I woke up just after nine o’clock yesterday morning and turned my TV onto ESPN as any sports fan would. I tuned into Sportscenter, ESPN’s sports news and highlights program. I saw one of the anchors talking to Ric Bucher, an NBA reporter, about New York Knicks sensation Jeremy Lin. I watched for a couple of minutes before dozing off to sleep. I opened my eyes a few minutes later and saw a different anchor introduce a preview of a one-on-one interview with Lin. They played some of the conversation and I started to get annoyed. I wanted to hear about other players on other teams in other sports.
I was hearing endless talk about a guy who was starting his eighth game for a team that had a losing record for the season. His team lost to the New Orleans Hornets at home on Friday night. The Hornets have only nine wins this entire NBA season. It wasn’t making any sense. Why was this kid getting so much hype by ESPN? What was so special about New York?
They had 15 wins and 16 losses overall and were in 8th place in the Eastern Conference, the last playoff spot available. On Sunday, the Knicks were playing the defending NBA champion Dallas Mavericks. Dallas had a six-game winning streak and a 20-11 record for the season. The Mavericks seemed to play second fiddle in ESPN’s eyes. Dallas was mentioned only when the story turned to how they were going to defend Lin.
From 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. (tip time), ESPN’S Sportscenter turned into a four-hour pre-game show for the Mavericks vs. Knicks game. They showed a panel discussion with its NBA studio analysts reviewing Lin’s past success and predicting future situations. In addition, there was an on-court demonstration illustrating how to defend Lin, led by former defensive star now turned analyst Bruce Bowen. In fact, the network used one of its baseball reporters, Tim Kurkjian, as a double for Lin in the demo. On the left side of the screen, a list showing upcoming stories was displayed constantly which is normal for Sportscenter. However, the time-of-day clock was replaced by a timer counting down to the beginning of the Knicks-Mavericks game. There were numerous shots, too many to count, of Lin practicing before the game.
The game was televised by ABC, which along with by ESPN, is owned by Disney. ABC’s weekly NBA pre-game show, NBA Countdown, should have been titled “The Jeremy Lin Show”. The first five minutes included another discussion about Lin’s play and how will teams like Dallas defend him. At the end of the segment, host Michael Wilbon read an apology issued by ESPN over a headline for an ESPN.com story following Friday’s Knicks game. The story of the Knicks loss was head lined, “A Chink in the Armor”. The word “chink” is a used as a racial slur toward Asians. The editor was fired later in the day.
Seven minutes into the show, the league’s best team, the Miami Heat were mentioned in response to a Twitter question asking if were the team to beat in the NBA. Later, ABC switched to a live preview at Madison Square Garden with play-by-play announcer Mike Tirico. Tirico gave a quick summary of the two teams and then interviewed filmmaker and longtime Knicks fan Spike Lee.
At 12:50, twenty minutes into the thirty-minute program, The Dallas Mavericks were finally featured by themselves as the reigning champions and not Lin or the Knicks opponent. After about a minute of talking about last year’s Finals MVP Dirk Nowitzki, it was back to more shots of Lin. To provide one last insulting touch, the live player introductions of both teams were shown. Except for the NBA Finals, the live announcement of the starting lineups to the crowd are never shown. Usually, the play-by-play announcer will read over the starters to the TV audience long after they are told to the fans in the arena. ABC admit tingly told viewers they would show the player introductions live to show the crowd reaction for New York, especially Lin.
The game had not started, I had no rooting interest beforehand but wanted to root so badly for Dallas. As a fan of the NFL’s Washington Redskins whose biggest rival is the Dallas Cowboys, this was insane. However, that’s what Linsanity was doing. It wasn’t Lin or the Knicks fault. I actually enjoy watching Lin succeed when many people said he would not. I love that the Knicks, one of the NBA’s most historical franchises, are becoming a decent team after years of losing basketball. All I ask is to have this stuff jammed down my throat constantly.
