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Dwight Howard's mom cried at the thought of her son signing with the Jazz

Dwight Howard takes great joy in his mom's tears. (AP)
Dwight Howard takes great joy in his mom’s tears. (AP)

Every time my grandmother visited when I was a kid, I used to tell her the ice cream shop up the street from us burned to the ground. She fell for it every time. It was a cruel joke, because she loved that hot fudge probably more than her stupid grandson, but we both got a pretty good kick out of it.

I can’t be sure how she would have reacted had I told her I signed a $150 million contract to become an ice cream baron in the Northwest, because sadly that never happened. So, instead, I’ll have to live vicariously through Dwight Howard jokingly telling his mom he signed with the Utah Jazz this summer.

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“I played a prank on my mom,” Howard told CBS Sports Radio’s Doug Gottlieb Show. “I wanted to see her reaction, so I told her, ‘Mom, I just got this big contract, $150 million,’ and she was like, ‘Oh my God, who?’ I said, ‘Utah Jazz,’ and she started crying. And I said, ‘Mom, I’m sorry, I was just joking. I’m coming home to Atlanta.’ She was super happy. My family was super excited. This city’s been great.”

It’s not that the Jazz would’ve been a horrible choice, since they’re currently the sixth seed out West, although it would have been a strange one, since Rudy Gobert is already entrenched as their center of the future. Somehow, I don’t imagine Howard’s mom was crying over a potential depth chart decision.

This was about Atlanta, the family’s home since before Howard was even born in 1985. How could he pick Salt Lake City, of all places, over The ATL? Turns out he didn’t, signing a three-year, $70.5 million deal with the Hawks in mid-July. That’s less than half what he told his mom he signed for in Utah, but that’s probably not worth crying over, either, since he’s already earned $163.6 million in his career.

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Regardless, things are working out pretty well in Atlanta. Howard is averaging 15.2 points on a league-best 63 percent shooting to go along with 12.4 rebounds and 3.1 combined blocks and steals in just 28.7 minutes a night. This is the sort of production that made him an eight-time All-Star from 2006-14.

Likewise, the Hawks are off to a 7-2 start, including a win in Cleveland, and trail the Cavaliers by a game for the East’s top spot. With Howard as the anchor, they own the NBA’s second-best defensive rating (95.8 points allowed per 100 possessions) and net rating (plus 11.2 points per 100 possessions).

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“I wanted to just prove to myself that I’m still capable of playing in this league and playing at a very high level,” the three-time NBA Defensive Player of the Year told Gottlieb. “There were moments when I’ve had some doubts, but I really just fell in love with the game again. My passion for the game is at an all-time high, and I’m just super excited about the possibilities of this Atlanta Hawks team.”

Cool. My grandmother got super excited about ice cream and fell in love with it again every year, too.

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Ben Rohrbach is a contributor for Ball Don’t Lie and Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at rohrbach_ben@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!