1 stud and 1 dud from Los Angeles Lakers preseason loss to Kings

Dud on the Los Angeles Lakers: Dwight Howard

While the Lakers have been consistent with losing in their six preseason games, Dwight Howard’s performance has been extremely inconsistent. He won a title with Los Angeles in 2020 before spending the 2020-21 season with the Philadelphia Sixers, but he’s back in purple and gold.

On Thursday night, Howard scored five points off of 2-for-4 shooting from the field and pulled down seven rebounds. In 13 minutes of play, he also had five fouls. It goes without saying that the Lakers can’t afford to have him in foul trouble, especially in that short amount of time on the court.

What version of Dwight is head coach Frank Vogel going to get on a nightly basis? On Sunday, Howard had two points, three rebounds and three fouls in 12 minutes. However, in the first matchup against the Warriors last Friday, he scored 23 points off of 8-for-11 shooting and pulled down 12 rebounds in 24 minutes. Dwight didn’t play as much last night as he did on Friday, but that’s because he had five fouls.

Deandre Jordan is expected to start at center in the regular-season opener and Vogel wants Howard to play a similar role to the one that he did two seasons ago, but the statistics that he put up the past two games won’t get him far. On Thursday, he had a chase-down block against Harrison Barnes, so he’s still able to show streaks of the player that he once was in his prime. However, Los Angeles can’t afford to constantly wonder if “good Dwight” is going to show up or not.