Jeremy Lin was born on August 23, 1988 in Torrance California, a suburb of Los Angeles. His legal name is Jeremy She-How Lin. He is a famous basketball player who currently plays for the Beijing Ducks in the Chinese Basketball League (CBL). Jeremy became a global media sensation in 201 when he led the New York Knicks in an unexpected winning streak. This became known as the “Linsanity” craze across the world – watch the video below to see more! Mr. Lin was the first Asian American to be on a team that won an NBA Championship.
Mr. Lin is of Chinese and Taiwanese descent. In addition to his basketball, he has had a role in some TV shows and documentaries, including Fresh Off The Boat, Linsanity, and Free to Play. Mr. Lin is the first NBA player that graduated from Harvard and is of Chinese/Taiwanese ancestry. He has also had many YouTube collaborations, including rap videos. And he is also known for his Christian faith.
Overall, Jeremy Lin is a colorful character and an inspiration to many. We hope these quotes inspire your day with a little flavor of Linsanity!
Inspirational Jeremy Lin Quotes
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- “This is my dream being lived out and I’m so thankful for that.” Jeremy Lin
- “Every day in practice I have to lead by example. But at the same time, when people aren’t doing what they’re supposed to be doing, you’re responsible as a player. You can’t rely on the coaches to say everything. The players have to be responsible and take ownership of the team. Every day in practice there are situations where you need to say something and get a message across, but do it in the right way.” Jeremy Lin
- “You don’t get better if you win all the time. You look at yourself more when you lose.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’m not playing for other people; if I start thinking in those terms I would put too much pressure on myself. I play basketball because that is what I love to do.” Jeremy Lin
- “For me, when I get knocked down, I really try to get back up and go at it again. I don’t like to give up.” Jeremy Lin
- “All these people, all these things came into my life, and they’re all blessings from God. And now that I look back, I realize that these are His fingerprints all over my story.” Jeremy Lin
- “Sometimes you come up against a mountain and you end up making the mountain seem bigger than God.” – Jeremy Lin
- “Well, I’m not here to live up to anyone else’s expectations-I’m here to live up to mine.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’ve always been a target. Everyone looks me and says, ‘I’m not going to let that Asian kid embarrass me. I’m going to go at him.’ That’s how it’s been my whole life.” Jeremy Lin
- “Sometimes you come up against a mountain and you end up making the mountain seem bigger than God.” Jeremy Lin
- “I want to be a representative and be a role model for the Asian American community.” Jeremy Lin
- “My identity is in Christ, not in basketball.” Jeremy Lin
- “God loves me, and that he has the perfect plan for me. His plan will take me through a lots of ups and downs, but if I stay faithful to him that in the end he will work everything for my good. Now when I play basketball, I don’t play for anyone else, I only play for God. That’s the type of purpose that he gave me, and once he gave me that purpose, is when I found my peace, and once I got my peace, that’s when I got my joy.”Jeremy Lin
- “I’m not playing to prove anything to anybody.” Jeremy Lin
- “If you look back at my story, it doesn’t matter where you look, but God’s fingerprints are all over the place.” Jeremy Lin
- “When I’m on the court, I try to play with all my emotion and heart.” Jeremy Lin
- “If I had a day to myself I would just play video games with my brothers.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’ve learned how to be open and bold about my faith, but in terms of my influence, I just try to lead in a godly way. What that means for me is to serve them, whether it’s just doing the dirty work, like cleaning up sweat on the floor, or deferring to other people, or carrying equipment bags.” Jeremy Lin
- “My family used to call me an oversized kid and I think that’s pretty accurate in some ways.” Jeremy Lin
- “Having small group once a week gives me a lot of encouragement and accountability. Even though I go to church, I don’t really know many people there, but my real community is my small group.” Jeremy Lin
- “You don’t get better if you win all the time. You look at yourself more when you lose” Jeremy Lin
- “I was a big Michael Jordan fan growing up. I don’t feel my game resembles his though.” Jeremy Lin
- “I was playing garbage minutes the first two to three weeks. There was definitely a little bit of ‘what’s going on?’ in my prayers.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’m a playmaker. I’m always attacking the rim and have somewhat of a reckless style. I try to be everywhere at once.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’m not like the next Michael Jordan, but I’m also not what everyone saw me as before I started playing in the NBA, either.” – Jeremy Lin
