Although Lydia Lee’s two daughters have flown the coop, the diehard Lakers fan hopes her Redondo Beach home won’t be an empty nest for long.
Lee, a 72-year-old retired schoolteacher, with the help of daughter Joanna Lee, posted an ad on Craigslist on Sunday night offering a spare room to NBA point guard Jeremy Lin, whom the Lakers acquired in a trade with the Houston Rockets earlier that day.
Although Lin will have to do his own laundry and pick up after himself, Lydia insists he won’t have to worry about much else.
“I’m a Chinese mom, he knows a Chinese household,” she said of why the point guard should move in with her and her husband. “I can take care of things. He’s a nice Christian boy, we’re a Christian home. We have a lot of things in common.”
When Joanna, 34, heard Lin was going to be a Laker, she knew her mother would be excited. She called her to ask if she had heard the news.
Of course she had.
As Lydia, a Lakers fan since the Showtime days of Magic Johnson, discussed why Lin would help the listless Lakers, who finished last in the Pacific Division last year, her mind started to drift to where the point guard would stay. She threw out the idea of renting the room to Lin as a joke, but quickly realized that there were plenty of perks in it for Lin: good food, a comfortable home near the beach and free rent.
Joanna listened on the phone from her home in Los Angeles, and posted the idea on Facebook, where her friends then encouraged her to put it on Craigslist for fun.
Although it started as a joke between mother and daughter, the Craigslist ad picked up steam and elicited dozens of responses, but none from Lin himself.
His lack of a response is somewhat a relief to Joanna, who would have had no way to compete with Lin for her mother’s affection.
“Oh my gosh,” Joanna said of the possibility of Lin living at her parents’ house, “that means that me and my sister are going to be my mom’s least favorite children.”
The room Lydia is offering is small — cozy, one could say — decorated with Lakers memorabilia: a three-peat pennant celebrating the 2000, 2001 and 2002 championships and a mug from 2010. The windowsill is lined with Lydia’s favorite bobbleheads, collected from weekly trips to Carl’s Jr. They’re lined up carefully, separated into purple jersey and gold jersey teams. She’s hoping she can add Lin’s bobblehead soon.
Lin’s 6-foot-3 frame may not fit the queen-size bed in the middle of the room, but she insists the memory foam mattress will be a comfortable place for Lin to rest after practices or games.
She’s also offering to chauffeur Lin to practice — after all she already knows the way.
When Lydia, who doesn’t quite hit 5 feet tall, taught second-graders in Redondo Beach, she had her students write letters to Shaquille O’Neal asking to join his official fan club. The class edited the letters and put them together so she could deliver them to the Lakers. She went to the team’s El Segundo practice facility, but couldn’t get buzzed in.
So Lydia, with her friendly smile, waited outside the gate, hoping someone would come by and she would be able to slip in behind them. But no one came.
After conceding to mail the package, she and her class received a response from the Lakers that included pencils, notes recognizing their official acceptance to the fan club and a personal note from O’Neal.
“My kids loved it,” Lydia said.
She’s confident Lin will have a similar relationship with the community.
He will be returning to his home state, having grown up in the Bay Area. After graduating from Harvard in 2010, the point guard went undrafted before turning into an international sensation with the New York Knicks in 2012 in the three-week supernova known as Linsanity.
Despite Lin’s popularity, the team chose not to match an offer from the Rockets that offseason when he became a restricted free agent.
Lin averaged 13 points and 5.2 assists per game in two seasons with Houston and lost his starting job to Patrick Beverley last year.
Lydia hopes Lin, after getting shipped out of Houston and spurned by New York, can find a happy home in Los Angeles, possibly under her roof.
“He deserves a good welcome,” she said. “I feel the other teams didn’t treat him well, I feel like he will love the Lakers. It’s a great time for him to be here. The team is rebuilding and he can be a part of the rebuilding.”
