Ranking Dwight Howard's New Kicks with His Past Sneakers

Dwight Howard's new shoes were unveiled last week with the start of the new NBA season, and I've got to say, he's got another pretty cool looking pair of shoes out there.

Howard's kicks have been pretty consistently good for his tenure with adidas, and even though it seems to be a rough time to be signed with adidas, what with Howard's image troubles, Derrick Rose's torn ACL and Eric Gordon's knee problems, they continue to pump out some good shoes.

His newest edition, the adidas AdiPower Howard 3, is bulky in name only. It's a lightweight (as all basketball shoes are these days) stylish shoe that doesn't try to rely on looks alone. It looks cool, but it doesn't go out of its way to look cool.

The only thing I found strange about these bad boys is that, like every other shoe Howard's had in the past, the initial release is in Magic colors. It seems like they would have at least thrown some yellow or purple on them.

In honor of his newest shoe, it seems necessary to take a look back at Howard's shoe history and compare them to the rest.

9. 2010 Adidas Supernatural Commander

Is it just me, or do these shoes look like they would have come straight out of a video game from 2006?

These overly-puffy, overly-shiny, triple-strapped abominations were the initial shoes that adidas debuted for Howard in 2010, although he eventually switched over to the Beast Commander as the season went along, which was probably the best decision he ever made.

The enormous ankle panels look like they could unfold and turn into wings at any point. 

These Supernatural Commanders are just too over the top for a conventional basketball sneaker, and they look a lot more like the kicks that came out in the mid-2000s compared to some of the cool things that were going on in 2010.

8. 2007 Adidas TS Lightspeed

Howard's first real personal shoes are another pair that I'm not a huge fan of, but the mid to late 2000s were pretty hit or miss in shoe styles.

There's just too much going on here. They've got the look of a traditional Adidas from the back to the middle, but then they just kind of go haywire.

With four different colors showing off on a shoe, it seems like they realized that they needed to tie in some sort of Magic allusion right before they went to ship them, so they painted a blue strip on at the bottom.

Aside from the busy look of the shoe, I've just never been a huge fan of the rounded upper. Support-wise, it's not too different from the more jarring look that shoes have today, but it just doesn't look as stylish.

7. 2011 Adidas AdiPower Howard

The first incarnation of adidas' AdiPower Howard style shoes wasn't a bad design; it's just that the rest of the shoes in the Howard catalog end up getting better extremely fast.

I like the downplay of the adidas look of them; it's a cool direction for the company to take, plus the white-on-grey clashes, but in the right way.

The textured side-panels make for a pretty cool look. Plus, these were the first (and only) shoes that Howard wore that had the "12" on the side, which really personalizes them.

The only thing that I genuinely don't like about the look of the first AdiPowers is the speckles that run along the bottom. It just seems like an unnecessary addition to the sneaker.

6. 2008 Adidas TS Pro

There's a bit of a strange design going on with the adidas TS Pros, Howard's third big shoe, but in all, it doesn't detract too much.

Like adidas always seems to want to do, they've textured their triple-stripe, which is normally fine looking, but in this case, it looks more like there are strange air vents in the side of the shoe, and I'm not sure that's what they were going for.

Something I do like about this one is the barely noticeable design in the side panel. Plus, I'm a big fan of the blue back, especially with a long blue sock sticking out of the shoe.

These are the shoes that Howard wore in the 2008 Slam Dunk Contest, which was basically the night that Howard jumped from being an NBA player to a household name, so there's some history in them as well.

5. 2011 Adidas Supercommander

When you go with an ultra-textured shoe, it can be very hit or miss with the audience, but I think it's pretty safe to say that these were a hit.

These adidas Supercommanders do a good job integrating the traditional adidas triple-stripe, but they do it in a very unconventional way for them.

The mesh side panels with blue peeking through around the diagonally-textured triple-stripe really comes together nicely, as do the subtle blue eyelet covers. Combine that with the blue and white creeping up the sole, and you've got yourself a beautifully colored sneaker.

This is also the first Howard shoe that went with the drastic rise in the upper, rather than keeping it more a mid-height shoe or a rounded top.

4. 2009 Adidas Commander LT

I've always been a big fan of a shoe with the strength and support of a basketball shoe but the look and feel of a running shoe. It just mingles well together.

The grey body of the shoe that goes all the way around is vastly different than the constantly jarring colors that litter Howard's shoe history, so it's a nice change of pace. Plus, it sits incredibly well with clean, white shoelaces and the blue triple-stripe and sock liner.

There is one thing that I'm not a huge fan of, and that's the strange bottom panel with the field of stars in the background. It would be fine if it blended well, but the white border around the triple-stripe makes it stick out too much.

In all, this one is quite a different design, and it has to get some points for that.

3. 2012 Adidas AdiPower Howard 2

I'm not a huge fan of the different blues that they use on the adidas AdiPower Howard 2, but in the end, I realize that that seems to be the only real negative thing I have to point out about it.

It's got the same high-rise style in the upper with the quick dropoff at the tongue, a style that seems to be all the rage these days, and it's got a nice color for the sock liner.

Once again, they use the subtle design on the side panel in a white-on-white style that both cleverly goes under the triple stripe and moves onto the back of the shoe when it turns light blue to go along with the light blue base on the back.

It's a solid shoe, and it's really hard to find any huge flaws in the design.

2. 2010 Adidas Beast Commander

I'm a sucker for strange-looking shoes, and these are definitely strange looking when you compare them to the rest of Howard's shoes.

The adidas Beast Commanders replaced the terrible Supernatural Commander, and they did a terrific job in the switch.

With the black side panel encompassed by a thick white border, plus a jarring design up around the ankle makes it look as if there are legitimate corners on this shoe.

Combine it all with the black piping around the bottom, the alternating blue eyelet covers and the very faint blue up around the tongue, and you've got a pretty out-of-character shoe right there.

1. 2012 Adidas AdiPower Howard 3

Howard's new adidas AdiPower Howard 3's are my favorite new shoes of the year. I like them even more than the Rose 3.0 that came out a few months ago, and I love those shoes.

Adidas really went in a different direction with these, and even though he's not with the Magic anymore, it seems like the blue on black is the perfect color combination for this style.

They took the triple stripe design and put it at a much more dramatic angle while putting a bit more space between the three stripes, and the blue that sits on top of the black on these bad boys is just plain sharp.

Combine that with the most dramatically rising high-top yet in the Howard line, and I'm instantly a fan. I might need to go grab a pair of these.