Lin Ready To Rejoin Knicks Again

NEW YORK--Knicks point guard Jeremy Lin announced Wednesday night that he was feeling 100 percent and ready to rejoin the team again. Unfortunately, the Knicks had been eliminated from the playoffs earlier with a loss to the Miami Heat.

“I’m feeling a lot better today. I think I’m ready to get in there and play,” Lin told reporters Wednesday. “I talked to the doctors, I did some stress tests, gave it a few days, and since I haven’t felt any pain in three or four days, I think I’m ready to go. The fact that the season is over is just bad luck on my part. What a break! This has been a star-crossed season.”

Lin has been out several weeks due to a knee injury. In his absence, his team has struggled to find consistent point guard play. His condition started improving recently, but the point guard didn’t want to return until he felt “100 percent.”

“Look, if I’m not 100 percent I can’t help the team the way I want to,” Lin said. “And frankly, when I tried to jump on that ankle, I felt brief tinge of pain. I can’t play with that. I’m pain free now, though. Too bad my loser teammates had to get eliminated tonight.”

Lin’s teammates were dejected after their loss to the Heat. Facing an uncertain future, the team hoped find a way to grind out another win against Lebron and Co. and extend their season another game. But without Lin or Iman Shumpert on the floor, the team sputtered.

They’re happy to hear Lin is feeling better now, though.

“Well that’s nice about Jeremy being ready to play,” said center Tyson Chandler. “We could have used him in the playoffs, though. Even at 80 or 85 percent he would have been an upgrade over Mike Bibby. Hell, at 40 percent he would have been better than Mike Bibby. No offense to the guy. Those three-pointers he hits once a week are really useful.”

Some Knicks players were surprised that Lin didn’t come back any sooner, especially because he was a full participant in practices the past couple weeks and actually competed in an iron man triathlon over the weekend.

“It’s surprising,” said Carmelo Anthony. “Jeremy looked pretty good in practice. He was moving freely and didn’t seem to be limited at all. Plus, he competed in that iron man triathlon thing. I don’t think you can do that unless you’re pretty healthy. Then again, he did finish second, so maybe he wasn’t that healthy.”

According to coach Mike Woodson, there’s a difference between playing well in practice and playing well in games.

“Look, just because he did well in practice doesn’t mean he was ready to play,” said Woodson. “It takes a while to get into game shape. We just thought it was best for him to sit out until he was absolutely ready. He didn't want to get back in there and suffer a setback and risk long term injury, so we decided to take the pragmatic approach and wait until all the soreness was gone. Willis Reed he ain't.”