Bad Boy Bynum

Andrew (The Thug) Bynum

Following yesterday’s majestically wonderful sweep of the Los Angeles Lakers by the Dallas Mavericks, all the talk I’ve been hearing involves “blowing up the Lakers.” Most of this talk centers on Andrew Bynum. The most persistent rumor I’m hearing is that the Lakers want to trade Bynum and either Lamar Odom or Pau Gasol to the Orlando Magic for Dwight Howard.

The problem with that trade, or any other involving Bynum, is his status going into whenever the next NBA season starts. (Don’t forget the league is facing collective bargaining talks that are going to be far more contentious and games-threatening than what the NFL is going through now.) When Bynum committed the flagrant foul against J.J. Barea at the end of yesterday’s massacre, he de-evolved from a basketball player to a thug. And the league must — absolutely must — respond accordingly.

I am going to argue that anything less than a 10-game suspension for Bynum at the start of the next season would be far too lenient. He not only came close to handing Barrea a serious injury that could have sidelined him for the rest of the playoffs, he then displayed utter disregard for his team and the league by removing his jersey as he walked off the court. And, unlike Odom, he was totally unapologetic after the game saying only “I wanted to foul somebody.” Of course, being the thug he became, he picked on the smallest player on the court. Put all that together and it’s at least 10 times worse than Ron Artest’s clotheslining of Barrea in game two that led to Artest’s one-game suspension.

So now the question becomes how valuable is a Bynum who should not be allowed in the first 10 games of the next season. And what do you risk giving up the best big man in the NBA for a thug and his companion? If I were a GM of an NBA team, I don’t know if I would want to add Bynum to my roster right now and, if I did, I certainly wouldn’t give up my best player for him, regardless of what other players were included in the deal. Well, OK, if the Lakers included Kobe, I would talk, but that isn’t going to happen.