Jeremy Lin never fits. Didn’t fit in Houston. Didn’t fit in New York–despite tearing up the league nightly while he was there. Before that he didn’t fit with a number of teams that cut the resilient Harvard grad. Could it be that the strong Lin, a good size guard, has been playing the wrong position? One of the criticisms of Lin has been his inability, at times, to keep some of the league’s best point guards in front of him on defense. (To hear some Lin naysayers, you’d think that was easy.) But if Lin has proven anything, it’s that he knows how to take advantage of whatever situation he’s in. He rode his NYC triumph to a tremendous contract and a learning experience in Houston, and parlayed that into a move back home to the West Coast and a chance to shine in LA.
Now with an unfortunate thumb injury to Lakers small forward Nick Young, Lin has played a little bit of the 3 position (small forward) in practice. At first it seems odd–it was already unclear whether he was a 1 or a 2 guard. But then Lin is terrific at getting to the basket and using his strength inside to find ways to score–a small forward’s thing. And while at the 3 spot he’d be giving away inches every night, Lin would be the quickest in almost any small forward matchup. A lot of teams have been going with three guard line-ups–the so-called small ball–for long stretches, and a Lakers team with a healthy Steve Nash at point would seem to be exceptionally well-suited to it.
Byron Scott downplayed the notion that Jeremy Lin will play small forward (despite Jeremy doing so in scrimmage yesterday)
— Eric Pincus (@EricPincus) October 4, 2014
