Jeremy Lin this week addressed the emotional breakdown he’d had during a recent interview in Taiwan.
Before a crowd at a Harvard Business School event in Shanghai, the NBA free agent spoke about the vulnerability he’d shown on GOOD TV, a Christian station in Taiwan.
“In English, there’s a saying: ‘Once you hit rock bottom, the only way is up.’ But rock bottom seems to get more and more rock bottom for me,” Lin said through tears last month. “Free agency has been tough because I feel like in some ways the NBA has given up on me. And I always knew if I gave anybody a reason to doubt, they would.”
Lin defended his emotions this week, telling his Shanghai audience that “showing weakness is one of the greatest signs of strength.”
“Ironically, to be able to be OK with your weakness is one of the strongest things you could do. Who doesn’t have weaknesses?” he said, according to The Athletic. “We all do. But to show them is one of the strongest things you can do.”
Lin also admitted that he “knew” he was going to break down. But he was fine with doing so to show others that failure is part of the human experience.
Earlier this summer, Lin helped the Toronto Raptors defeat the Golden State Warriors in the NBA championship and became the first Asian American player to take home a ring in the league’s history. But now he’s a free agent who hasn’t been picked up by any NBA team.
He addressed critics of his play when speaking in Shanghai.
“I also know what kind of player I can become, and I know I haven’t done that. And so that’s what I’m going to continue to do is chase that and try to be the best version of myself,” he said.
At another event in Taiwan last month, Lin revealed that he “began to consider whether I should play basketball in Asia” roughly five years ago and that his greatest dream is to play on a team with his younger brother Joseph, a star on the Fubon Braves in Taiwan.