The Dallas-New York game featured fantastic action, incredible unpredictability, terrific game strategy, and a great crowd atmosphere. Lin dribbled to the basket on many occasions where at least two Mavericks defenders stood there like 20-foot high trees hiding the basket. He did a much better job of passing to teammates for open shots. Through the first two quarters, he had six assists and only one turnover. Unfortunately, he had three turnovers in each of the two quarters. Lin made up for it by scoring 28 points and handing out a personal best 14 assists. Meanwhile, Nowitzki put in 34 points for the day showing his unique outside game to compliment his inside presence as a forward.
New York‘s bench, helped by newly-signed J.R. Smith scoring 15 points in his first game of the season and Steve Novak’s four 3-pointers and 14 points, played a huge role in why the Knicks snapped the Mavericks six-game winning streak. It was a great basketball game to watch. There was no need for extra hype just because of one player or one team. The New York Knicks are talked about more now because they have improved a lot in 2 weeks. Their new point guard Jeremy Lin is a big reason for their success. Yes, Lin played college hoops at Ivy-League Harvard even though he had big-time talent. Yes, he was undrafted, and is the first Taiwanese player in NBA history. Should he be treated by the media differently because he is Asian? The answer is no. Lin is one player on one of 30 National Basketball Association teams. The Knicks are the NBA’s representative in New York City and the state of New York. Sports media needs to implore equality by not reporting on certain players and their performances more often due to their race. Everybody is the same.
Showing posts with label Linsanity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Linsanity. Show all posts
Monday, February 20, 2012
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Linsanity
Who is Jeremy Lin and what is Linsanity? Well, Jeremy Lin is an undrafted point guard out of Harvard University who is now playing for the New York Knicks. Since he was inserted at point guard, the Knicks have won six straight games and have gone from a team floundering below .500 to a group one win away from an even win-loss record. A little over a week ago, that seemed impossible Lin was sitting on the bench earlier in the season hoping he could get a chance. With New York struggling for a decent point guard, Lin was picked by head coach Mike D’Antoni to play a bigger role. Lin had barely seen any action, playing less than ten minutes a night in 8 games and only 20 minutes in another contest against Houston. That changed on February 4th.
The Knicks were 8-15 and fans were yelling for D’Antoni’s firing as coach. In a home game versus New Jersey, Lin scored 25 points and dished out 7 assists in 36 minutes of action in a 99-92 victory. Two nights later on February 6th, D’Antoni moved Lin into the starting lineup against Utah. Lin played an astonishing 45 of 48 minutes in his start while scoring 28 points and handing out 8 assists. New York won their second straight game, 99-88. On Wednesday, February 8th, the Knicks travel to Washington, D.C. to face one of the NBA’s worst teams, the Wizards. With Kobe Bryant and the Lakers coming to New York on Friday, it looked like a potential letdown in Washington. However, Lin had his first career double-digit points and assists game in the NBA. The double-double included 23 points and 10 assists.
The Knicks had won three in a row with Lin as the point guard but they faced the L.A. Lakers. Comparisons were made between Lin and Lakers star Kobe Bryant. Bryant flashed out on the NBA scene as a high-school basketball whiz in 1996-97. The hype was incredible for a regular-season game featuring two teams with average records. The Knicks were 11-15 at this point while the Lakers were 15-11. The Lakers are a good but not an elite championship team. Nevertheless, with two of the Knicks starters out of the lineup in Carmelo Anthony and Amar’e Stoudemire, Los Angeles had an advantage. With his teammates struggling to score, Lin asserted himself more offensively. He collected 38 of New York’s 92 points in the game. Lin hit 13 of 23 field goal attempts and 10 of 13 free throws. The Knicks won again despite only having two players besides Lin score more than 10 points. New York had won four consecutive games with a two-game road trip coming up in Minnesota and Toronto.
In Minnesota, Lin had his worst game statically but his teammates stepped up instead. Steve Novak had 15 points including a three-point shot which tied the score at 98 with under a minute to go. Iman Shumpert pumped in 20 points while Landry Fields added 19 and Tyson Chandler pitched in with 12. Lin scored at least 20 points for the fifth straight game but shot an awful 8 for 24 including making only 1 of 13 attempts in the second half. He even missed the first of two free throws with five seconds left before making the second to give New York the lead.
