Jeremy Lin has been having an up-and-down season for the Los Angeles Lakers, and he admitted that he spends countless sleepless nights trying to regain his form during his Linsanity years in New York. Meanwhile, "seven seconds or less" genius Mike D'Antoni called the Harvard alum as a "special" point guard.
In a piece from Pablo S. Torre for ESPN, Jeremy Lin said that he often overanalyzes a game for the Los Angeles Lakers which causes him sleep until 4 a.m.
"And then I wake up at 6, head spinning with a million different thoughts about plays from the previous night. About when I've had success in the past. How I can try to replicate that. How I can work on certain moves. How I can analyze the game differently," he said.
Part of his difficulty was his obsession to become a starting point guard for a championship team, and to also be considered as one of the best in the league.
"I've always wanted to be great. And for three straight years, I've put in a lot of work, but I haven't seen the results on the court. I mean, that's a long time, right? The average NBA career is five years. It's not like I'm an accountant and I can be an accountant 'til I'm 67 years old," he said.
But his former coach, Mike D'Antoni, who was responsible for letting Jeremy Lin loose in New York which produced Linsanity, said that the trick is to not rein in the point guard's ability to freestyle.
"You hate to miss an opportunity to coach somebody that receptive, that good. He's one of those special point guards," he told Torre.
"Those three weeks were the best," D'Antoni said, referring to the Linsanity period where Jeremy Lin averaged 25 points and 9 assists. "Every day was Valentine's Day."
"I think Jeremy can fit anywhere as a player," the coach, who got fired by the Los Angeles Lakers during the off-season, said. "He's that good. But he's not Linsanity if you put him just anywhere. If you close the floor on him" -- that is, if you don't stretch out defenses, if you don't leverage his yearning to attack the rim -- "he's going to look mediocre."
