Jeremy Lin, a stereotype that should be celebrated, may be the Dumbest Harvard Grad ever.
I am having a hard time coming up with a conclusion.The Harvard core curriculum is light on math, psychology and logic, and completely devoid of Marketing 101.Jeremy Lin has taken the global phenomenon known as Linsanity and doused it with kerosene.
The decision by the New York Knicks to let him walk was the focus of most of the analysis.He was faced with a dilemma because the Knicks would have to pay $50 million for Lin's services three years from now.Howard Beck of the New York Times provides a primer.How do you weigh Lin's basketball and marketing potential against a very small sample set, and also against not just what he would be paid, but the larger ramifications of his contract down the line?He is being ripped apart because of the adjectives associated with him, which include illogical, paranoid and dumb.
I am more interested in the choices Lin made.No matter what he does, Dolan will be rich and reviled.Lin gave the Harvard Business School a brilliant case study on how to cost yourself millions of dollars and influence when you aren't looking at the big picture.
The point guard went from scrub-to-star in February.The sports story of the year was played out at Madison Square Garden.Lin was forced to shop around his services in order to maximize his next contract with the Knicks.He got Houston to offer him $5 million for his first two years of his contract, and then a $9 million balloon in the third year, with a team option for a fourth.
Various Knicks sources, including their coach, playing poker as deftly as a late-night drunk at Circus Circus, announced that they would match it.Lin told Sports Illustrated that a global marketing machine would remain in the capital of marketing.
Lin failed miserably here.Lin and Houston agreed to add another $5 million to his guaranteed salary in the third year, which would cost the Knicks an extra $20 million or so because of the NBA's new luxury tax.
I understand why Houston did it.Lin was an equal party to the new offer.I only have two theories to offer.
Lin guaranteed himself an extra $5 million in his pocket with the revised offer.A man was sleeping on his brother's couch earlier this year.It makes sense to take the sure thing because of the legitimate worries that he was way overperforming.
Why structure it in a way that punishes New York?Lin could have tried to guarantee that fourth year if it was all about certainty.Spreading it out in a way that didn't push the Knicks toward the fiscal cliff is how $9 million per is more downside protection.
Linsanity is defined by forcing the Knicks to consider ending his tenure in New York.If Lin is 80% as good as he was last season, fronting a very good, very hype Knicks team had the potential to bring him tens of millions of dollars in endorsements.Steve Herz told my colleague Tom Van Riper that Lin leading the Charlotte Bobcat back to respectability wouldn't be that interesting.It isn't something that Coca-Cola is going to pay $10 million for.
You get Lin's new reality if you insert "Houston Rockets" into the sentence.He is an above average player on a below-average team in a low-profile city, rather than the golden boy on an obsessed-over team.
The Rockets were popular in China.Houston made a smart move here.It doesn't do much for Lin.
He was offended that the Knicks didn't court him pro-actively and that they needed to let someone else make an offer if he wanted more money.Lin said that blind item stories are probably not true, the kind of squishy response that conjures the classic celebrity apology.
He wanted to be the go-to guy on his team, rather than sharing the ball with Anthony and the rest of the Knicks.
Lin's brand is damaged by speculation in these areas.People did not fall in love with Lin because he was a star player.They loved him because he was humble and he won.The circus he helped create undermines all of those attributes.