Dwight Howard on Stan Van Gundy: 'He pushed me to be everything I ended up becoming'
Dwight Howard: It’s Stan. Stan Van Gundy. He pushed me to be everything I ended up becoming. Early on, he didn’t let me take plays off or pout about stuff. He made me live up to my greatness. I don’t know if I’ve really talked about that a lot, but Stan was on my head in a great way. He saw what I could be and where I could go, and he didn’t take breaks on me. I didn’t take breaks on myself, either, but he really let me know in front of the team. If I was bullshitting, he’d call me out.Source: YouTube More on this storyline Dwight Howard: Yeah, I don’t regret my kids. I regret how I decided to go about having my children. What I mean is, I have five kids by five women. That’s not really the right example to show for my daughters or my sons. It’s not that having kids is bad, but having kids by multiple women, sharing my body and energy with multiple people, and giving these women false senses of hope for a future—that’s something I wish I could have done differently. I didn’t know what I was doing at a young age. I was misguided. Now, as an older person, I see it. I wish I had done that better, because it would’ve saved a lot of heartbreak, a lot of money—a lot of money—but really, a lot of heartbreak. Not just for the kids and the family, but for the women too. Even if some of them had agendas or whatever, I know a part of them still hurt. To have a child with someone and not be with them…that’s painful. -via YouTube / December 18, 2024 With a team full of that much talent, many experts expected LA to continue their winning ways. Unfortunately key players would leave that team either via free agency or trade. As a result, it’s left many wondering: what if? “The team wasn’t the same after,” Danny Green shared. “Guys went to different places and got traded so we weren’t able to run it back.” Four years have passed since the Lakers won in the Bubble in Orlando. Since then the Milwaukee Bucks, Golden State Warriors, Denver Nuggets and Boston Celtics have all been crowned World Champions. What if the Lakers stayed together? How many more would they have won? “We spoke about this a couple times on Dwight Howard’s podcast and a bunch of other people’s podcasts,” said Green. “He thinks we would’ve gotten a three-peat. I say we would’ve got two. I don’t know if we would’ve done three but I think for sure if that team would’ve stayed together, we could’ve gotten a second one.” -via ScoopB.com / December 16, 2024 That’s why Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak held regular meetings about the post-Kobe Bryant Lakers. Especially: Kupchak met secretly and regularly at the Polo Lounge in Beverly Hills with Dwight Howard’s agent Dan Fegan, who died in 2018. Fegan told me several times about those meetings. One topic: which coach might make Kobe more of a team player. Fegan advocated Phil Jackson. Failing that, he recommended ways the Lakers use the amnesty clause to jettison the biggest contract in the NBA. If the Lakers amnestied Kobe, Fegan believed, there were many paths to pairing Howard with another star and returning quickly to contention. For a time, it seemed to Fegan that Kupchak and Jim Buss, who made the big Laker decisions at the time, were leaning that way. -via TrueHoop / December 12, 2024
Dwight Howard: It’s Stan. Stan Van Gundy. He pushed me to be everything I ended up becoming. Early on, he didn’t let me take plays off or pout about stuff. He made me live up to my greatness. I don’t know if I’ve really talked about that a lot, but Stan was on my head in a great way. He saw what I could be and where I could go, and he didn’t take breaks on me. I didn’t take breaks on myself, either, but he really let me know in front of the team. If I was bullshitting, he’d call me out.
Source: YouTube
Source: YouTube
More on this storyline
Dwight Howard: Yeah, I don’t regret my kids. I regret how I decided to go about having my children. What I mean is, I have five kids by five women. That’s not really the right example to show for my daughters or my sons. It’s not that having kids is bad, but having kids by multiple women, sharing my body and energy with multiple people, and giving these women false senses of hope for a future—that’s something I wish I could have done differently. I didn’t know what I was doing at a young age. I was misguided. Now, as an older person, I see it. I wish I had done that better, because it would’ve saved a lot of heartbreak, a lot of money—a lot of money—but really, a lot of heartbreak. Not just for the kids and the family, but for the women too. Even if some of them had agendas or whatever, I know a part of them still hurt. To have a child with someone and not be with them…that’s painful. -via YouTube / December 18, 2024
With a team full of that much talent, many experts expected LA to continue their winning ways. Unfortunately key players would leave that team either via free agency or trade. As a result, it’s left many wondering: what if? “The team wasn’t the same after,” Danny Green shared. “Guys went to different places and got traded so we weren’t able to run it back.” Four years have passed since the Lakers won in the Bubble in Orlando. Since then the Milwaukee Bucks, Golden State Warriors, Denver Nuggets and Boston Celtics have all been crowned World Champions. What if the Lakers stayed together? How many more would they have won? “We spoke about this a couple times on Dwight Howard’s podcast and a bunch of other people’s podcasts,” said Green. “He thinks we would’ve gotten a three-peat. I say we would’ve got two. I don’t know if we would’ve done three but I think for sure if that team would’ve stayed together, we could’ve gotten a second one.” -via ScoopB.com / December 16, 2024
That’s why Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak held regular meetings about the post-Kobe Bryant Lakers. Especially: Kupchak met secretly and regularly at the Polo Lounge in Beverly Hills with Dwight Howard’s agent Dan Fegan, who died in 2018. Fegan told me several times about those meetings. One topic: which coach might make Kobe more of a team player. Fegan advocated Phil Jackson. Failing that, he recommended ways the Lakers use the amnesty clause to jettison the biggest contract in the NBA. If the Lakers amnestied Kobe, Fegan believed, there were many paths to pairing Howard with another star and returning quickly to contention. For a time, it seemed to Fegan that Kupchak and Jim Buss, who made the big Laker decisions at the time, were leaning that way. -via TrueHoop / December 12, 2024
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