It's hard to believe that just a month ago, Jeremy Lin was hanging on to his spot on the New York Knicks' roster by a mere thread. The struggling team was considering cutting him. He traveled with the team to Miami on January 27th. He didn't play a single minute in the game, but he did visit the Heat's in-arena chapel where he apparently made a prayer to stay on the team.
The story comes from, of all places, the Heat's Udonis Haslem. The future mayor of Miami tells Reuters TV that he frequently visits the team's chapels before games.
"I came in late and I heard the chaplain praying for Jeremy to make the squad," Haslem says.
Of course, now, less than a month after that prayer Lin is a certifiable NBA sensation. He exploded off the bench to engineer a comeback against the New Jersey Nets about a week after, and the Knicks have gone 9-2 since then.
"We have all been shown tremendous favor and blessed to be in this position and we use these gifts in the way that he wants us to use them. He gave us these abilities to go out and play this game the way that we are capable of playing. I don't see anything wrong with that," says Haslem.
Lin's story has also had the perhaps positive effect of taking some of the NBA media spotlight off of the Miami Heat. Since the initiation of Linsanity, the Heat have only lost one game and are on a seven-game win streak.
"We have all been shown tremendous favor and blessed to be in this position and we use these gifts in the way that he wants us to use them. He gave us these abilities to go out and play this game the way that we are capable of playing. I don't see anything wrong with that," says Haslem.
Lin's story has also had the perhaps positive effect of taking some of the NBA media spotlight off of the Miami Heat. Since the initiation of Linsanity, the Heat have only lost one game and are on a seven-game win streak.
Tonight, the two biggest NBA on-the-court media sensations of the past two years come head-to-head. They might not need it, but let's just hope the Heat's chaplain is praying for them. Apparently, that guy can work basketball wonders.
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