Written by Zach Harper | 31 May 2009

Dwight Howard sat down with Rachel Nichols shortly after the Magic celebrated by covering his sweater in orange sherbet instead of the classic dumping of champagne.

It's actually a really good little piece put together by Nichols and ESPN. I rarely watch SportsCenter anymore and it isn't because I feel like ESPN is the MTV version of sports coverage or that my intelligence is insulted by what they call sports coverage. It just simply doesn't fit into my viewing and media consumption like it used to. But seeing the first Sunday Conversation piece in over a year from my usual media viewing made me think that if this is how they still are, I'd probably be more inclined to watch more of them.

A couple of things that I took note of while I watched this interview:

1. Dwight Howard seems legitimately bothered by the fact that LeBron left the court without congratulating Dwight and his teammates. It seems like he tries to be more diplomatic about it after his initial reaction to the question but it clearly is something that disappointed Howard.

2. I don't understand the being disrespected aspect of a marketing campaign by a sponsor that you aren't signed with. The puppet idea was pretty clever. It was done by Nike and not by Adidas. If you're offended by a company branding their own signed athletes then that seems really ridiculous and unreasonable. But if that's the cause for motivation that you needed, then more power to you.

3. The first shot of Kobe Bryant after a made three-pointer in the highlight clip looks like he's doing an impression of Andre Iguodala. Iggy, or Grimace as some call him, has a pronounced underbite and it looks like Kobe is trying to replicate it there.

4. The fact that Dwight Howard thinks he's at 20% of his potential as a young athlete with the world at his fingertips is a really scary thing for the rest of the NBA. I love that attitude from him and hope he gets closer to what he thinks is his potential. He recognizes that he's not a good player, which is the truth. He gets by on his athleticism and it's remarkable that he sees that.

5. This is purely speculative but I'm fairly certain that Dwight Howard was flirting with Rachel Nichols almost as much as she appeared to be flirting with him during that strength question.

6. I will NEVER get tired of Dwight's Stan Van Gundy impersonation. As Marisa Tomei says in My Cousin Vinny, it is "dead on balls accurate."

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