Josh Howard...

Meet Chris Webber.

Mental midgets of the sports world, unite!

UPDATE 6/19/06: After watching this in slow motion on the TiVo it looks to me like it was not just Howard. He signaled for time twice and began walking towards the bench as it was granted, and he is the guy to whom the offcial granted it, thus is the guy who deserves the most blame here.

But as he was first signaling for time and stepping forward, Erick Dampier is almost certainly also signaling for time and taking a step forward, although he quickly stepped back into his spot for the next free throw, obviously figuring out the mistake almost immediately. Damp was the inside guy on the free throw rebound formation and was thus probably not directly visible to the official, although he could have made a verbal call as well (I have heard no courtside mikes having picked up anything).

And near the three point line on the opposite side, Devin Harris also brings his hands up as if to signal time, but it is probably only 50-50 whether he ever actually did - he pulled them back away quickly, realizing it was not wanted.

The confusion came from coach Avery Johnson giving an exaggerated time out signal to the players, presumably while screaming that he meant to call it after the seocnd free throw, but which with the noise and confusion they thought that he meant he wanted one right then. Avery does bear some blame here, he has got to call somebody over and give them those directions verbally so there is no mistake, but that on no way exonerates the player(s). I'll cut a little slack to the two who realized immediately it was a mistake, but none can be given to Howard. Even if it is your coach's job to make things clear, you have to have some basic common sense knowledge of the situation and what is going on in the game.

Just as silly are some of the local talk radio callers and pundits who have tried to claim that the official should not have granted the TO, knowing the Mavs did not really want it. BS! When you see a guy about to go out of bounds and call time, that is often a strategic mistake - teams do not want to use their last 20 second timeout for a simple save of possession, particularly if the shot clock is down and it's close to dommed anyway. Should the offical deny the player a TO as he sees fit there? Of course not. If a player calls time, you must grant it, it is not your job as an offical to bail teams out of poor decisions.

So, bottom line, Howard made one of those high profile mental errors that deserves to live in sports infamy, especially if the Heat end up winning the title. And the offical absolutely did the right thing. This is a long winded way of saying that, no matter the circumstances, Josh is still a modern day Chris Webber - I was just adding some perspective.