See what Celtics greatest point guard said: Bob Cousy had heard so much about the NBA's latest sensation, and had assured so many inquiring minds that the league always catches up to unscheduled comets streaking across its sky, that he finally decided to see for himself. On Feb. 19, the 83-year-old former point guard of the Boston Celtics needed to break down the 23-year-old current point guard of the New York Knicks. An avid golfer who can shoot his age, Cousy canceled a round to watch Jeremy Lin play ball on TV. Suddenly the Hall of Famer realized he'd been misleading friends and strangers alike. Linsanity, he decided, wasn't something opposing coaches would surely bottle up and store away in a month or two, never to be heard from again. AP Photo Celtics legend Bob Cousy had his doubts about Jeremy Lin ... Cousy absorbed Lin's 28-point, 14-assist performance against the defending champion Dallas Mavericks and came away with a new scouting report. "The game of basketball over the years has been associated with big people," Cousy said from his home in West Palm Beach, Fla., "but what separates the men from the boys is speed and quickness, and I saw that Lin has both in abundance. "For two weeks, every time I went by somebody down here they were talking about him, and I'd tell them the hoopla was probably overdone, that it's not unusual for this to happen with a young player who catches the league by surprise. But I got a completely different sense from watching Jeremy play. Now I'm telling people he'll definitely find a niche in the realm of good-to-great point guards in this league." With the Knicks in Boston on Sunday, Cousy allowed himself a laugh over the possibility the visitors will have more stability at point guard, his position, than the Celtics, his team. Who could've imagined this a month ago, when the Knicks had no quarterback and almost no chance of saving their coach, Mike D'Antoni, while the aging Celtics still had a young All-Star who had already helped deliver Doc Rivers a title? But now Rajon Rondo is reported as trade bait and Jeremy Lin is Jeremy Lin, with Baron Davis behind him. Cousy can appreciate Lin's amazing journey, if only because he has a zillion-to-one quality to his own back-story. The son of French immigrants, Cousy was a skinny kid from an East Side ghetto where, he said, "the rats and cockroaches were bigger than the tenants." He didn't pick up a basketball across the first 12 years of his life, and it took his cab-driving father those 12 years to save $500 and move his family to Queens, where Cousy was cut twice by the high school coach at Andrew Jackson. Only an absurd twist of blessing-in-disguise fate -- Cousy fell out of a tree, broke his right wrist, and started dribbling everywhere with his left hand -- salvaged what had been a non-career. An ambidextrous Cousy finally made the Andrew Jackson team and won the city scoring championship in his senior year before, he said, "I got deluged by two college offers." [+] Enlarge Debby Wong/US Presswire ... then he watched Lin mow down the Mavs -- and was sold. Holy Cross and Boston College. BC didn't have any dorms at the time, and Holy Cross did. "I wanted to get away from the city and live somewhere on campus," Cousy said. "I remember the letter Holy Cross sent me. It was, 'Hey kid, we understand you're a hotshot at Andrew Jackson. If you have any interest in Holy Cross, fill out this application and we'll give you a scholarship.' That was the extent of my recruiting." Holy Cross immediately won the NCAA title, and the rest is playmaking history. Cousy is widely credited as the first point guard to make an art form out of the pass, to blend showmanship with the selfless act of giving up the ball. He won six NBA championships with the Celtics, and his style was transcendent enough to inspire generations of New York City point guards, including Kenny Anderson, who said he tried to emulate Cousy above all. So the old man is a leading scholar on the position, and one who sees staying power in the visionary named Lin. "My greatest asset was peripheral vision, and it seems Jeremy has that, too," Cousy said. "People thought I was doing supernatural things with my vision, like, 'Wow, you must have eyes behind your head,' but every good point guard needs that asset. "Lin sees the floor extremely well and has good size for a point guard. He seems smart, not just because he went to Harvard, but in the way he plays. Just based on what I saw against Dallas, it's hard for me to believe [Golden