There is no question that Dwight Howard is elite at his position. Very few players can have the impact that Dwight Howard has on a game. When he is on his game, he is the most important player out there, scoring at will and swatting shots into the stands seemingly every other possession. But that still leads to the question: is Howard worthy of the max contract?
There is no doubt that Dwight Howard deserves a lot of money. The kind of production you get from him isn’t something you can get from an average player. As it is, Dwight Howard will be earning $21.4 million dollars this season. That is the 5th highest salary in the league, trailing Kobe Bryant ($23.5 million), Amar’e Stoudemire ($23.4 million), Joe Johnson ($23.1 million) and Carmelo Anthony (22.4 million).
Dwight Howard obviously means a lot to whatever team he is on. When he is healthy, Howard is capable of producing like very few players in the league. A healthy Dwight Howard dominates the low block on the offensive end, demanding that the defense send a double team his way, or he will score at a very high clip. There is no other center as physically dominant as Howard and no other center in the game can change the way a team plays by his mere presence.
Here were Howard’s 2013-2014 numbers:
| Season | Age | GS | MP | FG | FGA | FG% | FT | FTA | FT% | ORB | DRB | TRB | AST | STL | BLK | TOV | PF | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 ★ | 28 | 71 | 33.7 | 6.7 | 11.3 | .591 | 4.9 | 9.0 | .547 | 3.3 | 8.9 | 12.2 | 1.8 | 0.8 | 1.8 | 3.2 | 3.4 | 18.3 |
Provided by Basketball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 9/18/2014.
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Those are some very, very good numbers. Howard finished 3rd among centers in points per game, as he was only behind DeMarcus Cousins (22.7) and Al Jefferson (21.8) in that category. Of those three, Howard had the highest shooting percentage, by far. Dwight Howard shot 59.1 percent from the field. The closest to him was Jefferson with a 50.9 percent from the field. Despite Howard not being a top the centers leader boards for points, he was ridiculously efficient, finishing 3rd in field goal percentage. The only real knock on Howard’s offensive game is his very poor free throw percentage. Teams will continue to employ the Hack-a-Shaq strategy when it comes to Howard and it will continue to hurt the Rockets’ offensive numbers.
Howard is also elite as a rebounding presence. Dwight Howard was 3rd in rebounding last season, finishing with an elite 12.2 rebounds per game. Over the course of his career, Dwight Howard has averaged 12.9 rebounds per game. He has never averaged less than 10 rebounds and has led the league five times in rebounding. Howard completely changes the dynamic of the game, because any team who has Howard can count on him to clean the glass like very few can.
All of this and we haven’t even reached his biggest strength: defense. Howard is an absolute game changer on the defensive end and he is one of the rare players who can change a game by simply being on the court. Players change their shooting motions and rush their shots in the paint, in an attempt to avoid having their shot swatted into the 10th row. The real concern here is that Dwight Howard has not been in the upper echelon of defensive players in the past two seasons. For the first time since the 2006-07 season, Howard failed to block more than 2 shots per game. Although Howard still finished 4th in blocks, it’s a far cry from prime Dwight Howard, who has led the league in blocks.
It’s a real concern for Howard, as his defensive numbers have declined the past two years. Here were his advanced stats last season:
| Season | MP | PER | TS% | ORB% | DRB% | TRB% | BLK% | TOV% | USG% | ORtg | DRtg | OWS | DWS | WS | WS/48 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 ★ | 2396 | 21.3 | .600 | 11.4 | 27.9 | 20.1 | 4.0 | 17.5 | 24.0 | 109 | 101 | 4.0 | 4.1 | 8.0 | .161 |
Provided by Basketball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 9/18/2014.
Howard posted up his lowest Defensive Win Share (DWS), Defensive Rating (DRtg) and Block Percentage (BLK%) since 2005-06. Howard’s defensive decline has been extremely noticeable, especially when you look at his past seasons, where he would put up Defensive Win Shares as high as 7.7 while leading the league in that statistical category. Not all of these can be put on Dwight Howard. His teammates play a pretty big part in his Defensive Rating, as Houston’s perimeter defense was lacking last season and they allowed a lot of dribble penetration.
Looking past his declining defense, Howard is still a very good defensive player, and is one of the very few star players who put up higher Defensive Win Shares than Offensive Win Shares (OWS). His defense is still extremely valuable, even if it isn’t what it used to be.
When you combine all of Dwight Howard’s attributes, you would get a player who wouldn’t be worth max if he played a different position. However, since very good centers are far and few between, Howard is most definitely worth a max contract. Whether or not he’s worth it after this one ends is a question for another day.