Ed Welland is a draftnik, the type of guy who sifts through statistics like a gold panner, looking for nuggets of key information.
Welland studied the crop of point guards on the draft board and said the pickings for playmakers were going to be slim in 2010. “That doesn’t mean there won’t be a player or two who surprise the experts though,” he wrote in the spring of 2010. “The best candidate to pull off such a surprise might be Harvard’s Jeremy Lin. The reason is two numbers Lin posted — 2-point FG pct and RSB40. Lin was at. 598 and 9.7. This is impressive on both counts. These numbers show NBA athleticism better than any other, because a high score in both shows dominance at the college level on both ends of the court.”11
This APBRmetrics stuff is way over my head, but what Welland was saying was that Jeremy’s high field goal percentage inside the 3-point line — making six out of ten shots or. 598 percent — along with his ability to rebound, steal, and block — that’s the RSB40 statistic — made him a 24-karat gold prospect.
But what did Ed Welland know? He drove a FedEx delivery truck in the small eastern Oregon town of Bend and published his player assessments on the sports blog hoopsanalyst.com. When he chose Jeremy as his top point guard prospect, he had never seen him play because Harvard games aren’t piped into lonely outposts like Bend. Welland made the call solely on the statistics printed on his spreadsheet.
NBA scouts put greater reliance on visual assessments, which are more subjective. In the run-up to the 2010 NBA draft, though, Jeremy got some long looks. He was invited to work out with eight teams, including his hometown Golden State Warriors. Yet when the big day came, Jeremy was passed over in the two-round draft, which selected only sixty players. Playing at an Ivy League school probably had a lot to do with that. The last Harvard player to wear an NBA jersey was Ed Smith, who played all of eleven games in his one-season career back in 1953 – 54. The conventional wisdom among pro scouts was that Harvard players just didn’t pan out in the NBA. You had a better chance of becoming president of the United States; eight Harvard alumni have graduated to the White House versus four Harvard players making it onto an NBA roster.
Jeremy then caught a break when Dallas general manager Donnie Nelson invited him to play on the Mavericks’ Summer League team after the draft noise settled down. NBA Summer League games are played at a frenetic pace, and they can be a bit sloppy, but for rookies and other nonroster players like Jeremy, Summer League provides a fleeting chance — perhaps a last chance — to pit their skills against NBA-level players and make an impression. This particular eight-day summertime season was held in Las Vegas in July 2010.
Jeremy wasn’t a starter for the Mavericks’ Summer League team, not by a long shot. He sat behind an electrifying point guard named Rodrigue Beaubois, whom Dallas coaches were evaluating for a roster spot. In the first four games, Jeremy was a spot substitute who averaged 17 minutes and 8 points a game.
Then some interesting things happened that changed the arc of Jeremy’s basketball life. Look for the hand of God through this series of events:
1. Jeremy’s team was playing the Washington Wizards Summer League team, which featured John Wall, the No. 1 overall draft pick in the 2010 NBA draft. Wall would be named the Summer League Most Valuable Player that season.
2. This was the last contest of the five-game Summer League season. A large number of scouts and NBA team officials were on hand.
3. Rodrigue Beaubois twisted an ankle and had a poor outing in the first half. Jeremy took his place.
4. By all accounts, Jeremy outplayed, outhustled, outdrove, and outshone John Wall in the second half while leading his team on a big comeback — drawing oohs and aahs from the crowd with several fearless drives to the rim.
Here’s a thumbnail description of how Jeremy played: During the fourth quarter, Jeremy’s tenacious defense on Wall forced a jump ball. He then came out of nowhere to make a sensational steal, then tore a rebound out of the hands of a seven-foot center. For the game, he hit 6 of 12 shots, including his only 3-point try of the night.
After that single half of brilliant play, several NBA teams looked at Jeremy in a new light. The Dallas Mavericks, the Los Angeles Lakers, and the Golden State Warriors all saw something in the kid. They thought that with the right seasoning, he could develop into an NBA player. Their thinking was that Jeremy could play a season in the NBA’s Development League — known as D-League — and see where it might take him.
And then Joe Lacob entered the picture.
Who is Joe Lacob?
During the summer of 2010, Lacob was in the middle of purchasing the Golden State Warriors with Peter Guber, the former chairman of Sony Pictures. Together, they put out a $450 million tender to buy the team.
So how did this affect Jeremy?
