Breakout night for Bynum!!!

Los Angeles, CA

We might have witnessed the awakening of a giant tonight at Staples center tonight. In a 108-97 win over the 'home' Clippers, Andrew Bynum had a career night. Bynum shattered his previous career high (28) netting 42 points to go alongside 15 boards, in a win over the injury riddled Clippers. The game also saw the emergence of another young big man. The Clippers DeAndre Jordan, a rookie out of Texas A&M, scored 23 points with 10 boards in only his second career start. Thus far in his young career he was averaging only 2 points and about 10 minutes played per game before tonight. It was a stellar performance from the rookie playing in large part due to the fact that the Clippers are without their four best players. Either way, it was Bynum showing why he is going to be the NBA's next big man on campus in the coming years. This was the first time since Shaq scored 48 in a March 2003 game against Boston that a Laker other than Kobe scored 40+ points. In that span of time, Bryant has reached the 40 point mark, an unbelievable 61 times. The first half was especially impressive for the young Bynum. He led all scorers into the locker rooms at the half with 25 and 10 coming his way during the first 24 minutes of play. Bynum ended the night shooting 70% from the field with 17-of-24 attempts finding the bottom of the net. The largely purple and gold crowd gave Bynum a standing ovation and cheered wildly when he left the court. In a post game interview Bynum gave credit to working out with his trainer and coaches Rambis and Kareem Abdul-Jabaar.

Kobe Bryant showed no ill effects from his latest injury. Playing the game with his right ring finger taped straight, and some bandage to help protect a floor burn he sustained on his palm, KB24 tallied his 16th career triple-double. The second of the year for Bryant against the Clippers, he finished the night with 18 points, 10 rebounds, and 12 assists. It also marks the fourth straight game in which the reigning league MVP, has recorded double digit assists. The rest of the Lakers maintained the balanced effort with Lamar Odom leading the Bench Mob with 19 points. Los Angeles Lakers also out rebounded the Clips by 20. 

The Lakers now play host to the Washington Wizards in the second night of a back to back. Guard Jordan Farmar could see playing time as early as this Tuesday against the Charlotte Bobcats. After an initial 8 week timeline to return, the 22 year old is healing ahead of schedule. You can check out a short video of Jordan addressing his injury online at the Lakers website. He seems very positive and is clearly very eager to get back out to game action. I expect to see a surge in the Lakers defensive effort as Farmar rejoins the team. With the additions of Lamar and Sasha now recently and Jordan hopefully by early next week this team should be able to get in some good practices. 

Here is a link to the Jordan Farmar injury update video:

http://my.lakers.com/blogs/2009/01/21/jordan-farmar-video-update/