They are just polishing his pair and he's just getting into rhythm. Confidence + staying aggressive + handling the pressure a little bit better = contract earned.
Everyone think Steve Nash was all world coming into the league. Jezz...just look at these numbers. Steve Nash first 4 seasons in the league: Year Team GP GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% RPG APG SPG BPG PPG 1996–97 Phoenix 65 2 10.5 .423 .418 .824 1.0 2.1 .3 .0 3.3 1997–98 Phoenix 76 9 21.9 .459 .415 .860 2.1 3.4 .8 .1 9.1 1998–99 Dallas 40 40 31.7 .363 .374 .826 2.9 5.5 .9 .1 7.9 1999–00 Dallas 56 27 27.4 .477 .403 .882 2.2 4.9 .7 .1 8.6
Same with Rando. See his numbers: http://www.nba.com/playerfile/rajon_rondo/career_stats.html Lin's numbers are better than both of them. At this stage of Lin's career, one can argue that Lin is ahead of them.
But you also need to take into consideration of their early year salary compare to Lin's to justify all the numbers.
Salary doesn't dictate development, it's just the free market placing a value on a player. Rookie salaries are actually distortions of the true market value. If they didn't have rookie contracts, you end up with the sort of contracts you saw in the old days, with Rookies signing for Huge contracts straight out of college or in their 2nd or 3rd years. Lin got paid what the market truly values his potential and worth on and off the court. That is irrelevant to the limitations of the natural development curve of young players.
Good? Yes. Really good? Nah. After all, what's the point of all the forum discussions, debates, and projections if you can't see how accurate your assessments are. At the very least, it's better than snarky one-liners.
