David Stern and Roger Federer join Linsanity fan club – NBA News
Linsanity no longer seems an exaggerated phenomenon and truly has turned endemic. The way Jeremy Lin’s popularity has sky-rocketed is very rare in the NBA and indeed in the sports world at large.
Commissioner of NBA for the last 28 years, David Stern, has also been enchanted by the charisma of Lin as well. David Stern is known to be diplomatic with regards to players, but this time he lavished the Sino-American athlete with acclamation.
Stern has seen the popularity of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson along with Kobe Bryant, LeBron James even Michael Jordan. The commissioner though considers the fanfare around those legends not up to the mark in contrast with Jeremy’s buzz in such short interval of time.
"I haven't done a computation, but it's fair to say that no player has created the interest and the frenzy in this short period of time, in any sport, that I'm aware of like Jeremy Lin has,"
To credit Lin’s ethnicity for his popularity will be fairly novel, impetus behind Jeremy’s success is his position as an underdog. Who would have imagined that an undrafted player can wreak havoc in the world of basketball?
He netted his highest, 38 points, against Los Angeles Lakers and recorded his career best 14 assists against the reigning NBA World Champions Dallas Mavericks in this season, while he is averaging 14.4 points per game and truly acting as the catalyst behind Knicks stupendous run since his emergence.
The astronomical boost in his fame started when he became the starting point guard for New York Knicks. Till this date the top five videos on NBA.com are of Lin’s; a testament to his unprecedented fame. That he has over 1 million followers on the Chinese networking site Sina, speaks volumes for his international appeal.
But such fame has its reverberations, and in his case it is in the form of sceptics.
He has recently been subjected to racial profiling. For instance, Floyd Mayweather antagonistically tweeted about Lin that the hype behind is fame has more to do with his ethnic connotations.
"Jeremy Lin is a good player but all the hype is because he's Asian, black players do what he does every night and don't get the same praise." Floyd said.
But on the other hand Linsanity has found its admirers beyond the world basket ball, as quiet recently tennis legend Roger Federer expressed his desire that his upcoming exhibition match against Andy Roddick at Madison Square Garden would be honoured by Lin’s appearance. He also credited Jeremy for Knicks’ success in such a surprising manner.
"I think this is why we all follow sports because of great stories like this, that all of a sudden someone breaks through that you didn't know or didn't expect and you didn't know the result was going to happen," Federer said.
With Lin’s popularity rising fast, there was significant pressure on the NBA to make him part of the All Star Weekend in Orlando, and after resisting at first, the NBA have now given the nod for him to play in the Rising Stars Challenge.
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