Well, it turns out that Joe Lacob — living in the Bay Area — had coached his son’s youth basketball team, which had played against Jeremy when he was a pip-squeak. This fascinating exchange between Lacob and San Jose Mercury News columnist Tim Kawakami explains things:
Let’s just confirm that you made the call to sign Jeremy Lin.
Lacob: It was my call.
Why Lin?
Lacob: Well, that’s a special situation.
Your son played with Lin? Against Lin?
Lacob: There were probably three guys who were pretty much the best point guards in high school in this area at that time, and Jeremy Lin was probably the best of them. And my son, Kirk, was right there with him. I’ve watched them play against each other, and I’ve coached against him since he was this high.
So I know him from [the time he was] a little kid. Also at Palo Alto I watched him win the state championship over a superior team, and he dominated it. Mater Dei. And he has heart, he has a lot of talent, he’s athletic, which a lot of people don’t understand. He’s pretty long.
He has a game that translates to the NBA. He can drive; he’s a slasher. He needs to shoot better, obviously. He needs to be a better outside shooter.
It’s funny, people don’t know his game. They say, oh, he’s a shooter but he doesn’t have these other skills. No, that’s not true, it’s the opposite.
Jeremy Lin, I think, can play. He didn’t sign because he’s Asian-American. That was a nice feature, like anything else. And I think it’s great for that community and for the Warriors. But he got signed because he can play.
If you watched his tape, if you watched him in the John Wall thing in Vegas, he played John Wall even up. This is not a guy who shouldn’t have been drafted. This is a guy who should’ve been drafted.
Doesn’t that put some pressure on a coach to play him?
Lacob: No, he’s got to prove it on the court.
You’ll be watching.
Lacob: That’s not for me to determine. He has to prove it, coaches have to coach him, and we’ll see. Jeremy should’ve obviously gotten recruited to Stanford. Made a huge error. And by the way, there were a lot of us who were Stanford boosters who were trying to get them to recruit Jeremy. They did not. Well, guess what, that was really stupid. I’m a big Stanford fan, but that was really stupid. The kid was right across the street. You can’t recognize that, you’ve got a problem.12
And that’s how Jeremy Lin got his chance to play in the NBA. Two weeks after Summer League, he signed a two-year contract with the Warriors, and the news of his signing sent a shock wave through the San Francisco Bay Area — especially the Asian-American community. Then, through tenacity and grit in training camp, Jeremy won a spot on the Warriors’ roster.
Undrafted, fighting for recognition, and given the slimmest of opportunities, Jeremy had somehow beaten the incredible odds to put on an NBA jersey.
Even better, his hometown team wanted him — and so did the hometown fans.
His Rookie Year
After signing with the Warriors, Jeremy got his own place in Hayward, located roughly midway between his parents’ home in Palo Alto and the Oracle Arena in Oakland, where the Warriors play.
Training camp, however, was a rude awakening. Jeremy discovered that he wasn’t as ready for the big leagues as he thought. The level of play was faster, taller, and better. His teammates outperformed him in practice drills, which only heightened his anxiety and wilted his confidence. Even his coaches’ encouragement couldn’t lift his spirits. “I was humbled very quickly,” he said, describing that rude awakening as a roller-coaster ride between euphoria and despair. He made the team, but just barely. Jeremy chose to wear No. 7 — the biblical number that denotes completeness or perfection — as his jersey number.13
He sat on the bench for the season-opening win against the Houston Rockets but made his NBA debut two nights later in Golden State’s second game of the 2010 – 11 season — on “Asian Heritage Night.” A packed house of 17,408 fans exploded with cheers when he was inserted into the game with two and a half minutes to go — and the Warriors comfortably ahead. Jeremy had the honor of dribbling out the final seconds of a hometown win over the Los Angeles Clippers.
Jeremy Lin had made history, becoming the first Asian-American basketball player of Chinese/Taiwanese descent to step onto a ninety-four-by-fifty-foot NBA hardwood court. The only other full-blooded American-born Asian to play professional basketball in the United States was five foot seven Wataru “Kilo Wat” Misaka, who played in only three games for the New York Knickerbockers back in 1947 — in the old Basketball Association of America (BAA), which would become the NBA two years later. Born to Japanese immigrants, Misaka deserves honorable mention for being a pioneer at a time when Americans had just defeated Japan in World War II and when memories of Japanese Army atrocities were still fresh in the public’s memory.
