NBA All-Star weekend: Dwight Howard on Blake Griffin and DeMar DeRozan

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Dwight Howard needs to be in Los Angeles. Or, very selfishly speaking, reporters need him to be here.

Even looking a little tired and sounding slightly hoarse, Howard managed to get off one of the better lines after Saturday’s All-Star practice. The topic was Blake Grffin and the dunk.

Howard first mentioned something about the pressure on Griffin, saying he has a ‘lot to live up to,’ considering it will be Griffin’s first dunk contest Saturday night.

It got better.

‘I don’t even watch TV,’ Howard said. ‘Yeah, I’ve seen a couple of posters. I think the guy from New York [Timofey Mozgov] had the worst poster of the year. I feel bad for his face.’

DeMar DeRozan of the Raptors told us Sunday in Toronto that Howard had given him some of his ‘secret dunks.’ Howard confimed that and elaborated on the gift-giving.

‘I gave him a couple of dunks -- if I was going to be in the dunk contest, then I would do them,’ Howard said. ‘I told him I would help him out, give him some ideas. Some dunks that I’ve been thinking about for a couple of years now. Hopefully he can pull them off.’

What would lure Howard, the 2008 winner, back to compete in the dunk contest?

‘Two years in a row, having a bad dunk contest, you might have to have some more players get in,’ he said. ‘I don’t know. I’m getting old. You have to understand. I get beat on a lot in the games. They take away a lot from my legs. I might try it again.’

-- Lisa Dillman