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Jeremy Lin - only member of G League top 10 scorers to remain unsigned... lack of skill, age or race?

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Jeremy Lin - only member of G League top 10 scorers to remain unsigned... lack of skill, age or race?

https://www.scmp.com/sport/basketball/a ... overlooked

https://stats.gleague.nba.com/leaders/? ... r%20Season

Jeremy Lin has been really vocal about the problems he has to face as a Chinese person in the NBA. He is the only G-League top score not offered an NBA contract. A lot of critics are willing to discount Lin based on his last few NBA seasons where his stats were a little bit soft. His last performance with the Raptors was especially horrible, but the raptors was both a blessing and a curse for him, and more of the latter. Sure, he rode coattail to an NBA championship ring, but Nurse didn't know how to use Lin and he didn't click with many of the other players. I think every scout has basically discounted his most recent hard work in the G-League and pointed to his worst days in his NBA career and said, well this is the best he can do.

I bet you if ANY team give Lin a 1 day contract to play in 1 final NBA regular season game, he will score 30+ pts in that game. If he was not Asian and Linsanity had never happened, he might have been signed as a filler for one of the teams.

I think the NBA owes Lin to give him a proper send off. The NY Knicks should offer Lin a 1 day contract, maybe give him some time on the court, and let him retire as a Knicks, where it all started.
41 replies
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Feb 11, 2007
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He would probably still be in the league if he did not request that buyout from the Atlanta Hawks to join the Raptors during that Raptors championship run.
On the Hawks he was shooting very well and had a PER of 15.9 which is about what Fred VanVleet put up in his career thus far.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/pl ... nje01.html

Also China has to be one of the least popular countries in the entire world right now.
Going to play in the Chinese Basketball League instead of the Euroleague was probably career and political suicide.

He also seems like a whiner at times pointing out that he gets bullied, and thinks discrimination is a key part to why he is not in the NBA.

.
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Aug 5, 2006
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Haven't watched any of his Gleague games but from these highlights he looks a step slower offensively. And these days if you want mins from a playoff team in the NBA you have to avoid being a defensive liability. When Harden went down I thought the Nets might give him a shot but they went with Mike James from Europe. Lin probably has to play in Europe for a season and prove he can hold his own there before an nba team seriously considers him imo.

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scoring isn't only thing that teams are looking for. everyone has different priorities, look at the raptors for example. they needed size so they signed Khem Birch after he was bought out and Freddie Gillepsie.
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Sorry Jeremy Lin is just not good.

He is a replacement level player at best on offense, but an absolute liability on defense. He also always plays like he's the man, the main guy and takes and forces too many of the shots, instead of facilitating and running an offense. Linsanity was really the same thing. His assist to turnover ratio are bad for a PG in G league. Not even 2.0
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kenchau wrote: Sorry Jeremy Lin is just not good.

He is a replacement level player at best on offense, but an absolute liability on defense. He also always plays like he's the man, the main guy and takes and forces too many of the shots, instead of facilitating and running an offense. Linsanity was really the same thing. His assist to turnover ratio are bad for a PG in G league. Not even 2.0
pretty much this.

Add in the fact he's 32 and add the baggage (Kapernick extra lite)...not worth it I guess.
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XFactor11 wrote: He would probably still be in the league if he did not request that buyout from the Atlanta Hawks to join the Raptors during that Raptors championship run.
On the Hawks he was shooting very well and had a PER of 15.9 which is about what Fred VanVleet put up in his career thus far.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/pl ... nje01.html

Also China has to be one of the least popular countries in the entire world right now.
Going to play in the Chinese Basketball League instead of the Euroleague was probably career and political suicide.

He also seems like a whiner at times pointing out that he gets bullied, and thinks discrimination is a key part to why he is not in the NBA.

.
I agree that the buyout from the Hawks was probably a bad move in hindsight. He was doing okay in terms of court time and stats until he joined the Raptors.

I do find it a bit disappointing that you think the the move to the CBA is unpopular because it is the "least popular country"... most people have their beef with the Chinese government, but the CBA is governed by FIBA. This re-enforces anti-Asian sentiment, that somehow all people and things from China is bad/unpopular.
scoper wrote: Haven't watched any of his Gleague games but from these highlights he looks a step slower offensively. And these days if you want mins from a playoff team in the NBA you have to avoid being a defensive liability. When Harden went down I thought the Nets might give him a shot but they went with Mike James from Europe. Lin probably has to play in Europe for a season and prove he can hold his own there before an nba team seriously considers him imo.
Lin is a step slower compared to Linsanity, but speed isn't everything in basketball. If you watch Jason Kidd or Steve Nash in their late years, they are not exactly fast either. And that's the problem with Lin, he got famous being a good at slash and dash and not as a play making PG.
SoGood wrote: scoring isn't only thing that teams are looking for. everyone has different priorities, look at the raptors for example. they needed size so they signed Khem Birch after he was bought out and Freddie Gillepsie.
Completely true.
kenchau wrote: Sorry Jeremy Lin is just not good.

