Linsanity Over

[LarBrd33]

Knicks have lost 7 of their last 8 and Lin has shot 36% in those games.  If you bought your Linsanity jerseys online, see if you can cancel the order before it's too late.

Kidding, but seriously... 15 points, 7 assists, 4 turnovers and 36% in those games.  His steals are surprisingly high, though (2.2) for someone whose defense is supposedly atrocious.  Peaking at the RealGM Knicks forum, NY fans seem to be still lashing out at any blasphemists who dare claim the chosen one's ceiling is as low as Kyle Lowry.  They still think he's on the level of Chris Paul, D-Will... one even suggesting he compares favorably to a young Kobe.  Granted, one of the members of the forum admitted he had never watched basketball in his entire life until Linsanity started... so there's that.

His stats haven't been good. 7 assists/4 turnovers is poor.  36% shooting is alarming when he's jacking up 17 shots a night.  Also fairly concerning when the best pure scorer in the game (Melo) finishes the night with 13 shots.  This could be a problem...

I checked his stats fully prepared to come on here and say, "ok guys you were right, I was wrong... Lin is legit"...

Can't do it.  Still not a believer.  Scouting has caught up to him.  A couple more of these performances (and losses) and you're going to start hearing chatter about starting Baron Davis over him. 

[Who]

Lin seems a little like Ramon Sessions in how reliant he is on the pick and roll to produce offensively.

Needs to grow the rest of his offensive game.

[LarBrd33]

Lin seems in a little like Ramon Sessions in how reliant he is on the pick and roll to produce offensively.

Needs to grow the rest of his offensive game.

Needs to grow his court vision and ball handling if you ask me.

Tonight he was 5-17.  Melo (best pure scorer in the game) had 13 shots.  Amare (one of the best scoring big man in the game) had 9 shots.  That's a problem.  It's cute when Lin is making his crazy shots and the Knicks are winning, but now that the losses are piling up... it's a problem.

[the_Bird]

It was fun while it lasted.  At least this guy doesn't have to buy a new jersey.

[Who]

The Knicks spacing offensively has really sucked when all three of Lin, Amare and Carmelo are on the floor together.

Lin wants to space out the floor and run pick and rolls.

Amare and Melo want to run a power game with both players spending a lot of time in the mid-post (with Chandler also in the paint) squeezing the floor and leaving Lin with very few options.

[guava_wrench]

Lin seems in a little like Ramon Sessions in how reliant he is on the pick and roll to produce offensively.

Needs to grow the rest of his offensive game.

Needs to grow his court vision and ball handling if you ask me.

Tonight he was 5-17.  Melo (best pure scorer in the game) had 13 shots.  Amare (one of the best scoring big man in the game) had 9 shots.  That's a problem.  It's cute when Lin is making his crazy shots and the Knicks are winning, but now that the losses are piling up... it's a problem.

I can't take serious the idea that Melo is the best pure scorer in the game until he leads the league in scoring with reasonable efficiency. There are other guys who score better than him. He just forces the issue more, often unsuccessfully.

How many forced Melo moves to the rim end in a failed finish not even close to going in? He has great scoring skills, but there are many guys who are better.

Don't confuse not being good at anything else as being a 'pure-scorer'.

[LarBrd33]

This honestly reminds me a ton of Brandon Jenning's rookie year.  His first 11 games he was unbelievable... dropping 29 points, 55 points, 32 points, etc... all the while shooting something like 55%.  They won 8 of those 11 games...

Then scouting caught up to him...

6-21 shooting
7-22 shooting
7-21 shooting
6-20 shooting

The losses started piling up.  But Jennings had already been anointed the "Savior".  He was "the next Iverson".  TONS Of hype...  So you had to chalk it up as a slump..

Losses and bad shooting continued until inevitably he had to cut back his shooting...

3-9 shooting
1-8 shooting
4-9 shooting
1-8 shooting... etc.

Finished the season averaging 15 points on 37% shooting.

To be fair, Jennings has developed into a heck of a player.  The difference, imo, is that Jennings was a top prospect all along, was 20 years old at the time... and currently in his 3rd year is 22 years old.  Jeremy Lin is 23 right now and wasn't expected to amount to anything, was cut by 2 teams and was partially flourishing because of Mike D's system.  

[LarBrd33]

Lin seems in a little like Ramon Sessions in how reliant he is on the pick and roll to produce offensively.

Needs to grow the rest of his offensive game.

