7 NBA Players Who Deserve as Much Hype as Jeremy Lin
Jeremy Lin is averaging 25 points and nearly 10 assists per game while making the New York Knicks relevant again. His play deserves to be the earth-shattering sports story that it is. But after two straight weeks of 24-hour Lindemonium, we’re beginning to overlook a bunch of other really intriguing NBA plot lines.
Nikola Pekovic was a foul-machine rookie, averaging 5.5 points and three rebounds per game last year. Three weeks ago, he took over the starting spot for an injured Darko Milicic and hasn’t looked back.
No NBA defender has figured out how to get this immovable object out of the paint. Pekovic is now third in field-goal percentage while averaging 16 points and 10 rebounds per game as a starter.
Marcus Camby is 12th all-time in career blocks. But, at 38, his 1.6 blocks per game rate is higher than nearly everyone ahead of him on the list, including Hakeem Olajuwon, Patrick Ewing, Shaquille O'Neal, Robert Parish and Dikembe Mutombo.
Only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar matches Camby’s pace.
Brandon Rush has hit nearly 54 percent of his three-pointers. The guy has canned more than 80 treys and is on pace to break Kyle Korver’s 2010 record for percentage.
Ricky Rubio’s rookie ride has exceeded all of the pressure and expectations. Nobody throws a better bounce pass in the league, he’s a SportsCenter staple for alley-oops, and he’s second in steals and fifth in assists per game.
Speaking of point guards, Steve Nash is sixth on the all-time assist list, but the bigger story is the season he’s currently putting together. At an age when Mark Jackson was an afterthought, and Jason Kidd is clearly slowing down, only John Stockton played at such a high level.
Steve Nash is currently averaging more points, minutes and assists, while shooting better from the floor and line than Stockton did at 38.
Finally, are you paying attention to the season that Oklahoma City Thunder’s young core is putting together?
Twenty-two-year-old Serge Ibaka is leading the league in blocks for the second straight year. Twenty-two-year-old James Harden is averaging 17 points per game off the bench.
Twenty-three-year-old Russell Westbrook is fifth in league scoring and sixth in steals, while 23-year-old Kevin Durant is third in NBA scoring.
The Thunder are the best in the Western Conference, and in a February 19th win over Denver, Durant had 51 points, Westbrook had 40, and Ibaka had a triple-double.
Jeremy Lin deserves the spotlight right now. I just wish it was shining a little wider, too.
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