State and Houston] cut him. It's hard to criticize without being there, but point guards who can run the show in the NBA are in such demand." Lin's meltdown in Miami didn't concern Cousy; he figured the kid was due for a lousy game, and he knew the Heat had the talent and motivation to shut him down. "They'd heard about Lin for a while," Cousy said, "and LeBron James and Dwyane Wade don't want to read about people other than themselves." Cousy doesn't believe Lin will have to fall out of a tree to develop a stronger left hand, one of his few game-day needs. "It's a simple adjustment," Cousy said. "I used to go through periods where guys were picking off my path to the right, and I had to keep them honest. You don't have to go five times to the left and five to the right -- two and eight is fine, and Lin will be able to develop that part of his game." The Best Of Linsanity ESPN New York looks back at Jeremy Lin's very best games with the 'Bockers. Jeremy Lin's Greatest Latest Cousy kept coming back to Lin's speed and quickness, the weapons the 6-foot-1 Celtic used against bigger opponents. Of course, Cousy was surrounded by Hall of Fame finishers. Lin? He's got Carmelo Anthony on one side, Amare Stoudemire on the other, and Tyson Chandler in between to run the pick and roll. Lin can also throw the ball to the likes of Steve Novak and J.R. Smith, at least when Davis doesn't come off the bench with them. This is how far the undrafted, unwanted point guard has come: Lin had 19 points, 13 assists and one turnover against Cleveland on Wednesday night, and it felt like he'd only brought his B game. "He's got the physical skills to reach a good, very good or great level in this league," Cousy said. "He's exactly what the Knicks needed, a leader and someone to distribute the ball as opposed to a bunch of guys just letting it fly." Funny how it worked out: The old Celtic figured the young Knick would be another here-today, sort-of-gone-tomorrow flash until he put away his golf clubs one Sunday and saw what the fuss was all about. "I assumed the league would catch up to him," Cousy said, "but now I certainly don't think that's going to happen." Bad news for the Celtics. Good news for fans in love with point guards who see the floor the way Bob Cousy saw the parquet.
Bob Cousy had heard so much about the NBA's latest sensation, and had assured so many inquiring minds that the league always catches up to unscheduled comets streaking across its sky, that he finally decided to see for himself. On Feb. 19, the 83-year-old former point guard of the Boston Celtics needed to break down the 23-year-old current point guard of the New York Knicks. An avid golfer who can shoot his age, Cousy canceled a round to watch Jeremy Lin play ball on TV. Suddenly the Hall of Famer realized he'd been misleading friends and strangers alike. Linsanity, he decided, wasn't something opposing coaches would surely bottle up and store away in a month or two, never to be heard from again. AP Photo Celtics legend Bob Cousy had his doubts about Jeremy Lin ... Cousy absorbed Lin's 28-point, 14-assist performance against the defending champion Dallas Mavericks and came away with a new scouting report. "The game of basketball over the years has been associated with big people," Cousy said from his home in West Palm Beach, Fla., "but what separates the men from the boys is speed and quickness, and I saw that Lin has both in abundance. "For two weeks, every time I went by somebody down here they were talking about him, and I'd tell them the hoopla was probably overdone, that it's not unusual for this to happen with a young player who catches the league by surprise. But I got a completely different sense from watching Jeremy play. Now I'm telling people he'll definitely find a niche in the realm of good-to-great point guards in this league." With the Knicks in Boston on Sunday, Cousy allowed himself a laugh over the possibility the visitors will have more stability at point guard, his position, than the Celtics, his team. Who could've imagined this a month ago, when the Knicks had no quarterback and almost no chance of saving their coach, Mike D'Antoni, while the aging Celtics still had a young All-Star who had already helped deliver Doc Rivers a title? But now Rajon Rondo is reported as trade bait and Jeremy Lin is Jeremy Lin, with Baron Davis behind him. Cousy can appreciate Lin's amazing journey, if only because he has a zillion-to-one quality to his own back-story. The son of French immigrants, Cousy was a