Is Dwight Howard a Villain for Wanting out of Orlando?

Dwight Howard wants out of Orlando, as the Orlando Sentinel reminded us this week. That's no secret. Does that make him a villain though? 

I suppose that depends on how you define villain. 

Here's the problem. When players are at this stage of their careers it seems no matter what happens they are vilified. 

If players ask to be traded they are "forcing" a trade and "pulling a 'Melo."

If players play out their contracts, then sign somewhere else they are "going LeBron" on you. 

If they don't do either and stick out their careers with the same team, they aren't great because they "never won a ring" even if they didn't win because they didn't have the right players around them. 

Let's bear in mind what compels a player like LeBron James, Chris Paul or Dwight Howard to go play somewhere else. Need. 

Free agents aren't beating down the doors of the small market teams.

Yes, there are some teams that are small market that have built contenders through the wiles and guile of their general managers. Most don't. 

That leaves the players in such markets between a rock and a hard place. Either play Hall of Fame careers in relative obscurity or forsake their homes and go to where other players are less reticent to join them. 

For the players, it's really not about "who is joining whom." For all this rhetoric about LeBron James "joining" Wade's team so he'll never be great, no one has made the same point about Chris Paul leaving New Orleans to be "Robin" to Blake Griffin's "Batman."

Paul left New Orleans to play in a major market where other players will play and he can have a chance to win a ring. 

Yes, the Oklahoma City Thunder proved that you can build a team through smart management and the draft, but let's not give Kevin Durant credit for that. He didn't build the team. He was a part of the building. 

Don't credit the building with what the architect designed, or fault it for a poor design. 

Kevin Durant doesn't need to go anywhere else to play for a championship. Neither does Derrick Rose. With both players there are things about their attitude and humility that deserve a lot of credit. Signing max contracts to stay on contenders is not among them. 

So no, Dwight Howard is not a villain for wanting to leave. I'd be inclined to say he's a villain for the way he's wanting to leave if it weren't for the history of people who have been criticized for leaving in the same manner. 

I'd like to say that he should keep his mouth shut, play hard and then leave at the end of the season. The only thing is when LeBron James did that, he was virtually crucified for it.

And yes, I know that people say it's for the "way he did it," i.e. The Decision, but I am convinced that if he had stayed in Cleveland no one would complain about the show. If he had left in any other way, people would have complained about the "way he did it" and said it wasn't what he did but it was the way he did it. 

No. It was what he did, not the way he did it. It's just that actually criticizing him for what he did is hard to build a case around so straw men are erected about the way he did it. 

So no, Dwight Howard is not a villain for wanting out of Orlando. He's just the next easy fodder for a judgmental and narcissistic media to stand in high-minded judgment of.