Dwight Howard, Pau Gasol | featured news

With the Memphis Grizzlies’ 86-70 victory over the Utah Jazz, the Lakers are bound for the playoffs, where they will rely on Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol... When Mike D’Antoni took over as the Lakers’ coach in November, he felt that he had a big problem. Two of them, actually. He did not think there was any way he could keep Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol on the court at the same time.

Dwight Howard missed a two-handed dunk on his first shot, and the night never got much better for the Los Angeles Lakers. When Howard and Steve Nash took their places alongside Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol under the Hollywood spotlight, the Lakers opened a season of enormous expectations with an equally big dud of a performance. Darren Collison scored 17 points, Brandan Wright added 14, and the Dallas Mavericks spoiled the Lakers debuts of Howard and Steve Nash with a 99-91 victory over Los Angeles on Tuesday night.

The deal means the Lakers get Howard; the Magic get Arron Afflalo, Al Harrington, Nikola Vucevic, just drafted Moe Harkless (No. 15 pick in this draft) and a first round pick from each of the three other teams; the Sixers get Andrew Bynum and take on Jason Richardson and his contract; the Nuggets get Andre Iguodala. That varies from the original report but fits with reports that Pau Gasol is not part of the deal. Expect some changes in the final form, but that seems to be the core of it.