Ronnie Brewer considered returning to the Chicago Bulls or Utah Jazz before signing with the Houston Rockets in unrestricted free agency.

"They play my style," Brewer said. "Dwight Howard is a defender, but can get up and down the court."

Brewer played with the Bulls for two seasons and was the Jazz's draft pick in 2006.

Dwight Howard decided to leave the Los Angeles Lakers this offseason to sign with the Houston Rockets.

"It's disappointing that Dwight isn't here," said Jeanie Buss. "I feel like we failed him. This is the mother part of me. When you become a Laker, I feel I become your mama. Maybe I get too sentimental for the basketball side of things."  

Howard spent just one season with the Lakers, coming back to play just a few months after back surgery.

"When we got Dwight my phone lit up with people wanting to see him play. I told them, 'If you're only going to come to one game, come in January' because I wasn't sure Dwight was going to play until then because of his back. I was so impressed that from Day One, he threw himself out there. He took the risk to play as many games as he could."

Jeremy Lin spoke candidly about his first season with the Houston Rockets, though it included 20,000 people at a youth conference in Tapei.

“I was ready to invigorate the entire city of Houston," said Lin. "I was supposed to save Houston basketball.”

Lin was signed by the Rockets last offseason after becoming a productive scoring guard with the New York Knicks.

“I became so obsessed with becoming a great basketball player … trying to be Linsanity, being this phenomenon that took the NBA by storm,” Lin told the audience. “The coaches were losing faith in me, basketball fans were making fun of me.”

Lin has found peace as he enters his second season with the Rockets as he pushed further down their pecking order behind James Harden, Dwight Howard and Chandler Parsons while battling Patrick Beverley for playing time at point guard.

“We are God’s beloved children, and there is nothing you can do to reduce God’s love for you,” he said. “When you do, you’ll be free.”

Ronnie Brewer is wrapping up a contract with the Houston Rockets.

Brewer played for the Oklahoma City Thunder and New York Knicks last season.

With Omer Asik not being traded following the acquisition of Dwight Howard, the Houston Rockets will evaluate playing the two big men together.

Asik and Howard are both natural centers.

"Coach McHale plans to experiment with Dwight at PF and Omer as C in training camp," wrote Morey.

Kevin McHale wants Dwight Howard to prioritize his speed and quickness offensively.

McHale helped organize workouts with Howard at the Toyota Center in Houston this week.

"It's a lot of hard work,” Howard said. “The biggest thing that he's been telling me this whole time, use your speed, your quickness and then your power. He's been really studying a lot of my games  and I've been doing a lot of studying myself.

"Like Kevin has said, it starts with me. I have to do what I can on both ends of the floor to dominate and that's what I'm working on now, is getting my timing, my speed, my strength and all of that stuff back so I can dominate all year.”

Howard already knows he and Harden will work well together.
 
"I think we're going to be great," Howard said. "We have an opportunity to grow and that's the biggest thing. We have an opportunity for four or five years to really make an impact in this league together as a duo.

"We're looking forward to doing the best we can to bring a championship here to Houston."

Dwight Howard isn’t trying to play like Hakeem Olajuwon.

Howard worked with Olajuwon earlier this week before taking a planned trip to Asia.

“It’s not about emulating Dream,” Howard said of the workouts, which also included Kevin McHale. “That’s the thing. We get caught up in comparing players, trying to do what this guys does just because you work with him. The thing is, when you workout with a guy like Hakeem or Kevin, you take away certain things. You don’t try to do everything they can do. I could workout with Michael Jordan, but I’m not going to be able to shoot the fadeaway like Michael Jordan.”

Howard pays close attention to Olajuwon’s footwork during drills.

“The biggest thing when we’re working out is I’m always watching his feet,” Howard said. “Today we were working on spin moves and I was doing a spin move with my left foot in the back and I saw him doing it with his right. So once I caught that, I adjusted. It’s little things like that where you see something and you put your own mix to it – that’s what makes it great.

“We’ve been working out for years and I’ve never tried to be Hakeem Olajuwon. We made jokes about the Dream shake – he’d call mine the milk shake – but I don’t want to say I’m going to be like Hakeem Olajuwon. The moves we’re doing and how we’re doing them, it’s not about doing it just like Hakeem or doing them just like McHale. It’s about understanding why and how you do certain moves.”

Dwight Howard decided to leave the Los Angeles Lakers this offseason to sign with the Houston Rockets.

"He was never really a Laker," said Jim Buss of Howard. "He was just passing through."

According to those close to Howard, he could have been persuaded to re-sign with the Lakers.

Jeanine Buss believes Howard would have remained with the Lakers if her father Jerry Buss was still alive.

Jim Buss never really spent time with Howard and the team instead launched a series of billboards around Los Angeles asking him to "Stay."

The Houston Rockets and Orlando Magic had tentatively agreed upon a trade involving Dwight Howard in March of 2012.

The Magic were prepared to trade Howard if he did not opt-in for the 12-13 NBA season.

The Brooklyn Nets were also attempting to trade for Howard, but couldn't come up with a package that the Magic liked as much as Houston's. At that point, Howard strongly preferred a trade to the Nets.

If the Rockets had traded for Howard, they more than likely would have been unable to subsequently trade for James Harden.

Ultimately Howard was traded by the Magic to the Los Angeles Lakers last August.

Kevin Durant and James Harden were asked to reflect upon the trade of Harden to the Houston Rockets with an entire season and offseason in the books.

"For me, it was definitely weird," said Harden of his reaction to the trade. "Especially that entire season just being by myself basically. Coming from basically a brotherhood. Basically being by my lonesome in a new city, new team, new organization. I kind of had to feel my way in.

"It was difficult," said Durant. "Me and James became close ever since he was drafted."

Harden averaged 25.9 points per game for the Rockets and led them to the playoffs. The Rockets acquired Dwight Howard in the offseason making them one of the elite teams in the Western Conference.

"I'm so happy he's doing so well in Houston with his own team," said Durant. "I think he's the best guard in the league right now."