skinny kid from an East Side ghetto where, he said, "the rats and cockroaches were bigger than the tenants." He didn't pick up a basketball across the first 12 years of his life, and it took his cab-driving father those 12 years to save $500 and move his family to Queens, where Cousy was cut twice by the high school coach at Andrew Jackson. Only an absurd twist of blessing-in-disguise fate -- Cousy fell out of a tree, broke his right wrist, and started dribbling everywhere with his left hand -- salvaged what had been a non-career. An ambidextrous Cousy finally made the Andrew Jackson team and won the city scoring championship in his senior year before, he said, "I got deluged by two college offers." [+] Enlarge Debby Wong/US Presswire ... then he watched Lin mow down the Mavs -- and was sold. Holy Cross and Boston College. BC didn't have any dorms at the time, and Holy Cross did. "I wanted to get away from the city and live somewhere on campus," Cousy said. "I remember the letter Holy Cross sent me. It was, 'Hey kid, we understand you're a hotshot at Andrew Jackson. If you have any interest in Holy Cross, fill out this application and we'll give you a scholarship.' That was the extent of my recruiting." Holy Cross immediately won the NCAA title, and the rest is playmaking history. Cousy is widely credited as the first point guard to make an art form out of the pass, to blend showmanship with the selfless act of giving up the ball. He won six NBA championships with the Celtics, and his style was transcendent enough to inspire generations of New York City point guards, including Kenny Anderson, who said he tried to emulate Cousy above all. So the old man is a leading scholar on the position, and one who sees staying power in the visionary named Lin. "My greatest asset was peripheral vision, and it seems Jeremy has that, too," Cousy said. "People thought I was doing supernatural things with my vision, like, 'Wow, you must have eyes behind your head,' but every good point guard needs that asset. "Lin sees the floor extremely well and has good size for a point guard. He seems smart, not just because he went to Harvard, but in the way he plays. Just based on what I saw against Dallas, it's hard for me to believe [Golden State and Houston] cut him. It's hard to criticize without being there, but point guards who can run the show in the NBA are in such demand." Lin's meltdown in Miami didn't concern Cousy; he figured the kid was due for a lousy game, and he knew the Heat had the talent and motivation to shut him down. "They'd heard about Lin for a while," Cousy said, "and LeBron James and Dwyane Wade don't want to read about people other than themselves." Cousy doesn't believe Lin will have to fall out of a tree to develop a stronger left hand, one of his few game-day needs. "It's a simple adjustment," Cousy said. "I used to go through periods where guys were picking off my path to the right, and I had to keep them honest. You don't have to go five times to the left and five to the right -- two and eight is fine, and Lin will be able to develop that part of his game." The Best Of Linsanity ESPN New York looks back at Jeremy Lin's very best games with the 'Bockers. Jeremy Lin's Greatest Latest Cousy kept coming back to Lin's speed and quickness, the weapons the 6-foot-1 Celtic used against bigger opponents. Of course, Cousy was surrounded by Hall of Fame finishers. Lin? He's got Carmelo Anthony on one side, Amare Stoudemire on the other, and Tyson Chandler in between to run the pick and roll. Lin can also throw the ball to the likes of Steve Novak and J.R. Smith, at least when Davis doesn't come off the bench with them. This is how far the undrafted, unwanted point guard has come: Lin had 19 points, 13 assists and one turnover against Cleveland on Wednesday night, and it felt like he'd only brought his B game. "He's got the physical skills to reach a good, very good or great level in this league," Cousy said. "He's exactly what the Knicks needed, a leader and someone to distribute the ball as opposed to a bunch of guys just letting it fly." Funny how it worked out: The old Celtic figured the young Knick would be another here-today, sort-of-gone-tomorrow flash until he put away his golf clubs one Sunday and saw what the fuss was all about. "I assumed the league would catch up to him," Cousy said, "but now I certainly don't think that's going to happen." Bad news for the Celtics. Good news for fans in love with point guards who see the floor the way Bob Cousy saw the parquet.
