Dwight Howard is Orlando's ambassador, for now

ORLANDO — Moments before Dwight Howard stepped through a doorway and into a crowd, a newspaper reporter who covers the Orlando Magic all year asked a colleague to reposition his backpack placed on the floor, lest he become infamous as the guy who tripped the man who once wore Superman's cape and thus ruined the hometown team's season.

As if on cue, voices around him echoed in unison.

You mean New Jersey's season, don't you?

And so it goes with the NBA's latest reluctant superstar and a league that purportedly shut down operations for five months last year so it could remedy precisely this issue.

Nineteen months after LeBron James left Cleveland for Miami and exactly a year after Carmelo Anthony forced his way out of Denver and to New York, Howard this time is the one who drew a massive media crowd Friday inquiring about his future when NBA All-Star weekend came to Orlando, the home he claims he loves and yet seemingly is poised to leave by the March 15 trade deadline.

They were lined nine, 10 people deep when Howard showed for Friday's mandatory media availability session, just as they were a year ago when Anthony held court at the All-Star Game in Los Angeles mere days before he was traded to the Knicks.

"I'm glad it's not me anymore," Anthony said, looking through thick-rimmed black glasses at Howard and the crowd next to his relatively unpopulated podium area.

Focused?

Howard can opt out of his contract this summer and sign unfettered with any team he chooses after he has played his first eight NBA seasons in Orlando.

He refused to answer questions about his future -- even from an adorably cute child reporter from Sports Illustrated for Kids -- this weekend, calling the All-Star Game's return to Orlando after 20 years away a cause only for celebration even though his agent weeks ago received permission to talk with New Jersey, Dallas and the Los Angeles Lakers.

"We're not going to talk about it right now," said Howard, who will turn down a $19.2 million player option for next season if he decides to become an unrestricted free agent at age 26 in July. "All that stuff can go on after All-Star weekend. Right now my focus is on having a great time, being a great host to all the great players around us. This is Jeremy Lin's first All-Star [Game], so I'm going to make sure I have some fun with Jeremy Lin. This is all that matters right now. This is the moment."

"If you want a good time, just go to one of the parties," Howard told reporters. "LeBron's having a party. I'm having a party."

"No," Howard said matter of factly.

NBA owners locked out their players last summer seeking to fix what they called a broken system. When the sides finally reached a new labor agreement in the middle of the night two days after Thanksgiving, those owners had traded a "franchise player" tag and hard salary cap system that would have significantly limited player movement for a bigger slice of the revenue pie.

The new deal still allows a veteran player largely to choose his own future, as NBA fans already have seen when New Orleans traded Paul to the Los Angeles Clippers in December rather than risk losing him and getting nothing in return this summer.

'Best for Dwight'

That's the decision the Magic must make now if it believes Howard will opt out of his contract rather than signing an extension in the city he says "will always be my home."

"He's got to do what's best for his family," James said. "He's got to do what's going to make him happy."

The Magic can offer Orlando's great weather, Florida's no income-tax appeal and as much as $30 million more than if he were to sign with another team as a free agent.

And still it might not be enough to keep a six-time All-Star and the game's most physically dominating player from bolting for a bigger market that offers better business opportunities and perhaps, but only perhaps, a better chance to win bigger than a Magic franchise that has reached the NBA Finals once during Howard's time there.

"LeBron did it his way, and he did what was best for him," Howard said of James' pretentious foray into free agency. "I have to do what's best for Dwight."

James, of course, united with U.S. Olympic teammates Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh in Miami, a superstar trifecta that won 58 games last season and reached the NBA Finals but still was considered a failure because it didn't win a championship straight out of the chute. That's a transgression the Heat very well might correct this season.

Feeling the frenzy

All of it is enough that Williams' mother called him recently, asking if he indeed was headed home to Dallas to sign with the Mavericks this summer. He said he told her to stop believing everything ESPN personality Steven A. Smith says.

All of it is enough to create what Oklahoma City superstar Kevin Durant calls "free-agent frenzy."

He opted to unceremoniously sign a contract extension with the Thunder when his rookie contract expired because he says he's happy in his little city, happy with his franchise, happy with his teammates.

"People like Carmelo, LeBron, C.P. [Paul], Dwight, they did the same thing I did after my rookie deal," Durant said. "They quietly signed an extension, same thing I did. Who knows, maybe after my contract is over, maybe I do go out there and have a free-agent frenzy in the summertime? You never know. But they did it the same way I did. I don't see why people are giving them a hard time. They're superstars in this league, and everybody wants to know where they're going to go."

"What's weird?" he asked. "They don't say that. They don't say that to me. ... I'm here. It doesn't matter what would have or should have happened. I'm here."

Until then, he will hear questions daily about his future. By Monday, he might even start answering them again.

Anthony has been there, done that through last season where he said it seemed like nothing mattered, except for where he'd re-sign and when.