Atlanta Hawks: Can They Win Doing It Dwight Howard’s Way?

Will Dwight Howard put his pride and traditional big man aspirations aside, and morph/anchor the Atlanta Hawks into the Cleveland Cavaliers’ stiffest Eastern Conference challenge?

The Atlanta Hawks finally introduced their prized free agency acquisition Dwight Howard this Wednesday, as they officially unvailed a new era at the Highlight Factory.

An emotional and redemptive Howard vowed to make his hometown proud during the press conference, as he continued his plight to repair his severaly blemished public image.

The homecoming story is certainly a heartwarming narrative — one that LeBron James similarily capitalized on — especially if the return leads to material success.

Winning in your hometown can turn an “NBA villian” into a celebrated hero, just as leaving a team that drafts you can turn said player from a soft-spoken, humble superstar into a hated antogonist seemingly overnight (amirite, Kevin Durant?).

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But, in the case of the artist formerly known as the Superman, there is something fundamentally different to his “coming home” story.  To it bluntly, he’s damaged goods.

A bad back and a shoddy skill set have caused Howard’s play to decline faster than anyone could have ever anticipated.

In a week where we celebrate the greatness of Tim Duncan, lest we forget, it wasn’t too long ago when the Big Fundamental yearned the day when the broad-shouldered Beast of the East realized his full potential, admitting to the Houston Chronicle the following back in 2005:

"“I’m very old,” Duncan said, smiling. “I was looking at it before the game, and I’m something like 9 1/2 years older than (Howard). That’s crazy. … “He doesn’t look like a 19-year-old. He’s got so much promise. I’m just glad I’ll be out of the league when he’s peaking.”"

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No one can argue Dwight has had his time of dominance.  During his peak — an underrated one at that —  Howard was the undisputed, most impactful big man in the game.

From 2008-11, just the presence of the 6’10” center could morph a middling cast of average defenders into an assembly that produced the best defensive team in the league.

However, somewhere between 2011 and the present, Shaquille O’Neal got into Dwight’s head.  He effectively convinced his deserting Orlando Magic cohort that he wasn’t a true big man if he didn’t “dominate” from the post.

He regurgitated the same “28-and-15” line (a mythical statline that the Big Shaqtus never acheived), and scoffed at his pick-and-dive, rim-rattling ways.

Fast-forward to present day, Howard is adamant on the role he wants to play: Dwight sees himself as Hakeem Olajuwon, not Tyson Chandler.

If his stint with the Houston Rockets is of any indication, his effort, and more importantly, his impact on defense hinges on how many touches he receives in the post.  If the big dog don’t eat, the big dog ain’t gonna defend.

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Perhaps our tainted glasses of years past has impaired our perception of peak-Dwight.

We all fondly remember the 2009 Eastern Conference champions, the Howard-led Orlando Magic, being a four-out, one-in team based around the fundamental aspects of the vertical suction created by the high pick-and-roll — an offensive strategy most NBA teams abide by today.

We can all vividly recall Dwight catching lobs and swatting shots; but, to be frank, Howard was also once an absolute beast in the post.

More explicitly, according to a recent Zach Lowe podcast, the ESPN writer stated that, per Synergy Sports, Dwight scored on approximately 50 percent of his 658 field goal attempts while operating on the block during the 2010-11 season.

He may be mechanical in his approach, but when Dwight — in his athletic prime — laid his sculpted cinder block of a shoulder into you, drop-stepped and cleared for liftoff, there was not much the opposing defender could do.

But this is 2016, and Howard has lost more than a step.

He can still manage to muster up consecutive games of balls-to-the-wall, all-out activity, as he’s demonstrated in both the 2014 and 2015 playoffs, but to do so in a full 82-game season? That may be wishful thinking, even if Howard is hell-bent on revitalising his career.

Which begs the question: does Dwight want it bad enough to the point where he puts his pride and ego aside?  Will he accept the player he is now?  Will he be happy leading the Atlanta Hawks as a glorified DeAndre Jordan?

If so, the Hawks, if all things break right, could rekindle their 2015 magic (no pun intended) and ascend as the Cleveland Cavaliers’ stiffest conference rival.

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In contrast, however, if Dwight Howard is still hell bent in being a low-post savant?  Not even his feel-good homecoming can save his tainted career.