Former Lakers player Dwight Howard recently said in an interview with reporter Brandon Robinson that he originally planned to renew his contract with the team after the Lakers won the championship, but ultimately failed.

"I was told I had a contract, and I was so happy to go back to the Lakers, so I posted on social media, and my agent suddenly called me and said, 'Hey, the Lakers have given up on this contract, you have to delete the tweet.' I was thinking in my mind why they did that. It has troubled me for a long time. I kept fighting for victory with the right attitude, not caring about personal scores or rebounds, just hoping to win the championship again. However, many people overemphasized that I care about scoring, and in fact all players wanted to perform and score in the game. So I was very disappointed at the time because I didn't have the chance to fight for the title. I believe we had a special team that had the chance to reach the NBA Finals many times and win a few more titles," Howard said.

After leaving the Lakers in the summer of 2020, Howard chose to go to Philadelphia to sign a contract with the Sixers.