Far
removed from the bright lights of Manhattan where Jeremy Lin lit up the world
just three short years ago, his epic story continues in near obscurity. Lin, briefly the hottest global brand of them
all, now toils for the Los Angeles Lakers, buried on the bench of an awful
team, playing out his gargantuan contract under terrible circumstances, awaiting
the next chapter of his remarkable and unique career. He is a polarizing figure, defended by his
legions of fans, and vilified by his vociferous detractors. And because of that, the assessment of his
actual contributions is more emotionally driven than fact-based, and thus badly
misunderstood.
Linsanity
was indeed a global phenomenon, as Lin took an undermanned and under-talented
Knick team, at the time missing injured stars Carmelo Anthony and A’mare
Stoudemire, instantly to unbeatable status, winning 8 of 9 games as soon as Lin
entered the lineup. They had won a mere
8 out of 21 prior to that point, despite the presence of those stars. Lin was a sensation, scoring more points in
his first five NBA starts – 136 – than anyone in over 30 years (Michael Jordan,
by comparison, scored “only” 116). On
that fateful night of February 4, 2012, Lin came off the bench to lead the
Knicks to a 99-92 win, scoring 25 points with 7 assists. Named a starter, he proceeded to score 28,
23, 38, 20, 27, 10, 26, 28, 21 and 17 before the Miami Heat slowed him down by
devoting practically their entire defense to stopping him. In the midst of this run he landed on more
magazine covers than any given U.S. President or supermodel, including two
straight cover appearances on Sports Illustrated. He was an overwhelming story, the near second
coming of Beatlemania itself, filled with unlikely angles, including his
Asian-American roots, his collegiate career at that noted hoops hotbed, Harvard
University, his D-League pedigree, and the “average human” clincher: I’m-sleeping-on-Landry-Fields’-couch-and-just-about-to-get-cut-again-therefore-on-the-brink-of-never-being-heard-from-again.
And
yet, even the period known as “Linsanity” is widely misunderstood. Most of Lin’s detractors in the blogosphere
are dismissive of Lin’s “two weeks” or “9 games” of glory. It is certainly true that Lin’s 9-game stretch
represented the peak of Linsanity, and that the Knicks' fortunes cooled
thereafter. Many think it “ended” with
the Heat shutdown in the 12th game of the run.
But
the facts are, the Knicks slump coincided with Anthony’s return, right before
that Miami game. While Lin’s hands
were no longer on the ball as often, as Anthony reclaimed his star’s prerogative
for the ball, Lin excelled nonetheless for the remainder of the season. While his production slipped from the 9-game
stretch of 26.4 ppg, he compiled a very strong line of 15.0 ppg and
6.8 assists in the following 17 games, until an injury ended his season.
Thus
the first of many misunderstandings about Lin.
Lin’s play was no fluke. He managed
an overall line over his 26-game Knick career in the spotlight – a third of an
NBA season – with high productivity, 18.2 ppg, 45% shooting, and 7.7 assists
per game. He was still a raw talent, as
evidenced by his 3.8 turnovers per game average, but no fluke.
Further
evidence of the “no fluke” theory is that the NBA is not like baseball. Baseball has a long history of minor league
call-ups who set the world on fire for a few months and then flame out. Remember “Hurricane” Bob Hazle? Kevin Maas?
Shane Spencer? But the NBA? Can you name another player who soared like
Lin and settled to mediocrity without an injury playing a role? But if Lin was not a fluke, then what
explains he lesser production since Linsanity?
Why did he not at least settle into what might have been reasonably
expected, a solid NBA starter if not a superstar or even an All-Star?
Lin,
a free agent in the summer of 2012, then received a generous offer from the
Houston Rockets, for $25 million over three years, including $15 million for
the final year. The Knicks chose not to
match it, with Carmelo Anthony himself leading the offense, as usual, publicly
terming the contract “ridiculous.” The
Rockets, an also ran in the powerful Western Conference, brought in Lin to be
the centerpiece of their offense, and perhaps capitalize on a fan base that
adored former Rockets center Yao Ming, the popular Chinese center. Lin’s marketing value was no doubt a part of
the Rockets’ economic calculus.
But
shortly thereafter, the Rockets had the opportunity to snag James Harden,
another potential superstar, and they pounced.
Who can blame them…Harden is now a legitimate NBA MVP candidate, with
transcendent skills, and even the stoutest Lin fan has to concede Harden was
and is the better player, and a coup for the Rockets.
Harden
needs the ball. Nominally a shooting guard,
he is really more of a combo point/shooting guard, leaning toward the point. Unlike Melo, who received the ball in the
forecourt, Harden initiated play as often as Lin, and like Melo was the usual recipient
of Lin’s first pass when Lin brought the ball up. In short, Lin quickly found himself in an
ever worse situation than with Melo, a point guard in name only.
Lin
adapted well to these circumstances. He
worked hard on his three-point shot and turned himself into a combo guard, much
like Harden himself. But in Lin’s second
season, Rockets’ Coach Kevin McHale recognized that a better lineup would have
Lin off the bench leading the second unit, while defensive star Patrick
Beverly, a modest offensive threat at best who did not need the ball, would be
a better fit as a backcourt partner for Harden.
