One of the more curious officiating decisions of the 2016-17 NBA season came on Monday when Dwight Howard got tossed from Atlanta’s game against Boston. Howard and Al Horford got into it, which led to Atlanta’s big man getting a tech. It was the normal pushing and jawing that you see every now and then during a basketball game, but Howard deserved to get hit with a technical for this.
Later in the quarter, Howard showboated a little too much on a dunk, got his second technical, and was ejected. Sure, context is probably important as to why Howard got T’d up and tossed, but it really did seem unnecessary for the former All-Star to get ejected for something so mundane.
Apparently, the league agrees. Shortly after the game ended, the NBA released a statement that said that Howard’s second technical would be rescinded.
The NBA says Dwight Howard shouldn't have been ejected against the Celtics pic.twitter.com/6xGD9Z1Jwa
— Harry Lyles Jr. (@harrylylesjr) February 28, 2017
The term “non-unsportsmanlike” doesn’t get tossed around all that often, mostly because you’d think that they’d just say “sportsmanlike” instead of lumping two negatives together like that. Anyway, good on the NBA for doing this. Players showboat a little after dunks all the time – it literally became Shaq’s logo – so it’s good that the league got on this right away and set the record straight.
