Dwight Howard averaged 16.6 points, 12.5 rebounds and 1.6 blocks for the Charlotte Hornets last year. (Chuck Burton/Associated Press)
The Los Angeles Lakers added LeBron James. The Golden State Warriors wooed DeMarcus Cousins. And now it appears the Washington Wizards are expected to sign a one-year contract with eight-time all-star Dwight Howard once his buyout with the Brooklyn Nets is complete.
The 32-year-old center has averaged a double-double in each of his 14 NBA seasons and chipped in 16.6 points, 12.5 rebounds and 1.6 blocks for the Charlotte Hornets last season, making him the logical starter in the middle of a lineup that needed an upgrade after Marcin Gortat was sent to the Los Angeles Clippers for Austin Rivers, leaving Ian Mahinmi and Jason Smith to play those minutes. Most importantly, Howard could be the “athletic big” that point guard John Wall clamored for at the end of the season.
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Howard could fill the void left by Gortat on the pick-and-roll. Gortat was one of the best at creating screen assists, a mostly thankless job that involves sacrificing your body for the good of the team with little-to-no credit beyond a kudo from a coach or tick mark in the NBA’s hustle stats page. He ranked fourth in the NBA last season for screen assists per game (4.5) but Howard wasn’t far behind at No. 6 (4.2). Plus Howard will be an upgrade to Gortat as the roll man during the pick-and-roll, averaging 1.04 points per possession (43rd percentile) compared to Gortat’s dismal 0.88 points per possession (14th percentile) in 2017-18.
Defensively, Howard and Gortat are a wash. Gortat was ranked as the 19th best defender per ESPN’s defensive Real Plus Minus last season, which factors in teammates and opponents, six slots ahead of Howard’s end-of-season ranking, the difference being 0.3 net points per 100 possessions. Howard was also an average defender against the pick-and-roll (49th percentile for points allowed per possession) but above average against spot-up shooters (55 percentile) and very good against players in isolation (82nd percentile). The defense against those two play types is desirable — the Wizards were called on to defend spot-up shooters more than any other play type and they were 25th in the league at stopping players in isolation.
But Howard isn’t a perfect fit.
His playing style is in stark contrast to the modern NBA. For example, more than a third of his possessions with Charlotte last season were post-ups. Among centers, only Boban Marjanovic, Al Jefferson and Joel Embiid had a larger share of their possessions with their backs to the basket. Looked at another way, Howard had more post-up possessions on his own in 2017-18 (499) than the Wizards did as a team (462). And not only is that play type inefficient for him — Howard produced 0.83 points per possession this way, putting him in the bottom 40 percent of NBA scorers — defenses would much prefer that than allow Wall, Bradley Beal or Otto Porter Jr. to get an open three-point attempt or push the ball in transition.
You could argue that passes out of the post create open shots from beyond the three-point line, but Howard passed out of the post just 15 percent of the time, plus not all of those went to a spot-up shooter on the perimeter. And the Hornets had plenty of threats from deep: Kemba Walker averaged 7.5 three-point attempts per game, connecting on 38 percent of those; Marvin Williams hit better than 41 percent of his three-point attempts; reserves Frank Kaminsky and Jeremy Lamb both finished the season as above-average three-point shooters.
There is one more red flag. Howard led the league in technical fouls last season (15), and between him, Markieff Morris and Kelly Oubre Jr., Washington will have three of the top 10 players for most technical fouls in 2017-18.
Will this move put the Wizards on par with championship-caliber teams in the East such as the Boston Celtics, Toronto Raptors and Philadelphia 76ers? Probably not, but it keeps them in the hunt as they try to establish conference supremacy now that James has taken his talents out west.
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