- “I love eating junk food. I’m a huge snacker, chips and candy.” – Jeremy Lin
- “And people are always saying he deceptively quick, deceptively athletic, and I don’t know if that’s just because I’m Asian or what it is, but obviously there’s going to be stereotypes that you have to fight.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’m going to be honest, playing in D-League games is tough.” – Jeremy Lin
- “I speak Mandarin and can read and write a little. I took a few classes at Harvard to get better in my reading and writing skills.” Jeremy Lin
- “Coming out of college into the draft, being Asian-American and being from Harvard, that’s not going to be an advantage because of stereotypes.” Jeremy Lin
- “My first dunk ever was in middle school. We were playing, me and my church friends, and I dunked it, and I swear I could not sleep that night.” Jeremy Lin
- “The first time I went to Taiwan, there were cameras, paparazzi, TV stations outside my hotel twenty-four hours a day nonstop.” Jeremy Lin
- “Faith, family, academics and then sports was the order of priorities in my family. My parents really stuck to these principles when raising me and my two brothers. As long as we took care of everything, they let us play as much basketball as we wanted.” Jeremy Lin
- “The way you talk to your teammates and push them and the way you treat them is important. There is a fine line between trying to help your teammates and criticizing them. The toughest part for me is how to keep my teammates accountable but at the same time do it in a loving way that doesnt judge or condemn them. It’s definitely been a struggle and I’m trying to learn how to lead consciously in a way that honors God.” Jeremy Lin
- “People are moved by my story, but they’re only moved by my story because of what I do on the court.” Jeremy Lin
- “I was shocked cause I didn’t even know that they made my jersey. I didn’t know that they made it so fast, so when I saw it I was like, I had to look three times and I was like, ‘Did they customize that?’ And then I saw a couple of other ones and I was like, ok, they must’ve made them overnight or something.” Jeremy Lin
- “With all the media attention, all the love from the fans, I felt I needed to prove myself. Prove that I’m not a marketing tool, I’m not a ploy to improve attendance. Prove I can play in this league. But I’ve surrendered that to God. I’m not in a battle with what everybody else thinks anymore.” Jeremy Lin
- “I realize I had to learn … to stop chasing the perishable prizes of this earth … and give my best effort unto God and trust Him with the results.” Jeremy Lin
- “I have worked out with the Thunder, Lakers, Knicks, Grizzlies, Spurs, and a few others before the draft. I have worked out primarily against shorter and supposedly faster players in these workouts.” Jeremy Lin
- “My best career decision was probably not giving up when I wanted to. God as well as my family and friends were there for me during my toughest times.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’m very humbled and honored. I’m very thankful to the Asian-American Community for all their support!” Jeremy Lin
- “From the sense of being an ambassador for Jesus Christ, hopefully, through my story and through all the improbables and the miracles that happened in my life, people are inspired or at least a little bit warmer to the idea of exploring who Jesus is.” Jeremy Lin
- “People started saying, ‘Oh you know, he’s quicker than he looks’, and I’m like, ‘What does that mean? Do I look slow, or I’m not really sure what that means.” Jeremy Lin
- “It seems like everybody’s perception of me is very bipolar. To one group, it’s overpaid, overrated; to another group, it’s underpaid, underrated, underdog. It’s funny to me because there’s no real balance.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’ve learned that social media and our private lives, you know, our private lives are not so private anymore, so it takes a little bit of getting used to.” Jeremy Lin
- “I just think in order for someone to understand my game, they have to watch me more than once, because I’m not going to do anything that’s extra flashy or freakishly athletic.” Jeremy Lin
- “It’s the off-the-court spotlight in terms of having people look at you in terms of analyzing every little thing you do in your life, or having less privacy in your day-to-day activities, that’s an area I need to get more accustomed to.” Jeremy Lin
- “Well, I’m not here to live up to anyone else’s expectations-I’m here to live up to mine.” Jeremy Lin
- “The change that I never fall into is the, ‘I’m-above-you-look-at-me-do-stuff-for-me change.’ The change that I’m hoping I get to is where I become wiser, smarter – where I put myself in situations that don’t have a huge potential for disaster.” Jeremy Lin
