By all accounts, Dwight Howard has spent two days meeting with the Golden State Warriors ahead of a potential move for the experienced free agent, with the latest developments in relation to the story seeming to suggest that the 2022 NBA champions will pass on taking the 37-year-old to the Chase Center.
As well as having a two-day meeting with the Warriors, Howard also worked out with two of their stars, Draymond Green and Chris Paul, in Los Angeles. The 2020 NBA champion left the Los Angeles Lakers in 2022 before moving to Taiwan-based side Taoyuan Leopards. The Warriors may well have felt they were strong enough without Howard on board and wanted to avoid any potential headache made by such a move, and fans of Golden State who want to back their team with a bet should check out these best NBA betting sites, because doing so may well help you find the brands that offer the most competitive odds, therefore enhancing your potential payout.
Shams Charania, from The Athletic, believes a move elsewhere for Howard is likely;
“Expect Howard to discuss a potential return to the league with any other interested team in the coming week or so.”
On the subject of stars coming to join Steve Kerr’s side, Damian Lillard has made it clear that he won’t be doing so, stating that such a move wouldn’t make sense; Lillard is now with Bucks and out of the Portland Trail Blazers, but he wouldn’t join Golden State;
“I respect what they’ve been doing over the last eight, nine years or whatever, and I’m from there, obviously. That’s home. But I can’t go be a part of that, they won four championships. What I look like going to try to do that?…It don’t even make sense. I’d never do nothing like that. I’d lose every year before I go.” Lillard commented.
He then went on to question Kevin Durant’s 2016 move to the Warriors; “If I was in his shoes, I wouldn’t have done that personally, I feel like that was a team they lost to. I think they won [the championship] once before he got there. That ain’t something that I would have did.” Lillard concluded.
Kerr’s Dubs have been an incredible success story, with Golden State reaching the NBA Finals in six of the last nine seasons, winning four championships in the process. Last season, they fell well below their own very high standards. Their 44-38 regular season record placed them in fourth in the Pacific Division, and their defeat to the Los Angeles Lakers in the Conference Semifinals was certainly something of a surprise. The coming season is Kerr’s tenth in charge of the Warriors but the first in that period without Bob Myers as general manager. The arrival of Chris Paul in July has further strengthened an already impressive roster, and the decision not to top that off with a deal for Dwight Howard is probably a sensible one at this juncture.