Last night in Toronto, Lin again played reckless and out of control for most of the game. He committed a career-high eight turnovers while his team fell behind by 17 points. His opposing guard, Jose Calderon was lighting him up offensively and defensively. Calderon had 12 of his 25 points in the first quarter . Lin turned the ball over on three straight Knick possessions in the second.
After the third period and with the Knicks trailing by 9, D’Antoni switched defenders on Calderon selecting Iman Shumpert to guard him. Shumpert shut down Calderon allowing Lin, a weaker defender, to concentrate on offense. Shumpert stole the ball away from Calderon with the Raptors leading by 5 in the final two minutes and dunked at the other end to make it 87-84. The Raptors missed on their next possession thanks to a Tyson Chandler block. Lin led New York down the floor trailing by 3 points. He dribbled fearlessly into traffic, got fouled by Toronto big man Amir Johnson, and flipped the ball in while falling.
Like in Minnesota, Lin swished the free throw when he needed to tie the game. The Raptors again failed at getting a basket and the Knicks had the ball with 43 seconds left in regulation. Shumpert tried banking a shot off the rim as the 24 second shot clock ticked down. It clanged off the rim but Chandler grabbed the ball and passed back to Lin with 20 seconds. Lin held the ball twenty-five feet away from the basket as he setup the last shot. He started to dribbled forward while Calderon backed away fearing Lin would move past him. Instead he stopped and shot a long three-pointer over him and straight into the hoop with less than a second to go. Lin finished with 27 points and 11 assists and the Knicks continued their winning streak at six games.
The crowd in Toronto erupted like it was Madison Square Garden in New York City. The Raptors held a special Asian Heritage Night in honor of Lin, American-born but raised by Taiwanese parents. Thousands of Asian men and women screamed gleefully for one of their own excelling in a sport of basketball born in North America. Thousands of Knicks fans cheered back in New York as their team which looked down and out a week ago is now a contender for a playoff spot.
This is Linsanity, if that is an actual word. He was a high-school standout in Palo Alto, California near the University of Stanford. He was not offered a scholarship even though he was two-time Most Valuable Player in his school’s district league. He was named the scholar athlete of the year in Northern California and the player of the year by two local San Francisco newspapers. Somehow, he had to leave not only the Bay Area but the west coast to get noticed academically and athletically by Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts near Boston.
Lin scored 1,483 points in 4 years at Harvard ranking him fifth in school history. Lin was an all-around player with more than 450 rebounds, 406 assists, and 225 steals, a combination never achieved before in Ivy League play. No NBA team, including the Knicks, bothered to draft Lin out of college. The Dallas Mavericks signed him for five games of summer league action in 2010.. His hometown team, the Golden State Warriors, released him after 29 regular season games of limited playing time in 2010-11. Lin never gave up, got an opportunity, and proved that stereotypes are just labels and do not represent a whole group. Every person is unique and so is Jeremy Lin.
The Knicks were 8-15 and fans were yelling for D’Antoni’s firing as coach. In a home game versus New Jersey, Lin scored 25 points and dished out 7 assists in 36 minutes of action in a 99-92 victory. Two nights later on February 6th, D’Antoni moved Lin into the starting lineup against Utah. Lin played an astonishing 45 of 48 minutes in his start while scoring 28 points and handing out 8 assists. New York won their second straight game, 99-88. On Wednesday, February 8th, the Knicks travel to Washington, D.C. to face one of the NBA’s worst teams, the Wizards. With Kobe Bryant and the Lakers coming to New York on Friday, it looked like a potential letdown in Washington. However, Lin had his first career double-digit points and assists game in the NBA. The double-double included 23 points and 10 assists.