- “In many ways, the longer I live, I understand that there are so many things outside my control. That’s why I believe faith is such a big part of the story. There are so many things that were orchestrated by God, that were put into place to make this perfect storm, that created Linsanity.” Jeremy Lin
- “When I’m on the court, I try to play with all my emotion and heart.” Jeremy Lin
- “With pro-gaming that’s one of the toughest parts – living game to game.” Jeremy Lin
- “Not sure if that will benefit me or hurt me, but I know I have the skills and am ready to play in the NBA regardless of my ethnicity.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’m not playing to prove anything to anybody.” Jeremy Lin
- “I just try to play as hard as I can every possession. If you’re aware and you’re high-energy, the ball will eventually bounce your way and you’ll be able to make plays.” Jeremy Lin
- “I have an economics degree with a minor in sociology. The reason I have that is because I want to do a ministry in urban areas and help with underprivileged kids.” Jeremy Lin
- “I grew up in the church, and I always kind of knew Bible stories and knew the Sunday school answers, but when I was a freshman in high school I joined youth group, and that’s when I started to see radical love; that’s when I started to see what Christian community is supposed to look like and what fellowship is supposed to look like.”Jeremy Lin
- “You have to be wired a certain way to be a professional basketball player, and the way my body grew, something happened genetically that allowed me to become a lot more explosive.” Jeremy Lin
- “I get scared of a lot of attention. I get scared of the spotlight. And I’m not talking about on the basketball court.” Jeremy Lin
- “I just really, really, really hate to lose. Really.” Jeremy Lin
- “I absolutely would not have liked playing in Spain or somewhere like that, so I was just gonna do it a year. Then I was gonna be done.” Jeremy Lin
- “I would be a pastor. It is something I think about doing when my playing days are over.” Jeremy Lin
- “I love my family, I love my relatives. One special request I have is for the media back in Taiwan to kind of give them their space because they can’t even go to work without being bombarded and people following them.” Jeremy Lin
- “I’ve always been a target. Everyone looks me and says, ‘I’m not going to let that Asian kid embarrass me. I’m going to go at him.’ That’s how it’s been my whole life.” Jeremy Lin
- “God loves me, and that he has the perfect plan for me. His plan will take me through a lots of ups and downs, but if I stay faithful to him that in the end he will work everything for my good. Now when I play basketball, I don’t play for anyone else, I only play for God. That’s the type of purpose that he gave me, and once he gave me that purpose, is when I found my peace, and once I got my peace, that’s when I got my joy.” Jeremy Lin
- “And when other people see me play basketball…the way I treat my teammates, the opponents, the refs, that’s all a reflection of God’s image and God’s love so that’s the stuff I try to focus on.” Jeremy Lin
- “I just want people to respect the privacy of my relatives in Taiwan. … They need to live their lives as well.” Jeremy Lin
- “New York is fast paced, with enthusiastic fans and lots of media attention. Houston’s slower paced, and there’s more of a southern culture to the city. But both cities have unbelievable food.” Jeremy Lin
- “I think right now the way society’s going, I think role models are important, and kids need direction. If I didn’t have that direction growing up, who knows what I could be doing, because I’ve been lost many times in my life, and I’ve had to have someone guide me back on the right path.” Jeremy Lin
- “It’s really important to me to go to church, which is sometimes tough when I get back from road trips late on Saturday night, but I try to make it a priority to go every week.” Jeremy Lin
- “Just because I had a good game doesn’t change who I am, my identity is in Christ and not in basketball, I love playing basketball and it’s my job but at the same time I recognize that I’m a sinner and that’s not gonna change regardless of how well I play on the court” Jeremy Lin
Related: see our awesome quotes from other sports legends including: Larry Bird, Phil Jackson and Jackie Robinson. And also our NBA Jams Quotes Collection is worth a read!
Video: Jeremy Lin – A Day in the Life
If you’re a fan of Jeremy’s this sure is a fun video. Follow his routine for a day and see how he structures his day.
Related: Ayrton Senna’s Best Quotes (racing legend!)
Jeremy Lin – Linsanity
Watch this to see how fun 2012 was when “Linsanity” took over the NBA and went global.
Summary
Jeremy Lin was always fun to watch during his time in the National Basketball Association.
He is currently playing in China so it is harder to watch his games in the U.S., but he is active on social media and YouTube and you can find him on those platforms.
Image Credit: “Jeremy Lin Lakers Press Conference” by TheDailySportsHeraldis licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
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