NBA Trade Rumors: Predicting Where Dwight Howard Lands If He's Not Traded

Dwight Howard is both the biggest name and the biggest man on the NBA trading block. The Orlando Magic center, who will enter free agency at the conclusion of this season, has been the subject of trade rumors ever since the lockout came to an end.

He could be headed to any number of NBA cities in any number of varied blockbuster-type trade scenarios.

What if he doesn't get traded by the deadline, though?

What if Howard stays put and makes a deep playoff run in Orlando?

What if the NBA season concludes in June and Howard is still wearing an Orlando Magic uniform?

That possibility is not discussed that often, but it has a real shot of happening. LeBron James was not dealt; neither was Chris Bosh. The terms of individual impending free agents make trades more or less palpable to individual teams.

The Magic are currently 22-13. They have one of the best records in the league. Yes, they're in second place behind intrastate rival Miami, but to assume the Magic are a one-and-done type of postseason team is probably not a safe bet.

The Magic know that at this point, their leverage in a trade has been compromised. Howard has alluded to wanting out of Orlando. That hurts the team's ability to deal him. Add in the fact that any would-be pursuer knows that Howard may very well be on the free-agent market in a few months, and that team may feel like there's no need to give the Magic a host of young players or draft picks to acquire a player who may be available at only a high monetary cost.

So maybe Orlando rolls the dice and banks on Howard leading the team on a deep playoff run. Those types of runs can sometimes build a real bond within teams. Perhaps that bond will result in Howard deciding that the best spot for him is the one he's currently in.

If Howard won't be committing to the Magic for the majority of his Hall of Fame career, where will he play out his remaining years? If he's not traded and doesn't stay in Orlando, who will be his most persistent pursuers?  

The Los Angeles Lakers

If you believe in history repeating itself, and if you think that the Lakers' unusual front-office ineptitude this past season has been more of an aberration than a sign of a trend, you have to think that Dwight Howard in a Laker uniform is a distinct possibility.

You don't have to like it, you don't have to root for it, but you have to think it could happen.

It wasn't that long ago that another young, physically imposing and dynamic center roamed the paint for the Orlando Magic, making playoff runs, dunking, all with a big personality and a lack of NBA titles. 

That man was, of course, Shaquille O'Neal, and when the time came to become a free agent Orlando was unable to sign him to an extension and failed to trade him, and eventually he chose the Los Angeles Lakers as his new team.

That was in the summer of 1996. Now, 16 seasons later, lots of things have changed but a lot are still the same. Howard, like O'Neal, is enduring a final season under contract in Orlando while playing on a good team. He's also dealing with some fan and media backlash over his impending free agency. He's also still wearing a Magic uniform late, even as the season reaches the All-Star break.

The Lakers of 2011-12 are a team in need of an influx of youth and talent. Ironically enough, they don't need a center. Andrew Bynum may be the second-best center in the league after Howard. Yet acquiring Howard would allow the Lakers to deal power forward Pau Gasol.

Gasol is a lanky, versatile power forward who is still playing basketball at a high level. Dealing Gasol would allow the Lakers to acquire either a young point guard or a scoring small forward, both of which the Lakers need to round out what would be an imposing starting five.

Howard choosing the Lakers would hardly be a shock to any longtime fan of the NBA. In fact, it might even be expected at this point.

The Boston Celtics

There are probably two things that any team hoping to land Howard with a long-term deal will need: available money and a realistic chance of winning an NBA title. 

The Celtics, who are going to be bidding goodbye to aging veterans Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen at the conclusion of this season, are going to have the money. They have the tradition as well. It's a tradition that adding Howard would keep intact.

The Celtics, who have two first-round picks in the upcoming NBA draft, could add Howard to Rajon Rondo and Paul Pierce. Pierce, who has begun to show his age, would benefit greatly from not being the primary option of offense. Rondo would benefit by having another dependable offensive threat on the floor.

The Celtics are woefully shorthanded in the low post. Garnett is past his prime, and the rest of the options—Chris Wilcox, Jermaine O'Neal and others—are all inadequate starting low-post options.

Howard would be following in the footsteps of great Celtics big men such as Bill Russell, Robert Parish and Garnett. He'd be paid handsomely, of course. The Celtics would be securing a competitive team for several years by signing Howard, but as of now the big man has yet to publicly express an interest in Boston. He hasn't ruled it out either, though.

The Celtics need to make something happen soon. If not, they're in danger of slipping into another prolonged period of mediocrity. Adding Howard would be a great move to get them off that track.

