Dwight Howard is a world-class goofball.
In the words of a former teammate, he was: "A great farter. He can fart. He can fart loud — the loudest farts. Silent farts."
He was so prolific that the Orlando Magic had to make a rule about it. He reportedly ate so much candy — as many as 24 candy bars a day — that the Lakers team nutritionist suspected it was causing nerve dysfunction, responsible for the tingling he was feeling in his fingers and hands. He toyed with a move to the WWE as his NBA career was winding down. He was criticized for smiling too much.
But, as David Roth pointed out back in 2013, all that good-natured goofing wasn't nearly as fun as it sounds:
"If Howard were simply a grown man earnestly and passionately parsing the different flavor profiles in a bag of Wild Berry Skittles, he would be a goofball, and maybe a beloved one. Because of Howard’s insight-resistant grandiosity, though — his insistence on being not just at the center of attention, but surrounded by grinning supplicants — there’s something ridiculous and half-tragically self-satirizing about him."
If you're an NBA fan of a certain age — let's say 25 or younger — you probably only really remember Howard for these kinds of shenanigans. He made his final All-Star team in 2013-14, kicking off a rapid decline that saw him change teams every single season for the final six years of his career before playing his final NBA game in 2022. As a player, he was never really the same after he left the Magic in 2012, and the final decade of his career was defined by his personality rather than his production.
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As of this weekend, Dwight Howard will be a Hall of Famer. And, for many people, it will be difficult to reconcile that fact with his world-class goofballings. But if you mostly remember Howard for farting, gulping Skittles, sulking in pursuit of dead-end post-up possessions and bringing serious unseriousness to the biggest moments of a basketball game, then you're missing a big part of the picture.
It's hard to capture just what a force Howard was in his prime. He'll be forever linked with Shaq because of their painfully stupid rivalry, but I'm not sure I've seen another player who came as close in his combination of power and quickness. He didn't just block shots, he would simply snatch them out of mid-air.
He was capable of graceful, balletic dunks, with athletic, midair adjustments and impossible alley-oop catches. But he could also go over and through a 7-foot, 260-pound, elite rim protector like he wasn't even there.
I couldn't care less about his Slam Dunk Contest win, but his best in-game dunks can stand up to anyone's. Simply unmatched grace and power.
And he wasn't just a highlight machine. Howard won Defensive Player of the Year three consecutive seasons, and was almost as dangerous in space as he was in the paint. He led the league in blocks twice, rebounding five times and field goal percentage once. Yes, he was ghastly from the free-throw line, but he was such a scoring force around the basket that it often didn't even matter. (How about a total of 895 career and-ones?) And while injuries marred the end of his career, he was remarkably durable — playing all 82 games four times in his career (LeBron has done it once) and 70+ a dozen times.
Lots of people remember Derrick Rose's 2011 MVP as questionable, but fewer remember that Howard was the one who was snubbed. He finished second in the voting that season, averaging 22.9 points, 14.1 rebounds, 1.4 assists, 2.4 blocks and 1.4 steals per game while shooting 59.3 percent from the field. He did that for a 52-win team with Jameer Nelson, Brandon Bass, Jason Richardson and Hedo Turkoglu as the best players around him.
Don't forget the playoffs. He carried the Magic to the 2009 NBA Finals, and then back to the Eastern Conference Finals the following year. In five postseasons with the Magic, he played in 57 games, winning 30 and averaging 19.9 points, 14.4 rebounds and 2.8 blocks per game. He disappointed in plenty of ways, but he doesn't get nearly enough credit for the ways in which he succeeded.
People can be more than one thing. Howard was silly and infuriating and certainly didn't respond to adversity the way many of his biggest fans would have liked. But he was also one of the most physically dominating players in league history, and his peak was longer and better and more successful than you probably remember. There is absolutely no doubt that he has earned a place in the Hall of Fame.
If you want to remember him farting his way through pregame layup lines and obstinately calling for the ball on the low block while James Harden begs for a high screen, so be it. I'll be over here watching him steal the ball from Ray Allen and then make Kendrick Perkins look like Eddie House.