Lin’s
two years in Houston thus became another period of misunderstanding. Lin’s detractors routinely point to his
Houston years as a “failure,” how Lin “lost his job” to Beverly, hardly a star,
and failed to reignite Linsanity when “given the opportunity.” This ignores the circumstance of Lin being
paired with another of the league’s leading “usage” players, Harden, and the impossibility
of any point guard to achieve a major stat line with that arrangement.
But
Lin was actually quite a good player in Houston. He received healthy minutes (30 per game) in a
three-guard rotation with Harden and Beverly over the two years, and often
ended the games even when he no longer started them. His stats in this setup were extremely solid. For the two years combined he averaged 13.0
ppg and 5.2 assists (even while not playing a pure point), shooting 44% and a
more than respectable (and far better than Linsanity days) 35% from the
three-point line. On a per-36 minute
basis, this translates to 16 ppg and 6 assists.
His slashing style to the hoop continued, and he was the league’s second
best “closer” to the hoop, trailing only LeBron James.
And,
when called upon, he led the team. James
Harden was forced to miss 8 games over the two years, and Lin was thrust into
the starting role. And even on a team
with legitimate offensive threats Dwight Howard and Chandler Parsons, Lin
averaged 20 points per game with 6 assists in those 8 starts – in short, he
demonstrated once again that Linsanity was no fluke and, given the chance, he
could put up numbers worthy of All-Star consideration. And he even carried the load at times when
Harden was in the lineup…at times he would simply take over a game and score in
bunches. In his two years in Houston he had
20+ points 26 times and cleared 30 in three of those games, including a
38-point outburst versus the venerated Spurs.
And of course he did not “lose” his job, his coach simply recognized the
reality of the pairings, and adjusted accordingly.
But
the Rockets, while a very good team, could not crack the elite of the West, and
in the off-season the front office concocted a brash plan to land another
superstar to replicate the Miami Heat-inspired blueprint of three superstars on
one team – Harden, Howard and the target, Chris Bosh. Lin was traded to Los Angeles with a
first-round pick (a required sweetener given that the Lakers would have to take
on the final year of Lin’s contract, the whole $15 million), to free up the cap
space for that play, and the Rockers went after Bosh. (And failed.
Bosh returned to the Heat.)
Lin
landed in L.A. with the expectation of sharing time with the oft-injured, aging
Steve Nash, with the likelihood that Nash, while nominally the starter, might
be hard-pressed to make it on the floor for even 20 minutes a game. The rest would be Lin’s. Kobe Bryant, while a star of even higher
magnitude than Melo and Harden, a true legend, was returning from serious
injury and would surely be looking to offload a portion of his offensive
workload on Lin. So concerns among Lin’s
fans that Kobe would simply be another usage-sucking gunner, a la Melo and
Harden, were deflected.
And,
as it happens, Nash was injured in preseason and Lin became the starter. (Nash, it turns out, has yet to play this
season and his career is likely over.)
But Bryant was another story. Under
the plan developed by new Lakers’ Coach Byron Scott, Bryant averaged 37 minutes
a game at the outset, a curious stratagem for a 37-year old coming off Achilles
heel surgery. And far from off-loading a
portion of his offense, Bryant actually upped
his usage, averaging 23 shots per game.
And he was terrible, shooting a career low (by far) 37%.
This
situation was far worse than the ones with Harden or Melo. It was a nightmare for Lin. And the nightmare was compounded by Bryant’s
surly personality and Scott’s total inability to re-shape his system to the
talent available, his erratic substitution patterns, and his blindness to the
most obvious ways to improve team performance.
For example, it was clear in preseason that Lin and Ed Davis were
effective partners in the pick and roll, but Scott rarely played the two
together in the regular season. And his Princeton
offense was ill-suited to the young runners (aside from Bryant) who populated
the Lakers roster.
And
then suddenly, as the Bryant-led Lakers stumbled to a 5-15 record after 20
games, Lin and Carlos Boozer were unceremoniously demoted, their alleged poor
defense the culprits. (This is certainly
true for Boozer, but all sophisticated NBA stats show that Lin and his replacement, Ronnie Price, are even as defenders, and Lin of course is far superior on the offense.)
Lin’s
detractors say that Lin “failed” and once again lost his job to Price, an
inferior talent, a journeyman NBA guard who indeed makes Patrick Beverly look
like Jerry West. But Lin actually
performed well in the starting role. Despite
working with a roster of players who shot virtually every time they received
the ball – Bryant, Carlos Boozer and Nick Young – Lin averaged 12 ppg on only 9
shots per game, shooting 45% overall, a career high 36% from three-point-land,
and 5 assists per game. (On a per-36
minutes basis, this translates to the by now familiar statistics: 14 ppg and 6 assists.)
