Four seasons after he retired from the game, in his first year of eligibility, Dwight Howard was elected to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, according to ESPN’s senior NBA insider Shams Charania. Howard joins fellow first-balloter Carmelo Anthony in the class of 2025, which will be announced in its entirety during a ceremony at the NCAA Final Four in San Antonio, on Saturday, April 5.
Over 18 seasons with seven teams, Howard, who won his only NBA championship with the 2020 Los Angeles Lakers in the Bubble, was a highly decorated player and an eight-time All-Star. He also made eight All-NBA teams, won Defensive Player of the Year three times and helped the 2008 Olympic “Redeem Team” to its first of five consecutive gold medals after the 2004 team lost three games, the last to Argentina, while settling for the bronze.
For his career, Howard averaged 15.7 points and 11.8 rebounds, but he was much more impactful and dominant than those statistics would indicate during his hey days in Orlando, where he led the Magic to the 2009 Finals against Kobe Bryant and the Lakers.
Howard was a man amongst boys in Orlando, where coach Stan Van Gundy designed a system that at the time was innovative, with four shooters around his center, who was not a traditional post scorer but was so imposing physically that he basically demanded double teams. That is the team that many experts refer to as first unlocking the power of the 3-pointer, even if the volume of shots appears laughably low in comparison to today’s league, and it was built entirely around the 6’11 Howard, who also tortured opponents on the glass and as an athletic-freak of nature shot blocker.
In the summer of 2012, Howard departed Orlando for the Lakers, who attempted to construct their third version of a super team with him and Steve Nash alongside Bryant and Pau Gasol. However, it did not work out as planned. Nash’s body had a lot of miles on it and was broken down by that point, and the Lakers limped into the playoffs as the No. 7 seed and were promptly swept by Tim Duncan and the Spurs.
Embed from Getty ImagesHoward never fit with Bryant, from a basketball nor personality standpoint, and after just one tumultuous year of playing together, Howard shockingly left an extra $30 million on the table to sign with the Houston Rockets, where he spent his next three seasons, earning the last of his All-Star selections in 2014.
From there Howard never again played for the same team for two consecutive seasons, with stops in Atlanta, Charlotte and Washington before going back to the Lakers in 2019-20, when he was a serious contributor to the aforementioned championship that the Lakers won over the Miami Heat on the strength of size and defense. He was huge on the offensive glass for that team, and he gave the Lakers a second seven-foot defender alongside Anthony Davis. That Lakers team bullied its way to a title, and Howard was a big part of it.
After a season with Philadelphia, Howard came back to the Lakers for a third time for the final season of what is now, officially, a Hall of Fame career.
