Tonight, the Lakers and Dwight Howard will face each other for the first time since the messy divorce over the summer that had Howard packing his bags for Houston, leaving the Lakers scrambling to fill their roster.
This day has been imminent, and it’s still not entirely clear as to why Howard decided to forego $30 million and an extra year of security to go play for the Rockets, and that reason will continue to remain open to question, according to Sam Amick of the USA Today.
“I thought it was irrelevant to talk about why I left L.A. at this point. It happened this summer. I left. People make decisions. People change jobs. People change their minds every day, but I mean, it is what it is.”
And at this point, Howard may be right. The reason why he left Los Angeles doesn’t change a thing. Both parties are in the midst of another NBA season, this time they’ll be without each other, and it may be for the better.
Howard was brought in to potentially be the one to carry the torch when Kobe Bryant calls it quits, and for whatever reason, that plan didn’t exactly work out. Now, with Howard gone, the Lakers will have a surplus of cap space to give to the free agents who are willing to come.
Howard’s style and personality didn’t fit what the Lakers have represented over the years — and that’s not exactly a knock on him as there have been and will be myriad players who will not fit that role. It may not have been the most pleasant of exits, but why it happened doesn’t really matter.
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