Cravin’ Asian!!!

Remember when Yao Ming was the biggest story in the NBA? And when I say biggest, I literally mean tallest man in the NBA… At 7 ft. 6 in. this Asian sensation towered over the average Chinese man by over two feet. But whose talking about Yao Ming anymore, there’s a new sensation. Jeremy Lin.

However there’s a little something different than Ming and Lin besides their family heritage both descending from China. Lin is the first Asian AMERICAN to play in the NBA, not to mention a whole one foot three inches shorter than Ming. But if there was ever someone to root for in the NBA its Lin. Besides being the first Asian American in the NBA, he is also a scholarshipped Harvard graduate who went undrafted to the Golden State Warriors and is now dropping 38 over Kobe and the rest of the Lakers with the Knicks.

Recently in a Cross-Cultural Journalism class we discussed the lack of recognition different races get on television, and you know who had zero 0%… Asian Americans. So in the recent Knicks victory over LA, Jeremy Lin began to trend. Yu Darvish also began to trend when the Rangers picked him up for $112 million. But they’re never in the news or on TV right???

I suppose in the past month or so Asian Americans have seemed to have a very dominant presence, at least on ESPN. Lin is averaging 25 points per game and Darvish just signed a 6 year $60 million contract. So maybe their race isn’t on the news 24/7 or headlining the New York Times, but Sports Center is raving about these athletes from the East. Whether or not America is ready for it, Kobe sure wasn’t, Darvish, Lin and similar players are taking all sports by storm, and it just might be a tsunami.