Jeremy Lin: Knicks' Struggles vs. Heat Prove How Valuable Lin Is to the Offense

The New York Knicks' inability to move the ball around and make the Miami Heat defense work hard to defend through two first-round playoff games proves how valuable point guard Jeremy Lin is to his team's chances of winning.

The Knicks are down 0-2 to the Heat heading to New York, and their offense has been dreadful with Lin sidelined because of an injury.

Lin would like to come back for Game 4 of the series, according to the New York Post, but that looks like it will be the Knicks' final game of the season.

The issue with the Knicks is two-fold right now: They have to play better defense, and their offense must be run more efficiently. 

While Lin's defense is not elite, his ability to run the offense and get guys open shots is remarkable and very much needed right now for New York.

Without a pure point guard on the floor, Knicks star forward Carmelo Anthony has the ball in his hands way too much on offense, and this allows the Heat defense to just sit in its positions and not have to work hard.

Anthony is going up against an elite one-on-one defender in LeBron James. Even though he scored 30 points in Game 2, 'Melo had to work much harder for those points than he would have liked. Nearly every one of his shots was contested by one or two players.

Through two games, the Heat have a 34-16 advantage in assists. This shows that the Knicks are not moving the ball around well and are not making the extra pass to find the open man.

There is way too much perimeter and isolation play for the Knicks right now, and that's not a winning strategy against a team of the Heat's caliber.

With Lin on the floor, the Knicks run their offense better. Defenses have to worry about his scoring, and his penetration into the paint frees up people like J.R. Smith and Steve Novak on the perimeter to have wide open three-point shots.

Lin is so important to the Knicks offense, and you can easily see that by watching this series with Miami unfold.

He may come back for Game 4, but by that time, it will be too late for the Knicks, who are just being overpowered by a Heat team that's better in every facet of the game.

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