hanging with L.A., playing to a 28-all tie after the first quarter. Then,
in the second quarter:
Bryant played just nine minutes in Game
2, which the Lakers went on to win by seven, but as Rose says, he missed Game 3,
which Indiana won 100-91 to get back into the series at 2-1.
"Now, if it was up to me? If it was up to
me? He should've just missed the whole series," Rose says. "I would've had a
championship ring, and it'd be no harm, no foul."
Dwight Howard won't finish his
rehabilitation from back surgery in time for the start of the Los Angeles
Lakers' training camp or their first preseason game next month.
The Lakers provided an update on the
newly acquired center's condition on their website Thursday night, confirming
their long-anticipated decision to take it easy in Howard's return from spinal
surgery.
The team doesn't intend to announce a
timetable for Howard's recovery, but says he won't participate in the start of
training camp on Oct. 2, or the preseason opener in Fresno five days
later.
The six-time All-Star has said he hopes
to be ready for the start of the regular season Oct. 30, but the team isn't
speculating.
Howard recently began working with the
Lakers' training staff on his recovery from surgery last April repairing a
herniated disc and doing additional cleanup. Howard's personal trainer is
working alongside the Lakers' staff, and the center has experienced no
setbacks.
Howard is doing core stabilization
training while also getting in a little light running and shooting.
The Lakers can afford to be cautious with
their new big man, acquired from Orlando in a four-team trade on Aug. 10 that
sent All-Star center Andrew Bynum to Philadelphia.
Pau Gasol will be ready to play in the
middle when training camp opens in two weeks, and the Lakers have years of
experience in dealing with injured centers during Bynum's injury
struggles.
Way back in late June, when the Miami
Heat's championship was but a few days old, Dwyane Wade indicated that he would
hire a shooting coach this summer. It was a smart move for a player who
occasionally looked a little limited in the playoffs, both because of injury and
the diminished athleticism that comes with it. At 30 years old, Wade is reaching
a point where he has to adjust his game to a changing set of skills and
abilities.
However, Wade's work has not focused
solely on his shot. In fact, he's particularly focused on another aspect of his
mechanics: the catch.
By "catch," Wade is referring to more
than just catch-and-shoot situations — the issue is really more about how he
brings the ball up into his motion in all shooting situations. It's similar to
how a hitter in baseball must work on both his step as well as the swing
itself.
When we talk about shooting, we typically
look at the most obvious elements of the play: squaring up, elevating,
releasing, following through, etc. What Wade recognizes, though, is that
athletic motions are interrelated. In other words, a player can't shoot properly
if he doesn't first get himself in a good position to shoot, just as a point
guard can't make a good pass if he doesn't first get himself a usable passing
lane. It's a holistic view of the sport, not one where skills can be isolated as
if one didn't affect the other.
As Wade ages, then, changing his game
won't just be a matter of adding and discarding various aspects of his game.
He'll have to consider how those individual parts relate to each other and the
kind of player he wants to be. He can't flip a switch and become a different
kind of player — the transition never ends.
After cleaning up a record number of
medals at the Olympics, Michael Phelps has extended his winning streak at the
poker table.
According to TMZ, the retired gold
medalist raked in $100k from a single poker game at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas
this week.
A source reports that the 27-year-old
athlete spent a chunk of it afterwards at Tryst nightclub in the
Wynn.
Recently, Phelps came under fire for
possible International Olympic Committee violations when photos for his Louis
Vuitton ad campaign were leaked during the London Games. The IOC prohibits
athletes from promoting non-official sponsors during a time period around the
Games. Sanctions include stripping medals won by the offenders.
However, Phelps' agent Peter Carlisle
insists the leaks were not the fault of the
swimmer. "He didn't violate Rule 40;
it's as simple as that. All that matters is whether the athlete permitted that
use. That's all he can control. In this case, Michael did not authorize that
use. The images hadn't even been reviewed, much less approved. It's as simple as
that. An athlete can't control unauthorized uses any more than you can guarantee
someone isn't going to break into your house."
