You can’t have it both ways, Dwight Howard. You can’t demand a trade out of one side of your mouth and then act as team leader out of the other side. It’s not only disingenuous, it’s also futile. Who in that locker room do you think is listening to you knowing that in five months time (at most) you’ll be suiting up with another franchise? 

Howard has taken to tearing into his soon-to-be-ex-teammates a lot lately, questioning their effort and telling those that don’t work as hard as they should to stay in the locker room. He says that they can take it, that they’re professionals, but he conveniently ignores why the club is playing in such a funk, or at least a good part of why, and that is because he is constantly denigrating them in the press, either directly or indirectly, as a result of his trade demand. He teammates aren’t any happier about the club’s four-game losing streak than he is, but it isn’t helping matters much when they guy looking to jump ship is telling everyone else how to pilot the boat. 

Look, when summer comes Dwight Howard is free to go wherever he wants as a free agent. That’s the contractual right he has negotiated for himself. He’s even done Orlando more of a service than LeBron James and Chris Bosh did for Cleveland and Toronto by informing Orlando about his intentions. They are now given time to try and manufacture a trade to avoid losing Howard for nothing (whether they exercise that option remains to be seen). However, after that Howard needs to man-up and accept the collateral damage that comes in the wake of decisions like those. He has to accept that maybe the guys on his team aren’t quite as grateful for his candidness. Maybe they aren’t enjoying being cast as a band of unwanted children just waiting to be orphaned by a disinterested parent. Howard cannot call himself a leader while at the same time working publicly to abandon those he’s leading because people aren’t going to respond to his leadership in that case. Heck, people probably can’t help taking their foot off of the gas pedal a little bit as a result of his tirades. That may not be excusable either for a professional athlete, but much of the drama going on in Orlando extends beyond the raw competitiveness of athletics. 

So Dwight, just keep doing what you’re doing on the court and accept that you are not speaking for the team off of it. You’ve made your position clear and now you have to accept the fallout from that declaration. When your substantial weight has been lifted from Orlando’s locker room, that’s when they can finally feel free to care about basketball again.