The Dallas Mavericks

Mark Cuban doesn't seem like the type of owner who would be even remotely satisfied with winning just one NBA title.

His Mavericks team made a very deliberate effort to shed salary following last season's NBA title. The Mavericks allowed Tyson Chandler to sign with the Knicks. Also departing were DeShawn Stevenson, Peja Stojakovic, J.J. Barea and Steve Novak. 

Yes, the Mavericks brought in Delonte West and Lamar Odom, but the payroll is down a bit, and so are the wins. Brendan Haywood has been solid at center, but he's a downgrade from the intensity and athleticism that Chandler brought to the pivot.

Adding Dwight Howard would be a dramatic change to say the least. Howard would join a team positioned to make a run at a title immediately. Aging point guards Jason Kidd and Jason Terry, along with aging sharpshooter Dirk Nowitzki, would relish the chance to make another run at a ring with Howard anchoring the offense down low and the defense in the paint as well.

For Howard, the one question about joining the Mavericks would be the future. The team he would join is for the most part an older team without that much young talent. Boston has Rajon Rondo to pair with Howard long-term, and the Lakers would sell a 21st-century "Twin Towers" dynamic to Howard by pairing him with Andrew Bynum.

It would be a tougher sell for Dallas, but Mark Cuban isn't known for his shyness or his inability to close a deal.

The New Jersey Nets

The New Jersey Nets won't be the New Jersey Nets much longer. Starting next season, in fact, they'll become the Brooklyn Nets.

The Nets will be moving from their current and temporary home in Newark, N.J., to a new arena in downtown Brooklyn, N.Y. They'll be the first major sports franchise to call Brooklyn home since the Brooklyn Dodgers fled to Los Angeles following the 1957 baseball season.

The Nets would love to make a splash with their new fanbase, and landing Dwight Howard would certainly fulfill the desired "splash" effect.

The Nets are one of the more historically maligned franchises in the NBA. They have never had a sustained period of playoff appearances. The team made the NBA Finals twice in the early part of the 21st century. The Nets lost to the Lakers in the 2002 Finals and the Spurs in the 2003 Finals.

Since then the team has once again dropped out of contention for league supremacy, but a new billionaire Russian owner, who has partnered with hip-hop icon Jay-Z, is fixated on creating a Brooklyn basketball powerhouse.

The team currently has one of the NBA's best point guards on its roster. Deron Williams has been dishing and swishing in the NBA since his arrival in Utah six seasons ago as the third overall pick in the 2005 NBA draft.

Williams is another player ticketed for a big free-agent payday this coming offseason, and he could very well leave the Nets if he doesn't think that the team will be able to acquire a second star player to complement him and lift the team to contender status.

That means that the pressure to land Howard is nearly two-fold. Howard may be the key not only to the Nets being a very good basketball team for the next several years, but if he doesn't show up in Brooklyn and Williams bails as well, the Nets will likely start their tenure in Brooklyn near the bottom of the Eastern Conference.

That's something that the fans and owners are very much aware of. They were aware of it two summers ago when the Nets were among the more aggressive suitors of LeBron James. They've been aware of it throughout this current season, which has featured several "Dwight Howard to New Jersey" trade rumors.

In fact, even as this is being typed the trade rumors are heating up again.

The bottom line is that Howard may very well end up wearing a New Jersey Nets uniform. That could be the result of a trade in the near future or the result of a free-agent signing once the current season concludes.

The Houston Rockets

The Houston Rockets are a franchise with a fairly impressive list of great NBA big men.

Moses Malone, Ralph Sampson, Hakeem Olajuwon and Yao Ming. Three of those men were No. 1 overall draft picks, and the one that wasn't, Malone, is now enshrined in the Hall of Fame.

The Rockets have been a fairly successful NBA franchise. It's not a coincidence that their periods of greatest success have coincided with the times when they've had great low-post players.

The current Rockets team has some skilled players. Kyle Lowry is an above-average point guard. Luis Scola is a good power forward whose game suffers in large part because of a lack of a decent center. Kevin Martin is a high-scoring shooting guard who doesn't always play great defense but can put up 25 points a night and make it look easy.

The Rockets are a team with history in a large media market with a Hall of Fame low-post player as the coach. The team also has salary cap room. This year's Rockets team is a respectable 20-14 in spite of being undermanned in the low post with the likes of Samuel Dalembert, Jordan Hill and Hasheem Thabeet.

A Rockets team with the addition of Howard wouldn't be an automatic NBA Finals favorite, but the expectations would rightfully be much higher. They might be fulfilled as well.