More importantly, “Kilo Wat,” who came along in the same year that Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in Major League Baseball, was the first non-Caucasian to play professional basketball — a noteworthy achievement, since it would be another three years before the NBA admitted its first black player in 1950.
Over the years, there have been four other NBA players — Raymond Townsend, Corey Gaines, Rex Walters, and Robert Swift — who came from a mixed heritage, such as an American father married to a Japanese or Filipino mother. And then there are foreign-born Asians such as Yao Ming and Yi Jianlian.
I remember watching Jeremy play on TV during those early games with the Warriors. He hustled and played hard, but it was evident that he was playing not to make any mistakes, which makes a player less aggressive in a hard-nosed professional game where boldness and determination separate those who make it from those who are looking for a new job — like playing for an overseas team.
Jeremy’s newfound notoriety added to the pressure. An immediate blast of attention came from the media heavyweights — NBC Nightly News, the New York Times, and Time magazine, to name a few — who wrote glowing features about the first Asian-American of Chinese/Taiwanese heritage to play in the NBA. Jeremy thought he was grounded enough to withstand this media examination, as well as the thousands of requests to “friend” him on his Facebook page, but he soon learned otherwise. Even though the local fans loved cheering for their native son, the focused attention created an intense spotlight that followed him everywhere, and it showed on the court. It was apparent that he was a work in progress as a basketball player.
In late December 2010, the Warriors reassigned Jeremy — who had been averaging 8.5 minutes a game — to their D-League affiliate, the Reno Bighorns. It was hard for him not to see the move as a demotion.
In a state of near despair, Jeremy wrote in his personal journal that he felt like a failure after putting so much pressure on himself to make the NBA. During a conference hosted by River of Life Christian Church in Santa Clara after the season was over, Jeremy said he wrote this entry into his personal journal on December 29, 2010:
This is probably the closest to depression I’ve been. I lack confidence on the court. I’m not having fun playing basketball anymore. I hate being in the D-League, and I want to rejoin the Warriors. I feel embarrassed and like a failure.14
If you think about it, Jeremy had never “failed” at anything before. He’d been a straight-A student, achieved top scores in the SATs, attended Harvard, and turned himself into one of the best college basketball players in the country. But the NBA was a tough nut to crack, which only stands to reason, since many people say that the world’s best athletes play the game.
NBA players …
• are taller and stronger than 99.999999 percent of the world’s population
• can run like gazelles while maintaining a dribble
• can stop on a dime and successfully shoot a ball through a rim that has a diameter of 17 inches (about an inch less than twice the diameter of the basketball)
• show impressive athleticism and “hang time” when driving toward the rim
Basketball players must move quickly laterally, show great coordination, and jump like kangaroos. Put together, this creates quite an athletic package and underscores why the physical demands of professional basketball are higher than other major sports because of its robust combination of heart-pounding exercise and skillful shooting.
Jeremy had come so far — like pounding a high striker with a mallet and watching the puck rise within inches of hitting the bell. And now this, the nadir of his basketball career. “It was a shock [going to Reno] because I did not realize how different the two leagues were,” he said. “It was also humbling because the locker rooms, facilities, attendance at games, the travel — it was all very different.”
On New Year’s Day 2011, he wrote in his journal, “I wish I had never signed with the Warriors.”
Jeremy did some soul-searching and came to this conclusion, which he shared with the attendees of the conference at the River of Life Christian Church: “None of the paychecks, the car, the fame, none of the NBA lifestyle, none of that stuff, my dream job, my dream life, none of that meant anything to me anymore. My happiness was dependent on how well I played.”15
OK, now Jeremy knew what he was dealing with. Stripped of everything else, he realized that even the happiness he derived from seeing his shots swish through the net, hearing “attaboys” from the coaches, and acknowledging explosive cheers from the fans is short-lived. The lesson learned is that success is fleeting, but that what really counts is an attitude of humble dependence on God.
Basketball had become an idol in Jeremy’s life, and if he was dependent on making the game the source of his happiness, then he was destined to become one unhappy dude. He decided to trust God for his future, which gave him a whole new perspective on everything.
In our interviews, Jeremy and I had this exchange about the demotion:
How did you take those struggles, being sent down to D-League?
Jeremy: It was really hard. People don’t believe me when I say it was the toughest year of my life, but it was.
I had a lot of long nights and struggles and had to really learn how to submit my will to God and really learn to trust and just to go through different situations that I thought were maybe unfair at times or things I had wished would have gone a different way.
