Linsanity Good For the NBA And All of the Sports World

Jeremy Lin Is A Sensation For More than Knicks Fans

There’s “Look at Me” Lebron, non-mellow Melo, and a guy who calls himself Metta World Peace.

Somebody needed to rescue the NBA.

And it has come from the most unlikely of sources, a guy who bounced around teams like a basketball before coming off the bench and becoming an instant sensation for the New York Knicks. A guy from Harvard, of all places.

Thank you Jeremy Lin.

This great thing Lin has created, called Linsanity, is good for the game. But it’s also a positive for the entire sports world, for Lin is exciting as well as inspiring. Yet he’s also as unassuming as a beach bum.

‘It’s not because of me,” he said after a hitting a game-winning shot with less than a second remaining to beat Toronto, three of his 27 points. “We’re coming together as a team.”

The are coming together as a team because of Lin.

He doesn’t complain, whine that he doesn’t get the ball enough or get paid enough.  He’s not covered in tattoos – Matt Barnes of the Lakers is so plastered with them you have to turn your head from the TV when he’s shown – and is as modest as a monk.

The fact that he came from practically nowhere and managed to emerge as a total unknown only adds to his aura.  He’s no highly-recruited high school prospect who did the college “one and done” thing and was not raided early out of school by salivating NBA teams. Instead, he was handed over from team to team as if he were a piece of scrap paper until landing smack in the world’s largest media market.

In other words, he’s just what the sports world needs today.

Look at what’s going on around you these days. Athletes are using Twitter as a personal platform to bring attention to themselves. Touchdowns in the NFL have become less of something to celebrate as a team, but as stage for the player to use as if he’s in a one-act play. A second-rate NFL receiver, Roddy White (see if you recognize that name in a year or two; heck, do you even know it now?), criticizes the salary of NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.

We’re about to head into baseball’s Spring Training. Just see how many players fail to report on time.

Lin is a breath of fresh air, one unpolluted by the theatrics of modern sports. All his drama is on the court rather than off of it. And fans are taking to him as a result, almost if he’s some kind of moral sports savior. That’s why he’s more than just an Asian sensation; he’s capturing fans everywhere.

Blake Griffin and Lob City gave the NBA a good shot in the arm – and Griffin’s low-key, shy personality makes him much more likeable than the attention-seeking LeBron – but Lin is a sensation.

Lin’s success is a better story than “Rudy” because the guy can actually play.

Linsanity, indeed.