Just recently, Rudy Gobert won his fourth Defensive Player of the Year award due to his stellar work as the Minnesota Timberwolves starting center this season. This prompted Dwight Howard to congratulate the big man with the best reaction yet to his DPOY win.
Gobert first entered the league as the Denver Nuggets’ 27th pick in the 2013 Draft and traded shortly after to the Utah Jazz. The French center would only play 45 games that year as his team’s reserve center with averages of 2.3 points and 3.4 rebounds per contest.
The Jazz big man would eventually get better and obtain the starting center role for the Jazz during the 2016-17 season. In that same year, the French star led the NBA in blocks by rejecting 2.6 shots a game, to go along with his 14.0 points, 12.8 rebounds, and 1.2 assists.
Together with Donovan Mitchell, Gobert helped Utah reach the playoffs on multiple occasions. However, Utah reached its ceiling with the two All-Stars are its core, leading the front office to blow it all up by trading the big man to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
While initially laughed at due to the number of assets exchanged, Gobert vindicated himself by helping Anthony Edwards and the Timberwolves finish the regular season with the third seed. He was also instrumental in sweeping the Phoenix Suns, and their consecutive victories against a Nikola Jokic-led Nuggets team.
Dwight Howard Reacts To Minnesota Timberwolves Center Rudy Gobert’s Defensive Player of the Year Win
Various personalities gave their take on Gobert after he won his fourth DPOY award. Among those was former Los Angeles Lakers star Dwight Howard in a message he posted on X:
“Congrats Rudy! From one DPOY to another I will say this has been the greatest defense I’ve seen out of all the other times you’ve won! Get that ring this year then go for another and be the only one with 5! Im telling y’all that Darkness retreat will turn you into a different animal,” Howard tweeted.
During the offseason, Gobert said that he went on a darkness retreat, which entailed around 64 hours being immersed in full darkness. He added that that the said experience allowed him to meditate and think.
Like Howard reiterated, Gobert’s darkness retreat seemed to have worked wonders for his campaign this season. If all goes well, the Timberwolves star might go on another one just to lock down another DPOY trophy.
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