While the NBA season started late, I still haven't seen a single game. I've only peripherally been aware of the Knicks' sudden improvement due to the addition to their starting roster of a Chinese American player named Jeremy Lin. They had had a mediocre season, losing more than they won, and suddenly added Lin to the roster and they've won four of four. Lin's 6'3" and only 200 lbs. I heard an interview with him on NPR this morning where he stated that he was not a freakishly good athlete, but was clever in reading defenses and setting up teammates with good passing. He's also not good in one-on-one. He's a team player. The Knicks beat the LA Lakers last night with 38 points from Lin. That's a pretty impressive number. We haven't had anyone on the Knicks score that many points since the old days of Patrick Ewing.
How will Spike Lee react to this new addition to the Knicks?
Does he consider it to be the right thing for the team?
Lin grew up in Palo Alto and led his high school team to an all-California championship, then played at Harvard and was a bench-sitter for the Golden State Warriors until about a month ago. When he was picked up by the Knicks he didn't expect to make the team permanently and has been sleeping on his brother's couch. He got his chance with the Knicks last week after they played another listless game, and suddenly they began to hit hoops and win.
But there's yet another anomaly about Lin: he's Christian!
According to Wikipedia:
"Lin grew up in a devout Christian family and would one day like to be a pastor who can head up non-profit organizations, either home or abroad.[105][38][106] He has also talked of working in inner-city communities to help with underprivileged children.[91]"
I think we should all pray for him.
7 comments:
Kirby,
I thought you'd enjoy this:
FiveThirtyEight: Jeremy Lin is no Fluke.
But I think you're overplaying the Christian angle. There are plenty of Christians in sports, and it's not uncommon to hear of athletes who aspire to the ministry after their career.
Stu, do you think it is valid to pray for a Christian sports star, or for a team that is primarily Christian, and ask God to help them to succeed? If so, what do you think should be the content of the prayer. If not, why not?
Do you think we should also be able to pray against players such as Tiger whom we deem sinful and who we do not wish to become role models for American children?
Is it permissable to ask God to help Tiger miss a putt, or to help Jeremy make a clutch foul shot?
Is there such a thing as asking too much, and can you wear out yoiur welcome with God by asking for things that seem not overall to be terribly important?
Kirby,
Good questions.
do you think it is valid to pray for a Christian sports star, or for a team that is primarily Christian, and ask God to help them to succeed
I think it's valid to pray for anyone. As for asking God to help them succeed, that's not something I'd do. I would ask that they provide a Christian witness. For me, the issue is that "prosperity Christianity," as practiced by many a televangelist, is sinful. A Christian faith will make a person's life more meaningful and more fulfilling, but this is entirely distinct from common human notions of success like wealth or acclaim, and conflating them is a dangerous misconception, and leads people astray by causing them to aspire to wealth rather than virtue.
Do you think we should also be able to pray against players such as Tiger whom we deem sinful and who we do not wish to become role models for American children?
I think we should pray for Tiger, that he repent from his sins, and that he restore (as best as he is able) what his sinfulness has damaged. It is immaterial whether he is lead to redemption by success or by failure, so long as he is redeemed. Tiger is, of course, a deeply ambiguous character. His hard work and dedication to his sport are worthy of emulation; whereas his lack of faithfulness should be condemned, and its adverse consequences for him should be explained. I think we do well to present people as they truly are, and not as false heros or villians.
Is it permissable to ask God to help Tiger miss a putt, or to help Jeremy make a clutch foul shot?
Permissible? Of course. I'm not the censor of what constitutes appropriate prayer. But I don't think it has any utility, because I don't see this as the kind of petition that God is likely to grant.
Is there such a thing as asking too much, and can you wear out yoiur welcome with God by asking for things that seem not overall to be terribly important?
I don't know. But my intuition is no. God loves us enough not to hold our nagging against us.
Heard that Whitney Houston died today, but no details yet about where or how or why. Most of her early recordings were about her faith in God and her belief that a higher power would protect her from the hazards of life in the spotlight. I think she married Bobby Brown thinking she could reform him.
don't pray for professional athletes
it will only encourage them
i cannot abide anything beyond
intramurals
frisbee
hackysack
now there's some sport
marbles
hopscotch
pray for those people
that they can arise to the ranks of cultural importance
as they should
tiddlywinks
jh
Bobby Brown ruined her life, some have said. And introduced her to drugs, which we will probably hear shortly is what killed her. I have only heard of her peripherally. For whatever reason I don't follow the musical sensations as well as I might. I saw Stephen Tyler on the Ophrah Winfrey Network about a week ago and had to google to see who he was. He was the land singer for a band called Aerosmith. I'd heard of them, but couldn't name a particular song they had sung. He said he smashed his feet against the stage so often he lost the nerves in his feet and had to have surgery done, which meant he got heavily back into drugs. I watched a fifteen second clip of him singing. In general, I'm not a big fan of singers.
I did attend an opera once. It was the best sleep I've ever had.
I do like it when frogs sing, or crickets sing, or when horses neigh, or cows moo. But basically I think people should write, not sing.
Finally got around to reading Stu's initial 538 link. Ok, many people think Lin is for real including Magic Johnson.
My question about him is whether he comes out of another whole universe of play such that he has moves and ideas that the NBA hasn't seen yet, and which once they catch up to them, whether he will revert to the mean, as it's put.
Remember that at first America and Britain didn't have an answer for the Japanese Zero. It was lighter and faster than our own planes. But it became clear that it couldn't dive as steeply after they found one that had gone down and rebuilt it. They also discovered that the reason for its speed is that it had almost no armor plating.
Lin has exploded out of nowhere with very little espionage having been done on him. But I think his game will be analyzed and teams will learn to double-team him or whatever it takes to slow him down. It may be that Lin's cleverness will then simply take him up one more notch and he will again adjust.
Meanwhile, he has some gooey stuff that hangs off his chin. What is that? I think it's gross.
It's like some kind of liquid rubber, maybe to keep his chin from getting cut with elbows?
When Carmello Anthony came into the Knicks they took off for about ten games, but then the other teams began to adjust and he's reverted to the mean. Stoudemire has back problems and in clutch games he gets overstressed and it acts up.
It's hard to know how long the Lin phenomenon will last. It would be cool if he were to lead the Knicks into the championships. He seems to get the other players into the groove. He's been compared to Steve Nash. Nash has never won a championship, but he's a lot of fun to watch.
Iverson was about the same size as Lin, and probably more athletic.
What might make the difference is that Lin appears to have a brain. I don't think Iverson had a brain.
Brains make a big difference in almost every sphere.
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