The gifts to father John, mother Angela and children Jadin (3) and Chad (2) included a $12,500 check from the Magic, $500 for each Dwight Howard dunk, along with toys, clothes and other items. The day of festivities also included dinner, courtside seats and meeting players.

Ophthalmologists in Central Florida also agreed to provide treatment for Jadin's congenital eye condition.

Superman nuggets

The 17,000 Superman T-shirts given away to fans weren't the only place the Man of Steel logo showed up in Amway Arena Thursday.

Magic C Howard also wore his special edition, red and blue "Superman" adidas for the Christmas game.

Howard's new TS-Bounce Commander shoes had insignias on each of the heels.

He also continues to lead in overall all-star game balloting, according to the second round of returns released by the NBA.

With 1,421,882 fan votes, Howard leads all players from either conference.

And the NBA also announced that Howard, Memphis' Rudy Gay and New York's Nate Robinson would be three of the four participants in the All-Star dunk contest.

The fans will vote on the fourth entrant.

Not quite sold

It's not that Magic Coach Stan Van Gundy isn't in the holiday spirit.

But he isn't quite sold on the idea of the NBA playing Christmas day games.

"I'm going to be honest, I think playing on Christmas is ridiculous," he said.

"It's a great game, a great opponent and all of that, but it could be played on Dec. 26. There are some things more important than Basketball, but the NBA front office doesn't agree."

The Magic played the day after Christmas last season and until Thursday hadn't played on Christmas day since 2003.

Etc.

Magic F Brian Cook returned to the court Thursday after missing one game following the passing of his father, Norm Cook.