Jeremy Lin was set to visit the Houston Rockets yesterday, two people with knowledge of the plans said, and the New York Knicks restricted free agent was expected to get a contract offer.
The Rockets passed on Lin in December and he was claimed by the Knicks, turning into a breakout star when he landed the starting point guard job. Now with Goran Dragic not expected to return, Houston may want Lin back.
One of the people said on Tuesday that the Rockets are planning to make Lin a multi-year offer, though the Knicks can match it and have said they intend to keep him. The people spoke on condition of anonymity because the negotiations were to remain private.
The Rockets liked Lin, but had Kyle Lowry and Dragic ahead of him and needed to open a spot so they could add Samuel Dalembert to the roster. So they waived Lin, a decision general manager Daryl Morey would later write on Twitter that he regretted during Lin’s sensational February stretch that made him the biggest story in the NBA.
The undrafted guard from Harvard, the NBA’s first American-born player of Taiwanese decent, would fit nicely with the Rockets, who remain popular in Asia even after former center Yao Ming’s retirement.
However, both coach Mike Woodson and general manager Glen Grunwald have said the Knicks plan to keep Lin, who averaged 14.6 points and 6.2 assists in 35 games, 25 starts, before his season ended because of surgery to repair torn knee cartilage.
The Knicks may have to match two offers to keep their starting back-court intact. Landry Fields plans to sign an offer sheet with the Toronto Raptors that his agency said is worth about US$20 million over three years.
The Knicks are looking for veteran point guard help, hoping to land Steve Nash, but they do not want to lose Lin, whose popularity made them fans around the world and had merchandise flying off the shelves at Madison Square Garden in New York.
They scored their highest TV ratings in years during the height of “Linsanity.”
Deals cannot be signed until July 11. The Knicks would then have three days to match.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier