A year of waffling, saying one thing and meaning another and changing your mind while fans wait on your every word has the tendency to make you not trust a man. It also has the tendency to make you want to burn everything with his name on it in effigy, but Orlando fans largely held back on that front.
Yes, Dwight Howard is not exactly the guy you want to hold up as a bastion of truth, honestly, loyalty (despite the t-shirts) and everything else that was good. Howard soured his relationship in Orlando so much that the Magic's fan base was happy to be rid of their superstar player and go into a rebuilding mode (sorry, Rob Hennigan, Alex Martins and Jacque Vaughn, transition mode).
GQ naming Dwight Howard one of the least influential people of the year only makes complete sense. GQ's list of the 25 least influential people — "a collection of people so uninspiring that we should round them all up and stick them on an iceberg" — is a comical look at the losers of the year.
No doubt Howard is one of them as he has completely ruined his Q-score while torching a community and throwing the NBA world into chaos.
Congratulations, Dwight! You're a Laker now. And all you had to do to become one was spend months making vague demands of the Orlando Magic and then backtracking on those demands like a spineless pussy until every American hated your guts and wanted to see you fail. "I'll stay in Orlando if you fire my coach! Or maybe I won't. Or maybe you could fire the coach and then build a statue of me made out of frozen butter. NO WAIT TRADE ME TO BROOKLYN NO WAIT DON'T TRADE ME THERE BECAUSE I THOUGHT BROOKLYN WAS MORE CONVENIENT TO MANHATTAN THAN IT ACTUALLY IS." In a just world, Dwight Howard will hurt his knee and doctors will take seventeen months to make a proper diagnosis.
Humor aside, no player has seen his popularity fall as quickly as Howard did. What was once a good, community guy who really did value loyalty and playing hard above all else became a selfish superstar chasing vague big-market dreams. Howard's jersey has fallen to ninth in the NBA's list of most popular jerseys, which is surprising considering he just switched teams.
Apparently, jersey buyers did not switch with him.
The worst part is, Howard's saga is not quite over. He has given no indication that he will sign long term in Los Angeles and is still set to become a free agent this offseason.
The GQ list also features such low influencers as Mitt Romney, Madonna, Ryan Lochte and Knicks owner James Dolan.
The Knicks owner made the list for the puzzling ways he continues to include Isiah Thomas in his daily life and his poor running of New York. Probably the list was compiled before the team got off to such a good start. Not that it would matter anyway.
