Linsanity

In honor of Mark buying me tickets to see the Lakers vs Timberwolves game I thought it about time to write another NBA entry. I’ll get to the T-wolves later but first how could I ignore the two up and coming big names in the NBA? point guard on the Knicks that’s been getting all this attention? I was originally going to write on both Jeremy Lin and Andre Iguodala but I’ll give Andre his own blog entry. Don’t want to crowd the spotlight.

Who is Jeremy Lin? And did he just pop up out of the blue?

Not really…he’s been working his ass off to get to where he is today.

So who is this overnight star? Lin is the first American NBA player who is of Chinese and/or Taiwanese descent. (Yao Ming doesn’t count because he was not born in the US, but don’t worry Yao we’ll never be able to replace you!) And he’s a Harvard Graduate, nonetheless. Which would make him the #4th Harvard Graduate/attendee to go into the NBA (I might be missing some people who changed colleges in between). The first would be Wyndol Gray who ended up playing the Celtics and the Providence Steamrollers, second would be Saul Mariaschin who also played for the Celtics and third would be Ed Smith who also played for the Knicks but this was back in the 1950s so  no one in over 50 years has chosen the path Jeremy Lin has. But things haven’t come easy to Lin who was not offered any type of scholarship or job during his college years. He was even undrafted after college so he came to a deal with the Golden State Warriors for a contract. It WAS his home town after all. He wanted to go to UCLA but the PAC 10 wouldn’t accept him but Brown and Harvard would so he decided on Harvard. (Too bad they don’t give scholarships at Ivy Leagues). Yeah…I’d feel stupid if I were all of those colleges who told him to get lost. Like when Warren Buffet didn’t get accepted into Harvard Business School. WTF was up with that right? So how did Lin get from Harvard to the New York Knicks? So he played with the GSWs even though he got other offers, it was his favorite team growing up and when the lockout happened the GSW’s waived him so they could free cap to get DeAndre Jordan (who is on the Clippers now not the GSWs) then he got to the Rockets who also waived him to get some Samuel Dalembert so he ended up on the Knicks. And all this hype started on Feb 4th 2012 when the Knicks beat the Nets. Highest scorer on the Knicks that night and the next night.

25 points, 5 rebounds, 7 assists

And continued with his amazing plays during the next game against the Utah Jazz:

28 points, 8 assists

But what about the other games? Well to be honest, they haven’t played him as much as they had starting Feb 4th during the game against the Nets.

1. February 3rd, 2012  vs Celtics – 2 rebounds, 1 assist, 2 points ; 06:36min
2. January 31, 2012 vs Pistons  – 1 rebound, 4 assists, 4 points ; 06:07min
3. January 28, 2012 vs Rockets – 3 rebounds, 6 assists, 9 points ; 20:10min
4. January 24, 2012 vs Bobcats – 2 rebounds, 4 assists, 8 points ; 5:54min
5. January 14, 2012 vs Thunder – 1 rebound, 1 assist, 3 points ; 4:41min
6. January 07, 2012 vs Pistons – 4 points ; 4:00min
7. December 31, 2012 vs Kings – 1 rebound, 1 assist ; 3:51min
8. December 29, 2012 vs Lakers – 2 points ; 1:40min
9. December 28, 2012 vs Golden State Warriors – 1:27min
10. December 21, 2012 Preseason vs Spurs – 1 rebound, 1 assist, 6 points ; 05:45min
11. December 17, 2012 Preseason vs Spurs – 02:06min

They just needed to give him a chance to prove himself. And he did it. Hopefully we’ll see the Knicks using Lin more and more and hopefully as a starter. Can’t you see it? A Carmelo-Amare-Jeremy love sandwich? I can. I was waiting for the Knicks to step up their game this year and maybe this was JUST the kick that they needed to get their asses back in shape. We can never have too many awesome Point Guards! I do love Mike Bibby though…we’ll make it work!