What I learned was to lean on God in those situations and to make my relationship more intimate, to develop my relationship, and to spend more time with him every day. A lot of different convictions were coming up, and I did a lot of reading, and I did a lot of praying. More praying than I had ever done. I just learned a ton.
The first time you got sent to Reno, was it a shock to you?
Jeremy: Yes, it was a shock because I did not realize how different the two leagues were. I had always heard about it, but not until you go there do you really realize how different they are.
The first time I went down, that is when I started to realize — it was really humbling, when I realized that wow, you know in the NBA, I was complaining about this and complaining about that, and it gave me a whole new perspective on everything and gave me a little more sense of gratitude.
Some of the differences are what? The type of meal money you got? The type of hotel you stay at?
Jeremy: Just everything. Locker rooms, facilities, the attendance at the games, the service, everything. The travel. It’s all very different.
Did you ever have to take a bus to a game?
Jeremy: It depends. Sometimes you take a bus, like the time we had a nine-hour bus ride to Bakersfield.
Being sent down to Reno was a trial, and James 1:2 promises believers that they will face adversities of many kinds. But it wasn’t the end of the world — or the end of Jeremy’s NBA aspirations. It was this knowledge that gave him a total attitude adjustment: if going down to D-League is what the Warriors wanted him to do, then that’s what he would do. He would listen to his coaches, work on his weaknesses, and play hard.
One thing that didn’t change about him was his servant’s heart. For example, when the team traveled by air to places like Erie, New York; Canton, Ohio; and the border town of Hidalgo, Texas, Jeremy was entitled to roomier first-class seating since he was on assignment from the Warriors. The roster players were consigned to the cramped economy class — steerage. Wedging their six-foot, nine-inch bodies into their seats was a gymnastic trick worthy of a Cirque du Soleil production.
Jeremy always gave up his first-class ticket to a taller teammate and sat in the back of the plane. “That really spoke volumes about what type of guy he is,” said Eric Musselman, his coach with the Reno Bighorns. “Our players loved playing with him.”16
Jeremy played well in Reno, averaging 18 points, 5.6 rebounds, and 4.3 assists per game. He got both minutes and much-needed experience playing in a professional league.
He wasn’t confident yet, but he was a lot more comfortable when he was on the court, and that showed in his improved play.
Jeremy Left His Heart in … Reno
Following the rise of Linsanity, the Reno Bighorns front office knew a good promotion when they saw one. For their March 17 game this year, they had “Jeremy Lin Giveaway Night” and handed out 1,500 limited edition jerseys — even though Jeremy was no longer playing for the Golden State Warriors organization.
The jerseys went like proverbial hotcakes — and I can’t help but wonder what they’re going for on eBay now.
The Tempting Life
There’s no doubt that Jeremy discovered that playing in the NBA was not an easy gig. The long season had players bouncing from city to city like a pinball rolling down a slanted surface of pins and targets. The physical strain of playing on back-to-back nights in different cities fatigues the legs and zaps the desire to perform and play well. Even the best-conditioned athletes have to pace themselves during the season — even during games — so they have something in reserve for a fourth-quarter rally.
Besides the physical demands, I would argue that Christian hoopsters like Jeremy have it even tougher in the NBA because of the temptations that bombard them daily. They are presented with every reason to turn their backs on Christ and rely on themselves as they seek fame and fortune in this world.
In their defense, NBA players face challenges and temptations that the rest of us can’t even begin to understand. They have money; they have a lot of free time on their hands; they have flocks of women hoping to catch their eyes in hotel lobbies, restaurants, and bars. The ladies are dressed provocatively, are attractive, and flirt like schoolgirls with come-hither looks.
Some, unfortunately, are looking to get impregnated by an NBA player. They see having a child out of wedlock as a fast-track ticket to child support payments that begin in the five figures and can rise to sums of $75,000 a month. The number of illegitimate children of NBA players is staggering — and commonplace in other professional sports too — but it’s generally estimated that 50 to 60 percent of all players have had children out of wedlock. Child support payments are some athletes’ single largest expense.
One of the players I featured in my Playing with Purpose basketball book told me that the NBA once sent out a representative to talk to the players about “how to be careful.”
“He basically told us how to cheat and get away with it,” he said. “It was pretty crazy. He told us to get a prepaid cell phone that wasn’t registered in our name and not to leave any phone or text messages. He informed us that if you have unprotected sex and knock up a girl, there are consequences, especially in New York City, where the state of New York will hit you with an alimony bill of $75,000 a month if you make the league average of $5 million. He urged us to take precautions, because there are a lot of girls out there who are after your money.”
