Even with rumors still circulating that Dwight Howard is on the trading block, the Los Angeles Lakers have begun to make it clear that their superstar center is not for sale.
After stating publicly this week that the Lakers were not interested in trading Howard, Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak told the Lakers superstar himself that the team will not be trading him before the Feb. 21 NBA trading deadline, sources told ESPN.
After all the trouble that the Lakers went through to get Howard in the first place-conducting a four-team swap that had Howard come from Orlando while the Lakers parted with center Andrew Bynum-it seemed very unlikely at the start of the season that this scenario would have even been talked about now.
But a struggling Lakers team (23-26 as of Wednesday) and reports of infighting and discord between Howard and Lakers franchise star Kobe Bryant, as well as Howard's reported frustration with the Lakers' current offensive scheme, have been fueling trade speculation for the last few weeks.
On Wednesday, Bryant publicly urged Howard to play through the pain of his shoulder injury-which has caused Howard to miss three games so far-while adding that Howard "worries too much" about how people perceive hi.
"I told him, 'You can't worry about that. It's holding you back.' He says, 'OK, OK, OK,' but it's always hovering around him," Bryant told ESPN.
"He just wants people to like him. He doesn't want to let anyone down, and that gets him away from what he should be doing," Bryant added.
And yet, despite that, sources told ESPN that the Lakers are "very confident" that they will be able to sign Howard long term once his contract expires at the end of the season.
And yet, Howard isn't the only big piece rumored to be in trading talks.
According to the site Blog-a-Bull, the Chicago Bulls, who are still awaiting the return of Derrick Rose, have several pieces that they can put in play to trade for the Minnesota Timberwolves' All-Star forward Kevin Love.
Love, who came back from a hand injury earlier in the season, is averaging 18.3 points and 14.0 rebounds this season for Minnesota, and is arguably their best player.
However, Love has previously expressed his frustration with T-Wolves management, including contract disputes and word that management didn't believe his hand injury that cost him a month of NBA action was as serious as they were led to believe.
"Even people in my own organization were asking if it was a legitimate injury, people calling my honesty and integrity into question," Love, whose contract expires after the 2014-15 season, told Yahoo! Sports in December. "And that's what really hurt me."
However, while the Bulls could trade for Love-who would likely replace Carlos Boozer, averaging 15.7 points and 9.6 rebounds at the power forward position for Chicago--Bulls management indicated recently that they were not likely to make any major deals before Rose comes back.
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