With his entrance into the NBA, Yao Ming ushered in an era of tremendous growth for the game of basketball primarily in China but also on the international stage as a whole. Hoisting the hopes and dreams of a country of 1.3 billion people proved to be as much of a physical impossibility as it was a mental and emotional strain. Eventually the great wall of Yao Ming's 7 foot 6 inch frame couldn't hold the weight and his feet crumbled like those statues of ancient Greece and Rome. And just as with the fall of Rome gave birth to a new era, we see a new hero rising from the ashes...the ashes of Harvard University?
Follow the Jeremy Lin timeline: He was the Northern California High School Player of the year in his senior season. He excelled in the Ivy League while playing the combo guard position at the MOST prestigious educational institution in the world, Harvard University. On draft night, even though he was the Ivy League player of the year after his senior year of college, Jeremy went undrafted and he began his career as an NBA journeyman. Cut by the Dallas Mavericks and then cut by his hometown Warriors, followed by being cut by the Houston Rockets, he is now playing in the Mecca of the world and the undisputed capital of basketball- New York City for the Knicks. From Palo Alto, to Boston, to Dallas to Oakland through Houston, Jeremy Lin now resides in the cathedral of hoops-Madison Square Garden.
Jeremy Lin may be what the sports marketing world has been looking for. He has mass crossover appeal, while appealing to the masses with his crossover.
Do you hear that? I just heard 1.3 billion people reaching for their pockets looking for money to purchase a Jeremy Lin #17 jersey.
"He has mass crossover appeal, while appealing to the masses with his crossover." boom. I heard that!
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ReplyDeletelove it!!
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