Despite the threat of paternity suits, sexually transmitted diseases, or the emptiness associated with love-’em-and-leave-’em one-night stands, the easy availability of women sends many NBA players down a path “like an ox going to the slaughter, like a deer stepping into a noose,” as the wisest man who ever lived, King Solomon, stated in Proverbs 7:22. That’s why we need to be praying for those who are staying strong — the Jeremy Lins of today — as well as for those who can’t seem to resist the lures of the world around them.
“Most people forget that we’re talking about kids in their early twenties,” said Jeff Ryan, the chaplain for the Orlando Magic. “If you can remember your early twenties — and I remember mine — you don’t always make the right choices. I was fortunate that I didn’t have the temptations that these guys have. Remember, they are targeted. Some handle it well, and some don’t. Unfortunately, there are plenty of guys who get caught up in the women thing and get their heads turned. They come into the league with the best of intentions, wanting to be faithful, wanting to be strong, but they give in to temptation. It’s like my doctor telling me what I shouldn’t eat. Once in a while I’m going to have it anyway. I think that’s what happens to a lot of these guys. They know they shouldn’t, but they give in.”
In our interviews, Jeremy told me that his mom and dad warned him about the temptations found in the NBA. “They said, ‘Be smart. There are going to be girls throwing themselves at you, so be smart.’ Typical parent stuff,” Jeremy said. “They also reminded me to make sure that I took care of my relationship with God first.”
“So was it difficult or easy being a Christian in the NBA?” I asked Jeremy after he finished his rookie season.
“I don’t want to say it was easy, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It helped that I had a couple of teammates who were strong Christians — Stephen Curry and Reggie Williams. We would go to chapel together before the games and occasionally have conversations about our faith, so that was definitely helpful. I had a lot of accountability in terms of a small group at home. And I was at home playing for the Warriors, so I went to my home church whenever I could. I had my pastor, Stephen Chen, and then I had my small group.”
Having his family nearby made the transition into the pros a lot easier, Jeremy told me, but the difficult part was not having any type of rhythm.
“You know, church is really tough to attend, and the schedule is so crazy. I had to listen to sermons on my computer on a lot of Sundays. The sermons would not always be from my home church but from a variety of places. My dad burned a bunch of sermons for me onto a CD, so I would carry a little case of all the sermons. Devotionals were a big part of my walk — just quiet times in my hotel rooms.”
I asked Jeremy about those stretches in hotel rooms, since there’s a lot of downtime in the NBA during long road trips that can stretch from five to eight days.
“Yeah, I had more spare time this year and more time to spend with God this year than I have ever had,” he said. “That was one of the parts that made it easier compared to being in college, where you wake up, go to class, practice, then do your homework, and go to sleep. I had a lot more free time, since I was no longer in school.”
“And what about the temptations?” I asked. “I imagine one of the difficulties about playing in the NBA is all the women who hang around the hotel rooms and all the people who try to talk to you and that type of thing.”
“Yes, I think that’s definitely true, but it wasn’t really an issue for me because I didn’t go out very much. And then there were guys on my team I hung out with, and we had a different lifestyle, so it wasn’t a huge issue. It’s definitely out there if you want it, but I chose to take it out of play. Once you take a stand for something at the beginning, everybody respects that, and they don’t bother you about it.”
After bouncing back and forth between Reno and Oakland, Jeremy finished the last two weeks of the season with the parent club and finished on a high note in the Warriors’ final game in mid-April, scoring 12 points and playing 24 minutes in a win over the Portland Trail Blazers. When you tally up the totals, he had played in only twenty-nine games for a struggling Golden State team that finished 36 – 46.
So what was his assessment of his rookie season?
“People don’t believe me when I say my rookie season was the toughest year of my life, but it was.” Echoing words he had said to me when we talked about his demotion to Reno, he summarized the season: “I had to really learn how to submit my will to God and learn to trust him while going through situations I thought were maybe unfair or things I wished would have gone differently. I learned to lean on God and to spend more time with him every day. I did a lot of reading and a lot of praying, and through it I did a lot of growing.”
Jeremy had signed a two-year contract with Golden State, so there was every expectation that the team would continue to bring him along, give him more playing time, and help him become the best player he could be.
Funny how things worked out.