Things haven’t really been going well for Andrew Bynum since he left the Los Angeles Lakers. He has since been associated with four different teams, but has hardly played any basketball, and his knee situation might mean that he’s going to sit out another full season. He’s not retired yet, but it’s getting very close to it.
Currently he is considering going special treatment on his knees, something that is not approved in the United States. It will be with Peter Wehling, a German doctor who has also worked with Alex Rordiguez and Kobe Bryant in the past. It might save his career, but it will probably cost him the entire 2014-2015 NBA season.
Bynum left the Los Angeles Lakers after the 2011-2012 season, landing with the Philadelphia 76ers. Instead of helping them into the playoffs, he sat out the entire season, making more headlines with his growing afro than actually playing basketball. He wasn’t too happy about being traded to the 76ers, so maybe he did get his wish.
After a summer of trying to prove to teams he can still play and deserves a lot of money, the Cleveland Cavaliers took a risk on him with a contract that was filled with fail-safe clauses. After playing 24 games for them and doing everything in his power to show them he wants to leave, he got traded to the Chicago Bulls and released so they can save a lot of money on him.
Bynum was a free agent, going to the Indiana Pacers. Like everything the Pacers did last season to improve their bench, the Bynum experiment failed. He played only twice in the regular season and not a single game in the postseason. Another lost season for him.
Bynum is only 26. There’s still time for him to bounce back, but that depends on it being physically possible. The New York Knicks, with Phil Jackson at the helm, might be interested in him if his treatment, in the long run, works out fine. For now, he’s putting his NBA career on hold probably to actually create some sort of future for himself in the league. It’s not too much of a stretch to think that he has played his last NBA game.