Bryant
was then injured again, worn down by the pounding, and after a brief break tried
to come back and play on a more occasional basis. While he played he demonstrated far more
propensity to pass, but his on-again/off-again status further disrupted the
Lakers. Price received 30 minutes a game
for a stat line that barely exceeded the infamous “trillion,” the term used for
a player who fails to record any stats at all for his playing time.
Lin
became the leader of the second unit, and after a few sour games, found his
niche. Lin, told to be a playmaker
(rather than the score-first point guard that he is), would dutifully set up
Boozer and Young on the second team. Boozer
continued to shoot every time he touched the ball, shooting over 50%, and Young
did the same, with the opposite results (he is shooting a Bryant-like
37%). Lin continued to deliver a
reasonable stat line under the circumstances.
The
Lakers are a terrible team, and finally Scott and company threw in the towel
and started “tanking” in earnest. The
Lakers own a first round draft pick that they can only keep and use if they
finish among the worst five teams in the league. The Lakers’ perverse incentive thus caused
all sorts of inversions, not the least of which is their second unit is
actually far stronger than the first unit.
The fabled Los Angeles Lakers are starting – wait for it – rookie Jordan
Clarkson (who mercifully replaced Price), Wayne Ellington, Robert Sacre, Ryan
Kelly and Tarik Black. These are the 7th,
9th, 10th, 12th and 13th leading
scorers on the Lakers, and collectively they average 31.3 points per game, or
less than Bryant did in two of his best seasons. Considering the Lakers are missing Nash and
rookie Julius Randle, and you can see that most of these players, based on
scoring alone, might not have even been on the Lakers second unit on a full-strength roster.
Starting
the second-team – Lin, Young, Boozer, Ed Davis and Wes Johnson -- and playing
them 32 minutes per game apiece would only increase the Lakers’ chances to win,
and thus undermine the odds of securing that badly needed draft pick.
Lin
continues to play well in this impossible role.
Capped at 20 minutes per game, he continues to score productively – 9.2
points a game, and dish impressively – 4.2 assists per game. Project those totals to 36 minutes and you
get – of course -- 15 ppg and 7 assists.
And that is for a lousy team, playing for a lousy coach, in a lost
season.
And
yet the buzz continues…Lin is “overrated…a failure…not a starter…shouldn’t even
be in the league.” It is perverse thinking
and simply not justified by the stats.
Byron Scott claims Lin is “inconsistent” but he is no more inconsistent
than most NBA players, who routinely light it up one night and disappear the
next. Only the true superstars produce
almost every night, and Lin is not that.
But
Lin is a solid NBA player. While
reasonable people can agree it is difficult to judge just what he is and can be,
it is hardly a stretch, and backed up by ample evidence at this point, to say
that as a starter he would average in the 15 ppg range with 7-8 assists,
depending on the system and his teammates.
Clearly in a running environment, with a good pick and roll center and
some three-point shooters on the wings, Lin could do even better. Stick him in a plodding offense with fewer
possessions and an “Iso” offense and he will be less productive. But 15/7 seems to be the norm around which he
will vary, given 32-36 minutes. That
would make him about 15th in scoring among point guards and top ten
in assists. Perhaps not a top ten NBA
point guard or an All-Star, but easily in next ten, certainly among the best 30
point guards in the league. And if the
system really works for him, and he regains his confidence, he could get up to,
say, 18 and 9.
Lin
will almost certainly not be traded by the February 19th deadline. Any team that picked him up would have to pay
him the pro-rated portion of his $15 million contract, about $6 million for the
balance of the year. There are not many
teams with playoff hopes that do not already have a capable point guard. Someone would have to have a crying need for
a back-up point…and then be able to afford the $6 million to fill that role on
a rental.
But
Lin will, of course, be a free agent this summer. This is a golden era of NBA point guards and
so his options will be limited. He may
choose to sign an inexpensive one-year deal with a team that will give him a
shot at being a starter and see what he can do, or be a quality back-up in a
system that favors him. Let him rebuild
his reputation in a good environment and then go from there. His saga has been so visible and prolonged
that people forget he is only 26 years old, heading into his prime.
His
path thus far has been unique, remarkably so.
Other guards of his age, such as Goran Dragic, Kyle Lowry and Reggie
Jackson, have been nurtured in good systems and gradually have matured into quality
players. Lin’s “development” has been
virtually non-existent. Yet he thrived
the most when he was simply handed the keys to the car and told to go for
it.
A
team like Dallas seems ideal to me.
Rajon Rondo has not worked out and will likely leave this summer to
explore free agency. Tyson Chandler, his
old pick and roll buddy with the Knicks, roams the middle, and Dirk Nowitzki
and Chandler Parsons (another former teammate) are formidable on the
wings. And Monta Ellis would eat up the
three-point opportunities Lin would create.
Lin might score less on a team with that kind of firepower, but he could
still excel, and be the missing piece to the Mavs title aspirations.
In
any event, Lin’s strange career, full of the highest of highs, the lowest of
lows, incredible polarization and misunderstanding, is crying for another act,
a redemptive cycle. We shall see.
