Apparently there are two different Supermen in the NBA, Orlando Magic center Dwight Howard and Cleveland Cavaliers center Shaquille O’Neal.

But there is room for both if Men of Steel can acknowledge each other and Howard seems okay with that. Howard and O’Neal had been battling verbally over who deserves the title more, but Howard said on Sunday before the NBA All-Star Game that the battle between both over the “Superman” tag is over.

O’Neal had tagged himself Superman when he first arrived in the NBA, coincidentally when he played for the Magic in the 1990’s leading them to an NBA Final appearance in 1995 where they were swept by the Houston Rockets. O’Neal has the famous Superman logo tattooed on his left biceps as well with words Man of Steel around it.

Howard led the Magic back to the NBA finals for the first time since '95 when the younger O’Neal and then self-proclaimed “Man of Steel” took Orlando to the pinnacle and lost. Both lost on their first attempts at the league’s most prestigious title; the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy.

Howard was “ordained” during the 2008 NBA Slam Dunk contest when he used the infamous cape as a prop for one of his dunks to win the title. Though he had been doing the “Superman dance” from the rap artist Soulja Boy and was in an Adidas commercial where he begged Kevin Garnett to call him Superman, it was not until recent that the debate over the real Superman started.

Last week during an NBA regular season game, the 17-year NBA veteran O’Neal held Howard scoreless when the Cavaliers defeated the Magic 115-106. After the game, because he was “offended” with the comparison to Howard, O’Neal said to reporters “you tell me who the real Superman is.”

The younger Howard was surprised about the comments and initially did not take kindly to it.

“It didn’t sit well with me personally,” he said. “I’m a young player trying to get to where he’s at. I felt it would be better if he tried to help me instead of trying to put me down,” Howard said regarding O’Neal’s comment.

After the whole war of words had died down, Howard in an interview with TNT said on Sunday that he had no issues with “The Diesel” O’Neal when asked if he would reach out to him as a mentor.

“I don’t have any problems against him,” Howard said. “The whole Superman thing, there’s no battle of nicknames. I mean, if he wants to be Superman, he can be Superman. But I never tried to steal that title from him or take away anything that he’s done for the game of basketball.

“I would like, instead of people fighting over a nickname, for us to be able to talk about what it’s like to win a championship. Just little things that made him be who he is can help me,” Howard said. “But I never tried to do anything to be like him. I’m my own person. I just love to have fun, and I have a lot of respect for him and what he’s brought to the game of basketball, and I would just ask that somebody like Shaquille O’Neal to help me become a better basketball player and a better person.”