"Jeanie Give Me One More Chance" - Dwight Howard Seemingly Jokes About Returning Lakers But This Time He Might Actually Have A Point

Adam Pantozzi. Getty Images.

After losing in the first round in 5 games, the Lakers have a pretty big offseason ahead of them. What's going to happen with LeBron? DLo seems pretty hell bent on using the leverage of his $18M player option

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so that's not all that great. Is there a trade out there for a big name player, and will the Lakers even be willing to move some of their young pieces (again) like Austin Reaves? What the hell are they going to do about their center position?

Well….that one may actually be easy to solve. Maybe the answer is to simply bring back Dwight Howard?

Normally when Dwight does this stuff trying to get back into the league, it's mostly cringey. But this? Let's just keep it real. The Lakers have 3 centers on their roster right now assuming both Jaxson Hayes ($2.4M) and Christian Wood ($3M) both pick up their player options., That gives the Lakers a center rotation of AD/Wood/Hayes….which stinks. Objectively, Christian Wood and Jason Hayes are not good, and I'm not totally sure you could say they are better options than an old as shit Dwight who has been spending his time dominating in Taiwan or wherever.

And while this has sort of turned into his "thing" in recent years

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I still think he may be onto something here with the Lakers. While it's true their needs are more shooting related, we did just see Jokic have his way with their entire front court. Those Jamal Murray game winners? Guess what played a big part in those moments. Big time offensive rebounds down the stretch by Aaron Gordon. You know what Dwight could still do while in the NBA?

Defensive rebound.

In 2021-22, Dwight had a 26.3% DREB% (very good). The year before, 35.3%, in the Lakers title season it was 27.8%. He still looks jacked as shit and is still a rather large human, and given that I can't imagine he'll cost all that much, should the Lakers actually give him another look? Granted I'm partial to this because watching their demise brings me immense joy, but this time I think Dwight might actually have a point. He does have a skilset that the Lakers need, it's not like their backup centers are all good anyway, plus there's a chance they turn down their player options and leave for nothing. At that point, the Lakers are going to have to sign someone, so why not Dwight?

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With that in mind, I say do it. Rob Pelinka can't be any worse at building the Lakers roster given what we've seen these last few seasons, so maybe just go back to the group that won you a title*?