"B-list hunger, A-list talent make Howard a star" - Sean Deveney

[V2M]

B-list hunger, A-list talent make Howard a star
By Sean Deveney - SportingNews

Sean Deveney
SportingNews.com

It was easy to overlook Josh Howard -- for a while, at least. When he went out for the basketball team as a sophomore at Glenn High School in North Carolina, there wasn't much about Howard that suggested future hoops greatness. "He was so thin and lanky," says one of his former coaches, John Fowler. "Biggest thing on him was that toothy grin."

Because he was a 6-6 low-post player with poor SAT scores, Howard was ignored by most major colleges despite a stellar high school career -- Old Dominion and Virginia Commonwealth were his chief suitors until he caught the eye of Frank Haith, then a Wake Forest assistant and now the head coach at Miami. "There was just something about him," Haith says. "He was so determined. When I watched him, I kept thinking, 'This kid is going to make it.'"

Of course, when Howard went to the NBA after his senior year at Wake (he was the first unanimous ACC player of the year since David Thompson in 1975), he watched in angst as unknowns such as Zarko Cabarkapa, Travis Outlaw and Ndudi Ebi were drafted ahead of him. Howard dropped all the way to the Mavericks -- who were hoping to get Boris Diaw but were resigned to someone like Greek big man Sofoklis Schortsanitis until Howard fell into their laps with the 29th pick of the first round. "Right away, starting in summer league, you could tell he had an edge," Mavericks president Donn Nelson says. "He felt like he was done wrong and he had something to prove."

That's when Nelson learned something about Howard previous coaches already knew: "Here was a guy who seemed nice as can be, didn't complain or anything," Nelson says. "But he would cut off his right arm before he conceded defeat."

Thus began Howard's foray into the NBA, as a player who had been undervalued, underrated and plain wronged at every level of the sport but still was ready to remove a limb to prove himself. As a rookie, he didn't figure to play much on a team that had forwards Dirk Nowitzki, Antawn Jamison and Antoine Walker, but Howard carved out 23.7 minutes per game with hustle, rebounding and defense. "At that point," Howard says, "I was just thinking about getting on the floor. I didn't care how."

Amazingly, little has changed. Howard is in his fourth season, just played in his first All-Star Game and signed a four-year, $40 million contract last fall. But he still plays like a rookie who could have his minutes yanked at any time. The Mavericks seem to feed off Howard's urgency, which has helped make him an NBA oddity. He's at the head of a small group of burgeoning NBA stars who are making one of the sport's toughest leaps: from X-factor to A-list. "He's gotten so good at being a role player," Nelson says, "he's become a star."

Just don't tell Howard that. As he sees it, the Mavericks are still Dirk-centric, and with good reason: The big German is averaging 25.2 points and 9.4 rebounds, and according to Howard, "He should be the MVP this year. He should have won it the last two years." Because of that, Howard sees no reason to dump the dirty work and develop his inner diva, despite the fact his numbers put him among the NBA's elite -- his 19.3 points per game rank in the league's top 35, and his 7.3 rebounds are second among small forwards. "I'm a role player," Howard says. "This ain't my team. It's Dirk's team. I don't have time to worry about stars and all that. I've got too much to do on this team to worry about that."

He's right. Get a load of Howard's nightly checklist of roles: ballhandler, slasher, spot-up shooter, post-up threat. Combative rebounder, in-the-lane charge-taker, floor-burned loose-ball chaser and overall energy booster. No. 2 option on offense and No. 1 stopper on defense. Role player? Sure. But how many players fill that many roles? And who fills them as well as Howard? "He's a pain," says Bucks forward Ruben Patterson. "If you stop him from doing one thing, he comes up with other ways to help that team win."

And my oh my, does that team win. Fueled, in part, by the bitter aftertaste of blowing a 2-0 lead (and a double-digit fourth quarter lead in Game 3) to the Heat in last year's Finals, Dallas has established itself, to use Spurs coach Gregg Popovich's description, as the only hellacious team in the NBA. Heading into the second half of the season, the Mavericks are on pace to win 68 games. In the race for the league's best record, there is a comfortable 4-game gap separating Dallas from No. 2 Phoenix. It's an 8 1/2-game canyon to No. 3, Utah.

Credit Nowitzki. Credit the defensive precepts of coach Avery Johnson, who has the Mavericks ranked third in the league in opponents' scoring. Credit, also, Nelson, who expanded what already was one of the league's deepest rosters last offseason by adding veterans Devean George, Austin Croshere and Greg Buckner. But no factor was more significant to the Mavericks' first half invincibility than Howard's performance -- he is averaging career highs in points, rebounds, assists, blocks and minutes. More than that, says one Western Conference scout, "He is playing with as much toughness as anyone in the league. You don't usually think of toughness and the Mavericks together. But he's changing that, and they need that."

He'll need to maintain that change through the second half if the Mavericks are to avenge last year's Finals heartbreak. Howard, always good-natured, always smiling, doesn't admit to carrying chips on his shoulder. But those who have watched his career know better. Haith recalls that in college Howard sometimes struggled during drills, which created some tension between him and head coaches Dave Odom and Skip Prosser. But put Howard in a scrimmage, in a shooting contest -- anything with a score -- and things changed. "You never saw someone so competitive," Haith says.

Thus, Haith says, "I know he is carrying that Finals around with him. He uses things like that for motivation. He won't say it. But I know better. He is one determined young man."

Updated on Monday, Feb 19, 2007 11:17 am EST

[nikeball]

josh for president.

[mqywaaah]

All hail Josh!!!

[Bathouse Bear]

Josh is the Man!

[mqywaaah]

No. You are the Man!!