He is a replacement level player at best on offense, but an absolute liability on defense. He also always plays like he's the man, the main guy and takes and forces too many of the shots, instead of facilitating and running an offense. Linsanity was really the same thing. His assist to turnover ratio are bad for a PG in G league. Not even 2.0
Lin only shines in bottom tier teams and teams that are ridden with injuries. He is good when there are just 2 or 3 good guys left in the roaster and they have to give him the orange. He can't shine in championship teams like the 2019 Raptors and that might be the downfall of his NBA career.
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Statistics101 wrote: I agree that the buyout from the Hawks was probably a bad move in hindsight. He was doing okay in terms of court time and stats until he joined the Raptors.

I do find it a bit disappointing that you think the the move to the CBA is unpopular because it is the "least popular country"... most people have their beef with the Chinese government, but the CBA is governed by FIBA. This re-enforces anti-Asian sentiment, that somehow all people and things from China is bad/unpopular.



Lin is a step slower compared to Linsanity, but speed isn't everything in basketball. If you watch Jason Kidd or Steve Nash in their late years, they are not exactly fast either. And that's the problem with Lin, he got famous being a good at slash and dash and not as a play making PG.



Completely true.



Lin only shines in bottom tier teams and teams that are ridden with injuries. He is good when there are just 2 or 3 good guys left in the roaster and they have to give him the orange. He can't shine in championship teams like the 2019 Raptors and that might be the downfall of his NBA career.
See and that's the thing. Jason Kidd and Steve Nash ran an offense and created for their teammates. Much like how Chris Paul makes every team that he goes to, better, even at the age of 36.

If Jeremy Lin can only shine on bottom tier teams, I'd rather play and develop young guys on bottom tier teams that are obviously rebuilding.

Finally, I just want to add, I always have the image in my head of Jeremy Lin waving off Kobe to hit the one shot in the one Lakers game back in 2014 I think. It was a end of shot clock shot. Yes he made the shot, but you gotta know the pecking order sometimes. It was also again, a bad shot instead of moving the ball and a shot only possible because Kobe came over to help set a screen since he saw Lin couldn't go anywhere off the dribble.
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This is a biased article. It's looking at one stat to rank these players and scoring isn't that important in the bigger picture.

1. Everyone on that top 10 list is in their early 20s... except 32 year old Lin. The expectation is these guys are going to get better. Lin isn't. The reason why players get called up is to evaluate them. Pretty much every team knows what Lin can do and not do.
2. The G League was only 15 games long and Lin only played in 9 of them. Sample size is too small to really say who were the best in the G League.
3. The contract status that was completely missed in the article. 7 out of the top 10 players were on their rookie contract or a 2-way contract already in place before the G League started. So they already had NBA contracts. These contracts are already counted towards the max 15 player per team (and 2 -way contract do not count towards that number).

3 players in the top 10 did not have an NBA contract. Teams would have to either waive a player or a player lost due to injury (basically free up a roster spot) to signed these guys:
-Henry Ellison who the Raptors signed to a 10 day contract as they were in desperate need of a center, but ultimately didn't resign him.
-Former Raptor Oshae Brissett who was signed by the Pacers. That wasn't some random fluke or charity. Pacers head coach Nate Bjorkgren was a former assistant coach for the Raptors. He knew what he was getting with Brissett and swiped him when he got the chance.
-Then there's Jeremy Lin. GSW was the only team interested in Lin and it was a near impossible task to crack that roster. Not because GSW is filled with so much talent, but because both Jordan Poole and Nico Mannion were (both in the top 10 in scoring in the G League) called up PG for GSW. It's really hard to find a reason to call up 3 PGs when you're in a tight race for the playoffs. It would also have meant GSW would have needed to cut someone.
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XFactor11 wrote: Also China has to be one of the least popular countries in the entire world right now.
Going to play in the Chinese Basketball League instead of the Euroleague was probably career and political suicide.
"China has to be one of the least popular countries", of course otherwise Canada won't kidnap the Huawei lady.
Playing in Chinese league is a suicide, so true too, he should throw a bomb or something maybe get 10 million, better than sweat so much in basketball, LOL.
Of course nobody question why there are so many black player in NBA, but question why there are too many Asians in college.
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Statistics101 wrote: https://www.scmp.com/sport/basketball/a ... overlooked

https://stats.gleague.nba.com/leaders/? ... r%20Season

Jeremy Lin has been really vocal about the problems he has to face as a Chinese person in the NBA. He is the only G-League top score not offered an NBA contract. A lot of critics are willing to discount Lin based on his last few NBA seasons where his stats were a little bit soft. His last performance with the Raptors was especially horrible, but the raptors was both a blessing and a curse for him, and more of the latter. Sure, he rode coattail to an NBA championship ring, but Nurse didn't know how to use Lin and he didn't click with many of the other players. I think every scout has basically discounted his most recent hard work in the G-League and pointed to his worst days in his NBA career and said, well this is the best he can do.

