Dwight Howard will meet with the Houston Rockets, Atlanta Hawks, Dallas Mavericks, Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Lakers between Sunday night and Tuesday. Howard wants a quick resolution to his free agency and a source said his decision could come before the end of the week.

"He wants to make a decision based on basketball more than anything else," one source said.

Howard has had the Rockets as his frontrunner for several weeks since they would instantly become title contenders.

The Lakers remain a possibility, but are currently considered second in order of preference. The thinking is that the Lakers won't be a title contender in 2014 and may struggle to rebuild around him. Also, Howard did not enjoy playing in Mike D'Antoni's system.

The Rockets are planning on pitching to Howard their team's strength in China and the lack of state income tax in Texas as financial benefits to offset the difference he can make from the Lakers.

The Mavericks will attempt to sell Howard on a two-year plan to reshape its roster around the core of Mark Cuban, Rick Carlisle and Dirk Nowitzki.

Howard has never expressed any interest in playing in his hometown of Atlanta, giving them perhaps the longest odds.

The Warriors would need a sign-and-trade agreement to acquire Howard and it is believed their meeting is largely about establishing the franchise as a marquee destination for 2014.

Matt Barnes is drawing free agent interest from the Los Angeles Lakers, according to executives.

Barnes played two seasons for the Lakers before signing with the Los Angeles Clippers last offseason.

The Clippers are also interested in re-signing Barnes.

Barnes averaged 10.3 points and 4.6 rebounds last season.

The Los Angeles Lakers have waived Chris Duhon as expected.

Duhon would have earned $3.5 million had he remained on the Lakers' roster. Duhon's contract was partially guaranteed at $1.5 million.

Kobe Bryant doesn’t think it would be advantageous to hard-sell Dwight Howard on re-signing with the Los Angeles Lakers.

"It has to be his decision. The last thing you want to do is convince a person that they want to be here," Bryant said. "If you have to convince them when challenges or adversity comes up next season, it's very easy to say, 'Well they had to convince me to be here anyway, I really didn't want to be here, I'd rather be (somewhere else) but they sold me on it.' You want it to be his decision. When it's something that's rooted inside of him, it's something he champions. I just want to be there to assist his decision."

Bryant has made no secret of his desire to see Howard back with the Lakers.

"I think his talent level, his defensive prowess," Bryant said when asked why he wants Howard to re-sign. "We saw what he could do at the end of the year when we all started clicking … I think that makes him extremely, extremely valuable."

The Golden State Warriors will meet with Dwight Howard after all next week.

The Warriors will be represented by Joe Lacob, Bob Myers and Mark Jackson.

The Warriors would have to agree upon a sign-and-trade deal with the Los Angeles Lakers in order to acquire Howard.

Ric Bucher of Comcast reported on Saturday morning that the Warriors would not be meeting with Howard.

Hakeem Olajuwon and James Harden will join members of the Houston Rockets' front office and Kevin McHale in their recruiting pitch to Dwight Howard shortly after midnight EST on Sunday.

The Rockets are reportedly one of the frontrunners to sign Howard this offseason.

Howard is considering leaving the Los Angeles Lakers where he did not enjoy playing in Mike D'Antoni's offense.

Sam Amick of USA Today reports that the Golden State Warriors will meet with Howard on Monday, along with the Atlanta Hawks.

The Dallas Mavericks will meet with Howard on Tuesday, according to ESPN's Chris Broussard. Mark Cuban and Dirk Nowitzki will lead the Mavericks' contingent.

The Lakers will also meet on Tuesday with Howard.

Dirk Nowitzki made a recruiting call to Dwight Howard.

“I reached out to him, but that’s probably as far as I would go,” Nowitzki said. “I told him we’d love to have him and that’s really about it. It’s not like we call each other every day. I didn’t write him a letter. I just had a little phone contact and that was about it.”

Nowitzki regards Howard as the best big man in the league.

“He’s a beast on both ends,” Nowitzki said. “I’d love to play with a guy who can just get the ball in the post and spread the offense around the floor and on defense a guy who can protect the rim like that is a luxury so we’d love to have him but so would the other teams with cap room. We’ll wait and see what happens.”

The 2013 NBA Draft immediately delivered shock with the Cleveland Cavaliers' selection of Anthony Bennett. The Cavaliers were expected to pick between Nerlens Noel and Alex Len.

