Less than two weeks before the start of the NBA season, and Andrew Bynum laughs like he's still on summer vacation, hopping around the center of the locker room like a giant child.
Then you look closer and realize that, when describing the key to the Lakers' season, those words no longer go together.
He's no child. He's all giant.
Have you seen him? The kid who wandered into the Lakers' locker room three years ago has become a man -- huge biceps, broad shoulders, no longer gets lost in Shaq's locker.
In nine days, he'll be 21 years old, entering his fourth NBA season, which is exactly how long it took another Lakers high school draftee to win his first championship, a guy named Kobe Bryant.
For Bynum, it's graduation year.
Which doesn't give him an excuse for senioritis.
This is not a time for him to be late for practice, which happened last week.
This is not a time for him to be tentative with his rehabilitated knee, which has happened during training camp, Bynum yet to show the Lakers the full-court energy they require.
More than anything, this is not a time for his agent to be publicly popping off about the Lakers giving him a new contract.
A new contract for what?
He might be the key to the Lakers' championship run, but in three seasons he has played only about a month's worth of important games for them.
Yet last week his agent David Lee squawked in this newspaper about the Lakers refusing to seriously negotiate a new deal worth $85 million before an Oct. 31 deadline.
"I just don't get it," Lee said to The Times' Mike Bresnahan. "I do not understand certain things that happen."
Understand this: The Lakers have no idea whether Bynum will fully recover from the knee injury that cost him two-thirds of last season.
"I think he's going through a re-acclimation process still," Coach Phil Jackson said Saturday before the Lakers' 108-104 exhibition victory over Regal FC Barcelona. "Some of it has to do with finding out how much he still has to physically recover to get back to that position where he was when he left the game last January."
Understand this: Even if they don't sign him by Oct. 31, they can match any other team's offer next summer when he is a restricted free agent, so if they want him they are guaranteed to have him for at least two more years.
Why should they do something now?
