h/t @warriorsworld and @poormanscommish

Editor’s Note: Joseph Horner weighs in on the Jeremy Lin phenomenon.

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When someone becomes famous, many people turn to stereotypes to explain the success. When Asian American Harvard graduates become professional basketball players, it makes some people’s brains explode. Jeremy Lin’s recent wild success in the New York spotlight is giving the rest of us an opportunity to explore what it means to be Asian in America.

Basketball has always been a landmine of racial stereotypes. “Oh, he’s fast because…” or “Really, it’s easy for her because…” You know the drill. It’s just easier to think this ‘race’ or that ‘family’ is naturally gifted in some way. A person may be elite, but simple explanations creep into our thoughts and words about how God, or fate, or genetics, or whatever already dealt that person a good hand. The person may play their hand well, but they were dealt a flippin’ good hand (excuse my Utah talk).

Since games are played on the court and not in a laboratory, basketball offers the opportunity for individuals to find meaning in the strengths and weaknesses of their culture as their representatives compete. James Naismith’s ideas of Muscular Christianity still contribute to the Myth of the Scrappy White Guy. The great minds at Freedarko have dissected the Jewish relationship to the game.

I’m Asian American — born that way, as a matter of fact. Half so: My mother (full-blooded mainland Chinese) and father (Idahoan) met at Idaho State University in Pocatello, Idaho back when it was kind of uncool to do the cross–culture marriage thing. My mother’s father disowned them when they got married, while my father’s dad was slightly more kind — offering up a not-so-subtle “Why can’t you just find a white girl to marry?” I don’t blame them, 30+ years later. It was the times, it was somewhat-rural Idaho. That’s just how things were. It’s human nature to embrace stereotypes when you really just don’t know.

Here’s the rub though. Both my parents were raised in Idaho, both spoke fluent English, both are as American as apple pie and sweet and sour chicken (Chinese – not really, Delicious – yes). Consequentially, so was I. White-bread former NBA player Joe Alexander knows more Chinese than Chinese-American Joseph Horner (me).

That being said, despite being one of the few people with some Asian blood in my elementary school, I never felt stereotyped growing up — other than a few hopeful “Can you teach me Karate?” pleas from fellow 10 year-old schoolmates.

That all changed in high school math class. You see, I was a good student. I was expected to be a good student, and I was especially expected to be good at math. Somehow the “Asians-rock-at-math” stereotype made its way to rural Idaho. Blame it on whatever you want: media portrayals, whiz kids on TV, or even ancestors counting rice patties (see Gladwell, Malcolm), the stereotype existed.

Unfortunately, “You’re good at math” is the opposite of “You’re good at sports.” I wasn’t. I tried, but my lanky 6’3″ not-so-Chinese frame just could never get the coordination down. I played for fun but never at a competitive level of any sort. The equation of “Tall + Asian” must have caused some kind of stereotype inter-brain explosion for the residents of my town.

Growing up, I never saw any Asian Americans contributing in major professional sports. This was especially true of my beloved NBA and the Stockton-to-Malone Jazz. Stereotype or not, this was a fact. I have to admit, never seeing examples of athletic success made it hard to believe it was possible at times. Consequentially, I choose the other way. While I never blamed my lack of athletic skill on my heritage, I’m fully ready to blame my academic success on it. In a related note, I’m now working on a PhD.

What does this have to do with Jeremy Lin? He’s the second Asian American to play in the NBA (after Ogden’s own Wat Misaka). Is he over-hyped in typical NY fashion after a few games? Yeah, but I don’t care. I believe in everyone there is part of you that wants to see someone, somewhere, somewhat like you succeed in something that you can’t. There is a part of you that wants to know it can be done, that those stereotypes aren’t true. I, like all others of the “knowledge is power” generation grew up believing that with a little college and a lot of work I could do anything. But part of me never really believed that applied to sports. So, thanks Jeremy Lin. Thanks for showing me it can be done.

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Joseph Horner is a Chinese-Caucasian clinical psychology grad student and Utah Jazz fan from Idaho. No, really. Follow him here: @josephhorner

h/t twitter.com/anthonyalsop

Copyright 2012 NBAE (Photo by Steven Freeman/NBAE via Getty Images)

Grades by Jackson Rudd

First of all, our heartfelt condolences to Amare Stoudemire, who was away from the team grieving the death of his brother.

On the basketball court, it was a very frustrating game to watch. Once again unknown bench players had career games. This time it was Jeremy Lin and Steve Novak. Still, the Jazz only one more guy needed to step up and they would have been right back in the thick of things. Raja had his moment, but beyond that, no one was capable of carrying the team for a little run. Usually that would have been Earl Watson or Paul Millsap, but Earl’s ankle was obviously giving him problems and Paul Millsap was struggling through double teams all night.

