Jeremy Lin is a point guard who generates statistics like points, field goal percentage, assists, and rebounds throughout basketball games. The document analyzes the career statistics of Magic Johnson, one of the best point guards in NBA history, showing his statistics over 12 seasons including games played, field goal percentage, rebounds per game, assists per game, and points per game. It also includes box-and-whisker plots comparing Magic Johnson's statistics to Jeremy Lin's shorter career so far. While Lin's numbers are lower due to less experience, his strong play for the Knicks suggests his statistics may improve over time as his career progresses.

2. Basketball Stats
• Jeremy Lin is a point
guard. And a point
guard plays an
important role on the
basketball team. In
some ways, the point
guard is like the
quarterback in football.
Let’s look at this in
more detail.

3. Basketball Stats
The point guard manages the movement of the ball on the court. On
offense the point guard has several choices for managing the play.

4. Basketball Stats
He can make a shot to the basket, attempting a field goal.

5. Basketball Stats
He can also pass the ball to another player on the team and have that
player make a basket. This is known as an assist.

6. Basketball Stats
• Throughout a game a
point guard generates
the following
statistics:
– Points scored
– Field goal percentage
– Assists
– Rebounds

7. Basketball Stats
One of the best point guards in NBA history was Magic Johnson.

8. Year Games Field Goal Rebounds Assists Points per
Played % per Game per Game Game
79-80 77 0.53 7.7 7.3 18
80-81 37 0.532 8.6 8.6 21.6
81-82 78 0.537 9.6 9.5 18.6
82-83 79 0.548 8.6 10.5 16.8
83-84 67 0.565 7.3 13.1 17.6
84-85 77 0.561 6.2 12.6 18.3
85-86 72 0.526 5.9 12.6 18.8
86-87 80 0.522 6.3 12.2 23.9
87-88 72 0.492 6.2 11.9 19.6
88-89 77 0.509 7.9 12.8 22.5
89-90 79 0.48 6.6 11.5 22.3
90-91 79 0.477 7 12.5 19.4
Basketball Stats
This table shows his career-long statistics from 1979 to 1991 for the
statistics previously noted. These statistics are based on nearly 1000
games. (Source: nba.com.)

9. Basketball Stats
Let’s analyze these statistics from
Magic Johnson’s career. We’ll also
compare the comparable statistics
from Jeremy Lin, keeping in mind
that Lin’s statistics represent a
much smaller data set, one that is
still growing.

10. Lin:45.8
%
Basketball Stats
This box-and-whisker plot is for Magic Johnson’s average field goal
percentage. The median percentage is 52.8%.

11. Lin:
14.6
Basketball Stats
This is the box-and-whisker plot for the average points scored per game.
The median is 19.1.

12. Lin:
6.1
Basketball Stats
This box-and-whisker plot is for the average number of assists per game.
The average is 12.05.

13. Lin:
3
Basketball Stats
This box-and-whisker plot is for the average number of rebounds per
game. The median is 7.15.

14. Basketball Stats
While Jeremy Lin’s statistics are not as
high Magic Johnson’s, this is easily
explained. Lin has only been playing
a short time and his statistics are
bound to change. But based on the
impact he has made on the New York
Knicks’ season, it’s likely that fans will
be following these statistics
throughout the years he plays.