First Round
1. Cleveland Cavaliers: Anthony Bennett
2. Orlando Magic: Victor Oladipo
3. Washington Wizards: Otto Porter
4. Charlotte Bobcats: Cody Zeller
5. Phoenix Suns: Alex Len
6. New Orleans Pelicans (for 76ers): Nerlens Noel
7. Sacramento Kings: Ben McLemore
8. Detroit Pistons: Kentavious Caldwell-Pope
9. Minnesota Timberwolves (for Jazz): Trey Burke
10. Portland Trail Blazers: C.J. McCollum 
11. Philadelphia 76ers: Michael Carter-Williams
12. Oklahoma City Thunder: Steven Adams
13. Dallas Mavericks (for Celtics): Kelly Olynyk  
14. Utah Jazz (for Wolves): Shabazz Muhammad
15. Milwaukee Bucks: Giannis Adektokunbo 
16. Atlanta Hawks: Lucas Nogueira
17. Atlanta Hawks: Dennis Schroeder 
18. Atlanta Hawks (for Mavericks): Shane Larkin 
19. Cleveland Cavaliers: Sergey Karasev 
20. Chicago Bulls: Tony Snell 
21. Minnesota Timberwolves: Gorgui Dieng
22. Brooklyn Nets: Mason Plumlee
23. Indiana Pacers: Solomon Hill 
24. New York Knicks: Tim Hardaway Jr.
25. Los Angeles Clippers: Reggie Bullock
26. Minnesota Timberwolves (for Thunder): Andre Roberson
27. Denver Nuggets (for Jazz): Rudy Gobert
28. San Antonio Spurs: Livio Jean-Charles
29. Oklahoma City Thunder (for Suns): Archie Goodwin
30. Phoenix Suns (for Warriors): Nemanja Nedovic

Second Round
31. Cleveland Cavaliers: Allen Crabbe
32. Oklahoma City Thunder: Alex Abrines
33. Cleveland Cavaliers: Carrick Felix
34. Houston Rockets: Isaiah Canaan
35. Washington Wizards: Glen Rice 
36. Sacramento Kings: Ray McCallum
37. Detroit Pistons: Tony Mitchell
38. Philadelphia 76ers: Nate Wolters 
39. Portland Trail Blazers: Jeff Withey
40. Portland Trail Blazers: Grant Jerrett
41. Memphis Grizzlies: Jamaal Franklin
42. Philadelphia 76ers: Pierre Jackson
43. Milwaukee Bucks: Ricky Ledo
44. Atlanta Hawks: Mike Muscala
45. Portland Trail Blazers: Marko Todorovic
46. Utah Jazz: Erick Green
47. Atlanta Hawks: Raul Neto
48. Los Angeles Lakers: Ryan Kelly
49. Chicago Bulls: Erik Murphy
50. Miami Heat: James Ennis
51. Orlando Magic: Romero Osby
52. Minnesota Timberwolves: Lorenzo Brown
53. Boston Celtics: Colton Iverson
54. Washington Wizards: Arsalan Kazemi
55. Memphis Grizzlies: Joffrey Lauvergne
56. Detroit Pistons: Peyton Siva
57. Phoenix Suns: Alex Oriakhi
58. San Antonio Spurs: Deshaun Thomas
59. Minnesota Timberwolves: Bojan Dubljevic
60. Memphis Grizzlies: Janis Timma 

The Los Angeles Lakers will hire Mark Madsen as an assistant coach.

Madsen was hired as the head coach of the Los Angeles D-Fenders in mid-May, but has received the promotion to be an NBA assistant.

Dan D'Antoni is the only holdover from Mike D'Antoni's staff last season.

Steve Nash believes Dwight Howard can excel within the confines of Mike D'Antoni’s perimeter-oriented offense.

Nash sees parallels between the offense Howard ran with the Orlando Magic and D’Antoni’s spread attack with the Lakers.

“He played Mike's offense, pretty much, in Orlando. I think we can make it work. We need to surround him with some shooters, but I think he'll be great in it,” Nash said.

Nash thinks the Lakers, if healthy, can put it all together next season with Howard manning the middle.

“We were just scratching the surface last year before all of the injuries," Nash said. "We think we can form something really special after having a year under our belt and going into training camp together.”