I bet you if ANY team give Lin a 1 day contract to play in 1 final NBA regular season game, he will score 30+ pts in that game. If he was not Asian and Linsanity had never happened, he might have been signed as a filler for one of the teams.

I think the NBA owes Lin to give him a proper send off. The NY Knicks should offer Lin a 1 day contract, maybe give him some time on the court, and let him retire as a Knicks, where it all started.
just trash and not nba level player... and hasn't been for a couple years now

other g-leaguers who got signed are way younger with potential... Lin is on steep decline, has no reliable shot, mediocore D at best... so not signed

i mean IT is also unsigned and i'll say he's still higher level than Lin
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StatsGuy wrote: just trash and not nba level player... and hasn't been for a couple years now
Agreed. While I have no doubt he encounters racism on a regular basis, I don't believe this is why he is not playing in the NBA.
Reality is - there are many players who have short stints in the NBA, for all sorts of reasons.
No one owes Lin anything - completely ridiculous to suggest otherwise.
The guy is lucky enough to have a ring - many players of much higher caliber than Lin never got that through many more years of play.
Nurse didn't know how to play Lin? Are you kidding me?
Fairly obvious he had better choices, which in turn brought us a championship.
If we are gonna go the fantasy route, I may as well say that had Nurse played Lin more, we would not have won a championship.
If Lin is smart, he is prepping for life/career after the game.
"When someone is burning a book, they are showing utter contempt for all of the thinking that produced its ideas, all of the labor that went into its words and sentences, and all of the trouble that befell the author . . .” ― Lemony Snicket
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His time is past but just like comments about Kwame Brown, he has had a career longer than the average NBA player, good enough to be around for 10 plus years. Not many can say that.
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Part of the problem for Lin now is he's vocal and teams/GMs may not want publicity of any kind related to race. He plays a certain style and if you put him with a team that plays/has that style of play he can perform very well. If you go back to that NY Knicks Linsanity era [and even go further back to his high school and college years, you'll see he dominates under a certain style of play], he has the ball in his hands and he directs everything...coaches today won't let him do that.


It's like Nick Foles the NFL quarterback. He couldn't win a starting job and he's been a journeyman type QB but when they put him in and they let him play the offence that works for him he won a Championship. But even after doing that, coaches still want him to play a certain style...as if winning isn't good enough.

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maple1 wrote: His time is past but just like comments about Kwame Brown, he has had a career longer than the average NBA player, good enough to be around for 10 plus years. Not many can say that.
https://amp.www.complex.com/music/charl ... ing-trauma

Kwame Brown has a hard life.
His brother shot his child’s mother several times.
His father beat his gf with an axe and buried her alive.
Surrounded by lots of violence.

Its always kinda funny when you look @ the relative picture of things.
Sure he wasnt a “great” nba player.
But he played 12 years in the NBA and earned $63 million over his career.
As an nba player he’s already the top 0.0001 percentile in basketball talent.
As a professional athlete easily top 1% of humans in strength and agility.
And people always like to make fun still...
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Sep 13, 2007
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that's not really fair.....
the guy has legit beef over that.....esp in his early years....

rocket fans joked about the mandatory "LIN head shot", because so many people were taking whacks on Jeremy Lin, and the refs were letting it slide.

I follow NBA a lot, so i know it can get physical, but with Lin it was just another level.

It was so bad, where Lin was isolated one on one against the defender, on homecourt. And the defender blatantly whacked him, and no calls. It was pretty bad man

There's also that Carmelo uppercut......
XFactor11 wrote: He also seems like a whiner at times pointing out that he gets bullied, and thinks discrimination is a key part to why he is not in the NBA.

.
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Sep 13, 2007
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good point, he didn't really get that chance in Rockets.
A lot of times, he took the ball up then handed it off to Parson and Harden.
Even pat Beverly who was less offensively talented at times, had more chances to initiate the offense.
Felt like Kevin McHale (coach at time) and Morey, were sometimes trying to make a point to previous owner, for making them sign Lin.

