One upside of NBA games' many stoppages is seeing how creative teams can get in those breaks in action. For example, some arenas have half-court shot competitions; others display tribute videos to visiting players who once spent a season playing for them.
Count the Hawks as the team that chose that latter on Wednesday: Atlanta thought Dwight Howard — who was part of the visiting Hornets and who spent one season in Atlanta last year — was deserving of an ovation from the crowd at Philips Arena.
Thank you, Dwight! pic.twitter.com/MLTUQQBeWL
— Atlanta Hawks (@ATLHawks) February 1, 2018
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Howard averaged a career-low in blocks with the Hawks in 2016-17, and had his worst scoring season since his rookie year by averaging 13.5 points a game.
What makes the tribute particularly odd is the way the now 32-year-old center left the organization. ESPN's Zach Lowe mentioned in a September podcast that things had gotten so bad between Howard and the Hawks that players reportedly cheered when news of his trade broke.
When the Hawks took their first trip to face the Hornets on Friday, Howard furthered the divide between him and the Hawks, suggesting the matchup was a revenge game (the Hornets won, by the way).
Dwight Howard on playing the Hawks tonight: “I wanna kill” them. (Hawks were the team that traded Howard to @hornets in June).
— Rick Bonnell (@rick_bonnell) January 26, 2018
Hawks fans remembered the comment, and showed their emotions accordingly on Wednesday.
Dwight Howard was booed by Hawks fans, then got a video tribute.
— K. Brown (@CountOnKB) February 1, 2018
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Howard is not the only former Hawks player to receive a tribute video this season. When the Wizards traveled to Atlanta in December, Mike Scott received a tribute video for his five seasons with the team — even though he only averaged 7.1 points and 3 rebounds on 15 minutes per game.
Maybe the videos this season show that the Hawks are an organization that truly appreciates every player that wears their jersey; maybe they needed to fill space because streetballer Hot Sauce was off that evening.
Regardless, at the rate that these tributes are coming out, fans can probably expect a tribute to the team's playoff hopes sometime in March.