The Knicks had won three in a row with Lin as the point guard but they faced the L.A. Lakers. Comparisons were made between Lin and Lakers star Kobe Bryant. Bryant flashed out on the NBA scene as a high-school basketball whiz in 1996-97. The hype was incredible for a regular-season game featuring two teams with average records. The Knicks were 11-15 at this point while the Lakers were 15-11. The Lakers are a good but not an elite championship team. Nevertheless, with two of the Knicks starters out of the lineup in Carmelo Anthony and Amar’e Stoudemire, Los Angeles had an advantage. With his teammates struggling to score, Lin asserted himself more offensively. He collected 38 of New York’s 92 points in the game. Lin hit 13 of 23 field goal attempts and 10 of 13 free throws. The Knicks won again despite only having two players besides Lin score more than 10 points. New York had won four consecutive games with a two-game road trip coming up in Minnesota and Toronto.
In Minnesota, Lin had his worst game statically but his teammates stepped up instead. Steve Novak had 15 points including a three-point shot which tied the score at 98 with under a minute to go. Iman Shumpert pumped in 20 points while Landry Fields added 19 and Tyson Chandler pitched in with 12. Lin scored at least 20 points for the fifth straight game but shot an awful 8 for 24 including making only 1 of 13 attempts in the second half. He even missed the first of two free throws with five seconds left before making the second to give New York the lead.
Last night in Toronto, Lin again played reckless and out of control for most of the game. He committed a career-high eight turnovers while his team fell behind by 17 points. His opposing guard, Jose Calderon was lighting him up offensively and defensively. Calderon had 12 of his 25 points in the first quarter . Lin turned the ball over on three straight Knick possessions in the second.
After the third period and with the Knicks trailing by 9, D’Antoni switched defenders on Calderon selecting Iman Shumpert to guard him. Shumpert shut down Calderon allowing Lin, a weaker defender, to concentrate on offense. Shumpert stole the ball away from Calderon with the Raptors leading by 5 in the final two minutes and dunked at the other end to make it 87-84. The Raptors missed on their next possession thanks to a Tyson Chandler block. Lin led New York down the floor trailing by 3 points. He dribbled fearlessly into traffic, got fouled by Toronto big man Amir Johnson, and flipped the ball in while falling.
Like in Minnesota, Lin swished the free throw when he needed to tie the game. The Raptors again failed at getting a basket and the Knicks had the ball with 43 seconds left in regulation. Shumpert tried banking a shot off the rim as the 24 second shot clock ticked down. It clanged off the rim but Chandler grabbed the ball and passed back to Lin with 20 seconds. Lin held the ball twenty-five feet away from the basket as he setup the last shot. He started to dribbled forward while Calderon backed away fearing Lin would move past him. Instead he stopped and shot a long three-pointer over him and straight into the hoop with less than a second to go. Lin finished with 27 points and 11 assists and the Knicks continued their winning streak at six games.
The crowd in Toronto erupted like it was Madison Square Garden in New York City. The Raptors held a special Asian Heritage Night in honor of Lin, American-born but raised by Taiwanese parents. Thousands of Asian men and women screamed gleefully for one of their own excelling in a sport of basketball born in North America. Thousands of Knicks fans cheered back in New York as their team which looked down and out a week ago is now a contender for a playoff spot.
This is Linsanity, if that is an actual word. He was a high-school standout in Palo Alto, California near the University of Stanford. He was not offered a scholarship even though he was two-time Most Valuable Player in his school’s district league. He was named the scholar athlete of the year in Northern California and the player of the year by two local San Francisco newspapers. Somehow, he had to leave not only the Bay Area but the west coast to get noticed academically and athletically by Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts near Boston.
Lin scored 1,483 points in 4 years at Harvard ranking him fifth in school history. Lin was an all-around player with more than 450 rebounds, 406 assists, and 225 steals, a combination never achieved before in Ivy League play. No NBA team, including the Knicks, bothered to draft Lin out of college. The Dallas Mavericks signed him for five games of summer league action in 2010.. His hometown team, the Golden State Warriors, released him after 29 regular season games of limited playing time in 2010-11. Lin never gave up, got an opportunity, and proved that stereotypes are just labels and do not represent a whole group. Every person is unique and so is Jeremy Lin.
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