“I had no joy. I had no freedom.”
That’s how Jeremy Lin described his first season with the Houston Rockets to 20,000 fans at an evangelical conference in Taiwan, reports ESPN.
“The coaches were losing faith in me; basketball fans were making fun of me. … I was supposed to be joyful and free, but what I experienced was the opposite. I had no joy, and I felt no freedom,” said Lin.
Lin averaged 13.4 points a game last season with 6.1 assists. That’s a good season for most players, but didn’t meet the high expectation left by Linsanity.
“I became so obsessed with becoming a great basketball player … trying to be Linsanity, being this phenomenon that took the NBA by storm. I was supposed to save Houston basketball.”
LATEST STORIES
Lin’s performance improved in the later months of the season, but took a bad turn when he became injured and sat out several games and barely played in others.
“The one thing I learned was how empty fame and worldly success really are. … The desire for success never stopped,” Lin said. “If the voice that you listen to the most isn’t God’s voice, then eventually you will experience that emptiness, confusion and misery that I felt when I listened to the voice of Linsanity.”
You can watch an interview with ESPN analyst Brian Windhorst about the pressures Lin felt and how things might change on ESPN.