It’s probably no surprise that the Jazz played poorly in New York. I’m sure everybody got invites to big Super Bowl parties plus the Ewing Theory was in full effect with the absence of Amare and the early exit of Carmelo Anthony.

Utah Jazz

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Final Recap | Box Score

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New York Knicks

	Paul Millsap, PF 29 MIN | 3-10 FG | 3-4 FT | 13 REB | 1 AST | 9 PTS | 0 Paul was getting a lot of respect from the Knicks, who had obviously made him first priority when prepping to defend the Jazz, but he didn’t offer much in the way of retaliation. Even with his bounty of offensive rebounds, he wasn’t able to convert and coughed up the ball down low several times. Committing five turnovers, shooting 30% from the field and fouling out is not exactly the kind of game we want NBA coaches to be looking at when they pick the All-Star reserves.
	Gordon Hayward, SG 34 MIN | 6-11 FG | 2-3 FT | 4 REB | 4 AST | 14 PTS | 0 His line (14-4-4) was pretty solid but he could have been a difference-maker defensively and missed a couple of closeouts on Steve Novak’s barrage of 3-pointers that led to very unneeded losses of momentum. He was in active mode, though, and that’s a good sign. It’s easy to tell when Hayward is feeling good because of the way he moves without the ball.
	Al Jefferson, C 36 MIN | 9-20 FG | 4-4 FT | 4 REB | 3 AST | 22 PTS | +7 This was such a classic good stats/bad team game from Big Al. 22 points on 20 shots, no paint presence on defense, and not a lot of hustle on the boards. Still good to see him passing relatively well, but in games like this he doesn’t actually stimulate the offense. He just relieves it for stretches of isolated post moves.
	Raja Bell, SG 33 MIN | 4-7 FG | 5-5 FT | 4 REB | 0 AST | 15 PTS | +2 Raja provided efficient scoring, was responsible for none of the 20 Jazz turnovers, and hit back-to-back threes toward the end of the 3rd quarter to give the Jazz their best shot of the night. The game could have taken a much different turn if he was able to get the ball earlier in transition to get a chance at another 3 after he had made the previous two.
	Devin Harris, PG 30 MIN | 4-6 FG | 1-3 FT | 3 REB | 4 AST | 9 PTS | 0 4 for 6 shooting is nice, but the Jazz really need more than 4 assists against 3 turnovers to get the half court sets heading in the right direction. It’s good to see that he is being so careful with his shot selection, but you can’t overstate what a big factor confidence (or lack thereof) is with him right now. After watching him hesitate for two full seconds before taking an open 3, it’s impossible to describe Harris’ current playing style without using the term ‘hesitance’ frequently.
	Earl Watson, PG 18 MIN | 0-4 FG | 0-0 FT | 1 REB | 0 AST | 0 PTS | -11 No points and no assists? I thought that strange ankle laser solved all of his problems? Kevin O’Connor to-do list: hire that LA doctor to make a portable variation Earl could use before each game. This was not the Earl Watson Jazz fans have been going crazy about.
	Josh Howard, SF 15 MIN | 1-4 FG | 0-0 FT | 3 REB | 1 AST | 2 PTS | -13 It’s difficult to imagine someone approaching NBA games with more casualness than Josh Howard. When he is playing well, his laid-back playing style comes across as endearing, but when he’s dribbling off his own foot and taking 20-footers with 16 seconds left on the shot clock, it’s significantly less so.
	C.J. Miles, SF 14 MIN | 3-6 FG | 3-4 FT | 0 REB | 3 AST | 9 PTS | -11 He made some impressive shots, but his shot selection was such that most of his shots would have had to be impressive to get in the hole. While no one on the Jazz is about to get high marks for defense after letting Jeremy Lin and Steve Novak (who are not the co-founders of a software company, as their names might suggest) put up 47 points from the field on 17-27 shooting, C.J still doesn’t seem to have any consistent feel for how refs call the game at the NBA level even in his 6th season.
	Derrick Favors, FC 19 MIN | 3-8 FG | 2-3 FT | 3 REB | 1 AST | 8 PTS | -11 As David Locke noted, Favors was struggling to score over 6’5″ and 6’6″ defenders. It didn’t help that he was settling for 10-footers instead of going to his increasingly effective post-move repertoire.
	Enes Kanter, F 12 MIN | 0-0 FG | 0-0 FT | 1 REB | 0 AST | 0 PTS | -18 Possibly the worst game of his young career. Maybe it was the lights in New York, maybe he came down with something viral, or maybe it just wasn’t his day. Narrowly avoids the dreaded F by keeping it together with some decent help-side defense.