Rockets May Trade Dwight Howard, Raiders Will Stay In Oakland One More Year
NBA
The Houston Rockets are thinking about trading eight-time-All-Star Dwight Howard. The team is currently shopping the veteran around, looking to see if they can strike a deal before the February 18th deadline. The move would make some sense. Howard left the Los Angeles Lakers back in 2013, signing a four-year, $88 million contract with the Rockets, but is expected to soon exercise a clause in his contract that would make him an unrestricted free agent this summer. Trading Howard would help the Rockets squeeze a bit more out of their investment. For Howard, leaving a year early would mean giving up $23.3 million of his contract, but it just might be worth it for the opportunity to play on a more successful team. The Rockets are having a thoroughly disappointing season. Going into their All Star break on Wednesday, the team lost 116-103 to the Portland Trail Blazers, putting them at 27-28 for the season.
NFL
The Raiders will stay in Oakland for at least one more year. After being denied a 2016 move to Los Angeles, Raiders owner Mark Davis has been looking into alternatives for where he could move his team, and get a new stadium in the process. Potential sites have included Las Vegas and San Antonio.
The Raiders were one of three teams lobbying to move to Los Angeles for the 2016 season, alongside the San Diego Chargers and the St. Louis Rams. The Raiders and Chargers both utilize multi-purpose facilities built almost 50 years ago, and neither San Diego or Oakland are willing to build their teams new stadiums. The Chargers and Raiders proposed a joint-stadium project in Carson, roughly 12 miles outside of LA. But in January, league owners only approved the Rams’ stadium proposal. Team owner Stan Kroenke is planning a massive stadium in Inglewood, funded entirely with private money. The Chargers have been given a year to decide whether they want to move to LA and share usage of Kroenke’s new stadium. If the Chargers stay where they are, then and only then will the Raiders have the option to move back to LA. All three teams have called LA home at one time or another. The Raiders started in Oakland, moved to Los Angeles in 1982, then went back to Oakland in 1995, the same year the Rams left LA. The Los Angeles Rams’ stadium in Inglewood is expected to be the world’s most expensive stadium complex ever built. Construction will be completed by 2019.