Needs to grow his court vision and ball handling if you ask me.

Tonight he was 5-17.  Melo (best pure scorer in the game) had 13 shots.  Amare (one of the best scoring big man in the game) had 9 shots.  That's a problem.  It's cute when Lin is making his crazy shots and the Knicks are winning, but now that the losses are piling up... it's a problem.

I can't take serious the idea that Melo is the best pure scorer in the game until he leads the league in scoring with reasonable efficiency. There are other guys who score better than him. He just forces the issue more, often unsuccessfully.

How many forced Melo moves to the rim end in a failed finish not even close to going in? He has great scoring skills, but there are many guys who are better.

Don't confuse not being good at anything else as being a 'pure-scorer'.

Oh come on.  You serious?  I mean... sure Bron, Kobe and Durant are probably better, but Melo has been plenty efficient.  46% shooting, 80% from the line... 25 points PPG for his career.  He's a beast.  The year he averaged 29 points he shot 48%

[Neurotic Guy]

It never started in my eyes! Even Acie Earl & Mark Blount had decent stretches of play with the Celtics at a point in tgeir careers. The whole LIN THING was severely overblown & I never bought in. But he can be a decent spot starter & legitimate back up who can stick around for some years.

Knick fans should be excused for getting excited about a guy who put together 9/10 gams with 20+ points followed be another 10 games averaing about 15 ppg. In this stretch he's also racked up assists at a high rate and steals at a high rate.  Of course, he is turning the ball over at a high rate too.  But please don't tell me that if Avery Bradley or Keyon Dooling performed as Jeremy Lin has that C's fans wouldn't be over the top as well.  National/International media wouldn't be, but fans would. 

I do recall one Mark Blount receiving a nice contract after his contract year performance (2006?) and I recall many C's fans and pundits being quite happy about it.   And Blount's best stretches of production were not as impressive as Lin's. 

[LarBrd33]

It never started in my eyes! Even Acie Earl & Mark Blount had decent stretches of play with the Celtics at a point in tgeir careers. The whole LIN THING was severely overblown & I never bought in. But he can be a decent spot starter & legitimate back up who can stick around for some years.

Knick fans should be excused for getting excited about a guy who put together 9/10 gams with 20+ points followed be another 10 games averaing about 15 ppg. In this stretch he's also racked up assists at a high rate and steals at a high rate.  Of course, he is turning the ball over at a high rate too.  But please don't tell me that if Avery Bradley or Keyon Dooling performed as Jeremy Lin has that C's fans wouldn't be over the top as well.  National/International media wouldn't be, but fans would. 

I do recall one Mark Blount receiving a nice contract after his contract year performance (2006?) and I recall many C's fans and pundits being quite happy about it.   And Blount's best stretches of production were not as impressive as Lin's. 

Sure... we've all been burned by this one time or another... whether with Brandon Hunter or Jiri Welsch or Gerald Green or whatever... all the more reason to doubt when some scrub D-leaguer who has already been cut by 2 squads starts surprising teams who have no time to practice in a lockout-shortened season...

And I don't give the Knicks a pass.  For every Orien Greene we've compared to Nash, the Knicks have had two.  Every [dang] season I have to hear about how so and so is a star... how Marbury is better than Isiah in his prime... how Bill Walker is the truth... how Amare is very possibly better than LeBron... how Landry Fields is the most impressive rookie the world has ever seen... etc.  And honestly I barely even pay attention to them.

"Curry, Randolph, Lee.  Formidable front line.  You hear that, Boston?  Formidable.  Look it up."

http://jack-ontherocks.blogspot.com/2007/11/knicks-formidable.html

[pearljammer10]

It was only a matter of time until the media found a new story to dump Lin for.

[dtrader]

Honestly, I think it's just people outside of NY WANTING Linsanity to be over.  

It's not like he had a stratch where he played great, and he's been bad since then.  Since Melo came back, he's had a few bad games.  So have the Knicks in general.  It isn't Lin.  Lins last 2 games prior to today, he played great (40 points, 17 assists, 7 steals, 6 turnovers in those 2 games).  

Players just hav bad games.  Paul Pierce does the same thing...he'll have 2 games where he looks like a premiere SF, and then have a game where he looks terrible, and people say he's over the hill.  I think it's just the ups and downs of a season. If Pierce gets a pass for a few bad games, I think a player who's practically a rookie, playing under difficult roster circumstances, should get a bit of a break.