Kobe Bryant Wants Dwight Howard to Improve His Offensive Game

Dwight Howard made his highly-anticipated debut for the Lakers last night, and even though the team took another L, things were encouraging. Kobe Bryant, however, sees room for improvement in Howard’s offensive repertoire. From Yahoo! Sports: “From the moment the Lakers made the trade for Howard in August, Bryant had insisted this offense would go through him, and he tried so hard to deliver that message on Sunday night. All of them did. Over and over, the Lakers played pick-and-roll with Howard, tossed him lob dunks – some thunderously finished, some sloppily missed – and everyone could live with the loss, because they understood that Howard needed to get Sunday out of the way. Howard had to play those 33 minutes, and get up again after everyone gasped at the thud of DeMarcus Cousins slamming him onto his back. ‘I’m going to have some tough falls, because I play hard, and I like to block all the shots,’ Howard said. These Lakers don’t wonder defensively about Howard, because they already see the way he’s going to change everything for them there. Yet Bryant has gone out of his way to push Howard to become a far more complete offensive player, to, in his words, ‘challenge him to do more than just screen-and-roll and dunk. We want opposing teams to see him as a dominant force.'”