Is It Time for the Dallas Mavericks To Cut Josh Howard Loose?

To begin: I am a Josh Howard fan. I love the way he dribbles the ball across half court, looking like he's supremely uncoordinated, and all of a sudden he takes that first step into the paint, and before you know it, he's pulled up for a J or driven to the basket for a lay-up.

Other than Dirk Nowitzki, he's been the only constant for the Dallas Mavericks since they were a team on the rise in 2003-04 and now as they start to decline in 2009-10. Of the current Dallas Mavericks, Howard and Jason Kidd are the only two players drafted by the Mavs, and Kidd took quite a detour to come back.

In many ways, he’s been the X-factor for the Mavericks over the last few years—when he’s good, the Mavs are good.

In their run to the Finals, the golden rule of the Mavericks was if Josh scores more than 20, the Mavericks win. The Mavs went 18-0 when he scored 20 in the 2005-06 season and 6-2 in the playoffs, with the last two losses coming in the Finals, games five and six.

The next season the Mavs went 29-3 when he scored over 20, all while the Mavs were on their way to a franchise-best 67-15. The year after, they went 24-11, which is a career-high 35 20-point games.

Given that Jason Kidd came to Dallas and was supposed to create shots for Howard, it looked like the sky was the limit. And the Mavericks did go 15-4 in 2008-09 when Josh scored 20, but he just didn’t do it that often.

He was banged up and missed a lot of time, but that didn’t stop him from helping the Mavs topple the Spurs in the first round of the playoffs last year, both on the defensive and offensive end.

On a bad wheel and a bad wrist, he took on the assignment of guarding Carmelo Anthony in the next round, and while he did it to varying degrees of success, the Mavericks were outdone by the Nuggs.

But Josh has had his share of boners as well. A poorly-timed birthday party and admission of pot use. His little American flag incident. Drag racing charges that were eventually dropped.

As much as we like Josh, we have to accept that he comes with some baggage. On his best day, Howard is like a rich man's Andrei Kirilenko, capable of scoring, rebounding assisting and defending with the best swingmen in the league. On his worst, he's like a poor man's Ben Gordon, mercilessly jacking up jumpers that never go in.

While as Mavs fans we can forgive streaky shooting (see: Terry, Jason); it's the mental baggage that Josh comes with that is starting to slowly inch Howard out of Big D.

Marc Stein reported last week that the Mavs brass deliberately keep Josh Howard out of any trade gossip, for fear of what it will do to his apparently fragile psyche. Is he the sort of player you want when the game, season, and possibly a championship is on the line?

The answer, of course, is no, and Rick Carlisle agrees with me, since he's been leaving Howard out of the lineup during crunch time. A lineup of Kidd, Terry, Marion, Dirk and Dampier has been out during crunch time.

That's because Howard just hasn't looked up to form lately. It's not just his abysmal shooting performance (which has been terrible); it's his body language. He doesn't look interested in the games.

Then is it a coincidence that this has only gotten worse as trade rumors about Howard for someone like Kevin Martin or Andre Igoudala have come out? Methinks not.

So is it time for the Mavericks to finally cut ties with Josh Howard, the same Josh Howard who is essentially an $11 million expiring contract? Do they trade him at the deadline? Flip him and Dampier for a premium free agent this summer? Or do they renew his team option and put him in place at the shooting guard, leaving the hole at center to be filled with whoever the Mavs can get for Damp's contract?

It's a tough question, and one that goes beyond basketball for many Mavs fans. Deep down inside of us, we fear that he will go all Devin Harris on us, get reawakened by new surroundings, and becoming the player we always hoped to be, only in another uniform.

I'm not for just giving Howard away for the sake of change. After all, we know the type of player he can be when properly motivated. But is he properly motivated? And if not, why not? Is being surrounded by two hall-of-famers and on a team with a puncher's chance at a title not enough motivation?

If he's the type of player that can't get motivated by what the Mavs are doing this season, then it's time to dump Jo-Ho for a player who will move them forward, not drag them down. And if Jo-Ho wants to get his act together, both the team and the fans would love to have him along for the ride.