【原文】
Bynum's not here, but he made it all possible for Lakers
DENVER -- Thanks for coming, Andrew.
Andrew Bynum's season effectivelyended last week with Phil Jackson calling his chance of returning thisspring "remote," which sounded so inevitable, it ran as a secondaryitem in Lakers notebooks.
Bynum's season lasted 35 games -- the most important 35 for the Lakers since Shaquille O'Neal left.
Between Kobe Bryant's rant abouttrading Bynum in May ("I mean, Jason Kidd, c'mon!") and Jan. 13 whenBynum's season was halted, he had turned Bryant around, from rage atmanagement to respect for its judgment, from demanding a trade to ateam that could win a title to realizing, like Dorothy in "The Wizardof Oz," there was no place like home.
The night after Bynum was lost,Bryant ended months of cool detachment at their surprising start withthe 10 words that meant it was morning again in Lakerdom:
"We're a championship-caliber team with him in the lineup."
And so they were.
"Kobe recognized what his advance wasthis year," Jackson says of Bynum. "Obviously, there was a little trialand tribulation for a period of time we went through in training camp.
"But after that -- hey, this is a facet of our game that we haven't had in five years. There it is."
Here's how bright the Lakers' future is: They're still favored to win the West with Bynum gone.
Not that they don't miss -- a lot --what he would bring after two games of seeing the Denver Nuggets strolldown the lane and lay the ball up when they're not jumping over theLakers' backs to take 34 offensive rebounds in two games.
Bynum was a top-10 rebounder and shot blocker, so the day they get him back, all that's over.
Coming off the bench for the first 10games, Bynum still averaged 11 points and 11 rebounds in November,taking it up to 13-9 in December and 19-13 in the first six games ofJanuary before going down against Memphis.
The Lakers were 24-11 at that point, despite a difficult early schedule.
You may remember Bryant wasn't in thebest frame of mind, trying to put together a trade to Chicago right upto the opener before resigning himself to starting the season here.
Bryant has an iron will, so if he's going the right way, there is little in nature that can stop him.
Unfortunately, when he's not, there'salso little that can stop him, and at that point the arrow wasdefinitely pointing to "elsewhere."
If Bynum hadn't improved and theLakers had started, say, 15-20 (they closed last season 16-27 as Bynumhit the wall) and had then gone 4-5, as they did before acquiring PauGasol on Feb. 1, they would have been 19-25, No. 10 in the West, 5 1/2games out of the No. 8 playoff spot.
Impressed as Bryant would have beenat getting Gasol, would that have been enough to keep Bryant if theyhad missed the playoffs?
Let's just say the Lakers are glad they never had to find out.
I then spent months arguing with everyone I knew, not that this represented any change for me.
The one I'll never forget waswith Mychal Thompson, a friend of Kevin Garnett's who would havecarried Bynum to Minnesota on his shoulders to get Garnett, telling himthat Bynum would be better than Robert Parish.
"CHIEF?" shrieked Thompson. "CHIEF?"
Of course, Parish is in the Hall of Fame and Bynum does have only 78 career starts.
Interestingly, Jackson, who neverthought Bynum would happen fast enough to affect Bryant's (orJackson's) career here, always recognized Bynum's upside.
Early last season, with Bynum juststarting to show flashes starting in place of the injured Kwame Brown,I asked Jackson if he would trade Andrew Bynum for Garnett.
"How old is Garnett?" Jackson mused.
He never did answer, but with theLakers' preoccupation with Bryant's window, they did offer Bynum andLamar Odom for Garnett before Minnesota opted for the Boston package.
It never occurred to anyone when thenews broke that Garnett was going to Boston that this might one day becelebrated as a holiday in Lakerdom.
As you may have noticed, things can change fast around here. |
發表於 2008-4-27 04:58 PM
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