Celtics's greatest PG Bob Cousy see Jeremy Lin as a prospected Good to Great point gaurd. http://espn.go.com/new-york/nba/sto...nd-bob-cousy-loves-new-york-knicks-jeremy-lin
This is exactly how I see it. Anyone who doubts him either has not read about his past and seen all the highlights.... Or they just do not want to believe. Check out where he drops 30 on Kimba Walker and eventual champs Uconn. http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=QQ2mng5e95w And if you say that was just college doesn't matter... Here is where he drops 38 on the lakers. http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=8iWWFk6TX18 He is a Winner! I am excited to see what he does this year.
The two teams that were really pushing for Lin's services (the Rockets and Mavericks) are run by two very analytically driven minds. That says something about his talent and potential. Anyway, I don't really count what Lin did against the Lakers. He played his best basketball after the ASB once he was being scouted. His play after the ASB up until when he was injured was what impressed me the most.
Size, IQ, athleticism, court vision, steal, rebound, block, drawing fouls... Lin's better in a lot of aspects. AB shoots well and is pretty fast when he's on, but Lin's improved a lot on his shooting and arguably got same, if not better speed.
Lin's decision making off the PnR is at an elite level. His other tools are still developing but we need to abuse that skill of his.
The difference is no one is actively posting day after day that Brooks sucks, or theres a chance he will just warm a bench in the league. No one is on a mission to diminish him... well that I've read on these forums.
I'm just saying a lot of people bring up the 38 vs lakers as a defining moment. I just mentioned that brooks hit them up for 34 in a playoff game. As we've seen with brooks,lowry,dragic and others, you're only as good as your last game or what people want to remember. One minute brooks is on his way to being a quality starter capable of being unguardable,the next minute he's garbage and needs to be traded after a injury. One minute lowry is the next chauncey billups, the next minute he's trippin and needs to be traded. Get the trend here. Brooks,lowry,dragic,and now lin are young guys in their development. Neither guys have accumulated 2 seasons worth of starts at 34 mins a night. They have moment when they look like world beaters and they will have moments when they sux. I don't expect any differnt from lin. I just want people to be patient and don't blame people around him for his failures. We already see posters making up excuses fro why he turns the ball over of sux on defense. He's a guy who has to grow his body,mind,and game to be consistent through a 82 game season. We saw lowry go from a great defender to average when his workload increased. As a player,you don't know what's to expect during an 82 game season until you do it..
Wow, some great talent evaluators here. However, I put just a little bit more weight on Bob C's assessment. Maybe I'm wrong but it takes one to know one and if the man changed his mind after seeing Lin play, then I would suggest all the people who are really wishing the little Asian player to fail (you know who you are), to just relax and watch the man play. For every mistake he makes he is determined to fix. Bad shot? Spend summer and learn to shoot. Too weak? Work his butt off getting stronger. Too many turnovers? Well that's his next hill to climb. The man spends the half time break looking at film to improve his game! I think maybe Battier or Yao might do that, maybe. Can you think of anyone else in the NBA that would? Coaches do and should but the player?? It will be fun watching Lin play and as Rocket fans, I am hoping he will exceed even the high expectations of his fans, let alone his detractors.
Lee. I respect your opinions and clearly they're genuine, but I can't fathom how you think that JLin's defense sucks when it clearly doesn't on either the eye ball test or through stats. He is a ball hawk with a penchant for great anticipation especially in not letting a shot go up and in getting steals. I take the "not enough games" "weak under defensive pressure" "turnover prone" criticisms as truths that, although doesn't take into account the totality of his game, has some merit, but the "lack of athleticism; slow" "sucks at defense" criticisms are, at least to my eye, complete bogus. Does it have to get better in order for him to live up to his potential? Of course. BTW, his Lakers game was not the most impressive for me. There are many! Unrelated but here's JLin on one of his less heralded games showcasing his ability to run the offense. The entire game itself would be much much more impressive but the highlights will do. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioq4b9s_FN0 And can anyone teach me how I can embed a video on here? Thanks in advance
Here's a better link with more highlights. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vs_QsxpqvbY&feature=related
Yea when they had STAT. Such a balanced team. Which was destroyed as soon as Melo came back... shame.
