Dwight Howard ruled out of London Olympics
Dwight Howard will miss the rest of the NBA season and the London Olympics this summer following surgery to repair his herniated disk on Friday morning in Los Angeles.
Howard, a six-time All-Star, has been enduring back problems since early March and has missed the last six games through injury for the Orlando Magic. It wasn’t until Dr. Robert Watkins examined him last week though that the cause of the problem was actually found.
Originally, Howard was expected to rest for two weeks in order to repair the injury but the pain has grown worse and Dr. Watkins and the Orlando medical staff agreed surgery was now necessary.
Surgery on his herniated disk is guaranteed to rule him out of action for at least four months and it is only the latest development in the Magic’s soap-opera season. Following a request to be traded in pre-season, Howard ended speculation in February with his decision to stay put for a year, while news broke last week that he had personally asked for coach, Stan Van Gundy, to be fired.
He has since denied such rumours and responded to reports he was missing the rest of the season due to problems with Van Gundy.
“It hurts (emotionally).” Howard said on Thursday. “That’s the first thing… It hurts. And then with people saying I’m quitting on my team. This is a real issue. I tried to play through it and it just made my back worse.”
Orlando currently sit in sixth place in the Eastern Conference and while they have already guaranteed a spot in this years Playoffs, without Howard’s 20.6ppg, 14.5rpg and 2.2bpg, the team will likely struggle to make it past the first round.
With the final Olympic roster of 12 player and six alternatives due June 18, the USA team will have to look into making some replacements at the post position. With Howard’s surgery ruling him out he joins Lamar Odom, who has been eliminated from consideration after being made inactive for the rest of the season by the Dallas Mavericks and LaMarcus Aldridge who is likely to miss out due to injury.
The only other big men on the list are Blake Griffin, Tyson Chandler, Chris Bosh and Kevin Love, who has been out recently with concussion. Los Angeles Lakers centre, Andrew Bynum, has been in impressive form all season and could be a ready made replacement for Howard but USA Basketball chairmen, Jerry Colangelo, refused to be drawn into naming any names.
“We’ve talked about injuries.” Said Colangelo. “Obviously, if our ranks are really thinned we wouldn’t rule out adding some additional people. But it’s too early to say that we will do that. If there is a candidate out there, we’ll have private discussions.”
Whether or not Howard will be ready for the beginning of next season is still in doubt but possibly more pressing for Orlando fans will be whether Van Gundy is still the coach when Howard returns at the start of next season.
