ShareThisThe worst part about the Dwight Howard drama in Orlando Fla., is that someone else still wants him.
That's today's NBA.
If a guy can play -- if he can put you in the championship chase, pack your arena and sell lots of jerseys -- you want him.
You want his talent, his marquee presence, his lucrative marketability.
It doesn't matter that he has proven to be a me-first prima donna who selfishly puts his wants ahead of team goals.
Or that he lacks the class and professionalism to keep quiet about his wish to play elsewhere, even though he knows every public utterance undermines his coach, distracts his teammates and alienates the team's fans.
It doesn't matter that, despite being a team captain whose salary this season approaches $18 million, he cares more about leaving than leading.
If the guy is a difference-maker, which is what Howard is supposed to be, some other team will take him. Some team in Los Angeles, or the New York metropolitan area, or Dallas. Maybe some team in Chicago.
Eventually, though, Howard will get his way ... and get away. He'll force the Magic to trade him to a team of his liking before the league's March 15 deadline, or he'll play out the season and opt out of the final year of his contract in July.
Either way, he's gone.
Really, he's already gone, mentally if not physically, and everyone knows it -- especially his Magic teammates.
They know he wants out of Orlando, where he's the face of the franchise. They know he wants to play with a stronger supporting cast in a bigger basketball town. They know he doesn't want to play with them.
So is it any surprise that they no longer have any burning desire to play with him? It's no coincidence that the more attention the Howard soap opera gets, the worse his team plays. Before beating the woeful Washington Wizards on Wednesday, the Magic had lost six of their previous eight games, scoring fewer than 70 points in three of them.
True, the Magic sorely misses injured point guard Jameer Nelson. The team was plodding through a grueling, six-games-in-eight-nights stretch. Shots weren't falling.
It's also true, however, that all this trade talk and Howard's impending departure is taking a toll on the players -- and the coach, Stan Van Gundy -- he'll soon leave behind. The chemistry, cohesion and trust that define most championship contenders have been noticeably absent during this dismal downturn, which followed an optimistic, 11-4 start.
That's on Howard.
Not Van Gundy.
But guess who's going to get the blame? A good coach likely will get fired because his best player wants out and doesn't care if he sinks the season to get his way.
That's shameful.
What's worse, though, is that someone else would want a player who did that.
But someone else does.
That's today's NBA.
(Ray McNulty is sports columnist for Scripps Treasure Coast (Fla.) Newspapers, The Stuart News, Fort Pierce Tribune and Vero Beach Press Journal. On the Web at www.tcpalm.com.)
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