From smack talk in the bars to caustic message board posts on espn.com and other Web sites, it’s become apparent that sports fans today dwell on the negative aspects of the game more than ever before.

And that was never more apparent than during the NBA and NHL playoffs this year as some of the sports’ best athletes were roundly criticized by fans almost daily.

In many cases, the targets were young players like the Orlando Magic’s Dwight Howard, the LA Lakers’ Andrew Bynum, and the Pittsburgh Penguins’ Sidney Crosby among others.

Howard probably took the most heat out of that group, and he even took some from Lakers assistant coach Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the legendary former center who called his moves “predictable” in an interview with the media.

While what Abdul-Jabbar might been truthful in that statement, the media and the fans blew things out of proportion and use his assertions as ammo against Howard for not putting the Magic on his back and carrying them to victory against the Lakers in the NBA Finals.

Abdul-Jabbar put up an amazing 35.2 points per game and 16.8 rebounds per game at age 23 as a rookie with the Milwaukee Bucks in the 1969-1970 Playoffs, but the Bucks were beaten 4-1 in the Eastern Conference Finals by a superior New York Knicks team.

Howard’s stats weren’t quite as impressive as Abdul-Jabbar’s this year, but his 20 points and 15 rebounds per game were pretty remarkable in their own right, and his Magic still pulled off an upset over a highly-favored Cleveland team.

The point here is that the Magic greatly outperformed expectations this post-season and Howard was a huge reason for their success.

But because he wasn’t able to dominate the Lakers’ more talent, athletic front-line the way he did to Cleveland’s, fans are questioning whether he really has the chops to be a true superstar in the NBA. What they don’t realize is that these traits take time to learn.

It’s true that some guys are born with that killer instinct and some aren’t, but when a player possesses otherworldly talent combined with an excellent work ethic like Howard, that instinct can be learned and applied for at least one title run in most cases. Just think about how close he was this year and how much more experienced and talented the Lakers’ supporting cast was compared to the Magic’s. And then think about how good Howard will be when he hits, say, 26 years old in three years.

Players take time to mature, but no one seems to have the patience to give them the benefit of the doubt in today’s sporting climate.

Bynum faced tons of criticism from Lakers fans despite being only 21 years old and coming off of major knee surgery, but their NBA Finals win has quieted the masses for the time being even though Bynum only played a supporting role.

Then there’s Crosby, who only scored 3 points, including just 1 goal, in the 2009 Stanley Cup Finals. He sat out much of the last game with an injury but now the 21-year-old is being hailed as a hero and a transcendent player despite Evgeni Malkin being the driving force behind Pittsburgh’s Stanley Cup win.

A smart fan could easily argue that Howard played better than Crosby in his respective finals run considering the huge amounts of blocks and rebounds he put up, yet Crosby will be revered for his performance looking back ten years from now while some might scoff at Howard’s failure to win the title.

In reality, both should be praised for outperforming many of their more mature pro counterparts, because winning a championship in a team sport single-handedly is virtually impossible, not the pre-requisite for true superstardom that some fans make it out to be.

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