When Lin finally had a chance to play for a coach who believed in him (Hornets - Clifford), he thrived in an off-bench role.
Then he had a chance to play for a coach who supported in him in Kenny Atkinson....he got hurt two years in a role.

in short, when Lin had a lot of potential, he didn't really had a lot of supporters (Refs, players who were hostile to him - headshots, and coaches).
Then when he finally did, he got hurt and was a shell of himself.

Pretty crappy, eh


gr8dlr wrote: Part of the problem for Lin now is he's vocal and teams/GMs may not want publicity of any kind related to race. He plays a certain style and if you put him with a team that plays/has that style of play he can perform very well. If you go back to that NY Knicks Linsanity era [and even go further back to his high school and college years, you'll see he dominates under a certain style of play], he has the ball in his hands and he directs everything...coaches today won't let him do that.


It's like Nick Foles the NFL quarterback. He couldn't win a starting job and he's been a journeyman type QB but when they put him in and they let him play the offence that works for him he won a Championship. But even after doing that, coaches still want him to play a certain style...as if winning isn't good enough.

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/perso ... est-backup
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He also went public and said he's proud that he "stood up" to James Harden and Kobe Bryant for disrespecting or bullying him
when he was teammates with them on the Rockets and Lakers. He even said Kobe Bryant did not speak to him for 5 months (Kobe was injured at the time though).

For a guy that went to Harvard, that is not a smart social move to say in a public interview or twitter post even if it is true. Those players are superstars that teams and organizations
go out of of their way to accommodate and give in to whatever they request since they are the biggest names and revenue generators on their teams.

It makes it seem that Lin could cause trouble with the top players on his teams and publicly out them for being at odds with him.
Like The Rock would say, he should "know his role and shut his mouth".
noobienoob wrote: good point, he didn't really get that chance in Rockets.
A lot of times, he took the ball up then handed it off to Parson and Harden.
Even pat Beverly who was less offensively talented at times, had more chances to initiate the offense.
Felt like Kevin McHale (coach at time) and Morey, were sometimes trying to make a point to previous owner, for making them sign Lin.

When Lin finally had a chance to play for a coach who believed in him (Hornets - Clifford), he thrived in an off-bench role.
Then he had a chance to play for a coach who supported in him in Kenny Atkinson....he got hurt two years in a role.

in short, when Lin had a lot of potential, he didn't really had a lot of supporters (Refs, players who were hostile to him - headshots, and coaches).
Then when he finally did, he got hurt and was a shell of himself.

Pretty crappy, eh
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XFactor11 wrote: He also went public and said he's proud that he "stood up" to James Harden and Kobe Bryant for disrespecting or bullying him
when he was teammates with them on the Rockets and Lakers. He even said Kobe Bryant did not speak to him for 5 months (Kobe was injured at the time though).

For a guy that went to Harvard, that is not a smart social move to say in a public interview or twitter post even if it is true. Those players are superstars that teams and organizations
go out of of their way to accommodate and give in to whatever they request since they are the biggest names and revenue generators on their teams.

It makes it seem that Lin could cause trouble with the top players on his teams and publicly out them for being at odds with him.
Like The Rock would say, he should "know his role and shut his mouth".

His role as what? A stereotypical Asian who just shuts up be quiet and never says anything again bullies?

But its okay when a white guy does it… and even becomes a great legendary story that Micheal Jordan himself praises

https://www.nbcsports.com/bayarea/warri ... last-dance

Theres a subconscious bias there. If it was another black or white player that stood up to bullying y’all would just say “lol what a punk!”

But because its Jeremy Lin… it gets some severe criticism.

Its bigger than basketball.
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I think he should have saved those stories for his autobiography or interviews after he retires. Not when he is trying to be an active player in the NBA.

If you say negative things about Superstar players that are among the most popular or highly regarded players in the league in terms of talent and you are playing with or played with them in the past,
GMs and agents around the league are going to side with the Superstar talent and not with a player that can be replaced.

It's the same with Pro Wrestling. The top wrestlers that draw the big money could get away with doing anything, bullying, being Aholes, showing up or performing drunk or on drugs, etc, and get away with doing just about anything. If the lower card guys do the same thing, they would be fired instantly.
UrbanPoet wrote: His role as what? A stereotypical Asian who just shuts up be quiet and never says anything again bullies?

But its okay when a white guy does it… and even becomes a great legendary story that Micheal Jordan himself praises

https://www.nbcsports.com/bayarea/warri ... last-dance

Theres a subconscious bias there. If it was another black or white player that stood up to bullying y’all would just say “lol what a punk!”

But because its Jeremy Lin… it gets some severe criticism.

Its bigger than basketball.

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