When new 76er Dorell Wright found out the news, he sent a text to friend and new teammate Nick Young.
"I didn't think it was true," Young said upon receiving the text, "but it happened."
Bynum gives the Sixers their best center since Moses Malone and changes the complexion of the team.
"We're a lot better than we were two days ago,” Wright said, while Young added: "It changes a whole lot. It makes us a (team) to deal with. We just got to live up to the expectations."
Last season, in a more prominent role under new Lakers coach Mike Brown, Bynum was voted an All-Star starter for the first time, averaging 18.7 points, 11.8 rebounds and 1.93 blocks. In an attempt to be even better and healthier, the 24-year-old reportedly is heading to Germany next month to undergo Orthokine treatment, the same knee procedure Kobe Bryant has had.
"He's a big presence," Wright said. "He's going to clog up the paint. He's going to block shots. He's going to rebound for us and we just got to be ready for that.
"(He's) a guy we can throw it down (to) and get us some baskets with his back to the basket. He's young. We're a young team. So it's going to be fun."
The additions of Bynum and wing players Wright, Young and Jason Richardson, who joined the 76ers in the four-team, 12-player trade, to the young group of Jrue Holiday, Evan Turner and Thaddeus Young have the players excited about the talent and depth in Philadelphia.
"I like the sound of that,” Wright said. “I like the fact that we're still young. We're going to be able to run up and down and score a lot of points."
The Sixers made it to the playoffs as the eighth seed in the Eastern Conference last season, taking Boston to seven games in the second round, but now could conceivably compete for a four or five seed.
Wright, acquired in a trade earlier this summer, is two seasons removed from leading the league in 3- pointers. Young, signed as a free agent, shot a scorching 51.5 percent from beyond the arc in the playoffs for the Clippers last season and is a 37.8-percent shooter from 3-point range in his career.
The addition of Bynum certainly could provide open looks for both.
"If they're double teaming him," Young said, "you know I'm there to knock down some shots."
