Remembering Linsanity

A decade ago, an undrafted New York Knicks point guard named Jeremy Lin was two weeks into a surprising run as one of the NBA’s biggest stars. On February 19, 2012, he dropped 28 points in a victory over the Dallas Mavericks, recording a career-high 14 assists. That game would be one of the last standout performances of the period known as Linsanity, which made Lin an Asian American icon. Although Lin was reluctant to dwell on the sensation he’d caused in the immediate aftermath of his breakout, he has since opened up about the experience and embraced the power of his platform. In the following exclusive, illustrated excerpt from the upcoming book RISE: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now, Lin recounts the challenges and prejudices he faced on his path to the NBA and reflects on Linsanity’s legacy.

From the book RISE. Copyright (c) 2022 by Jeff Yang, Phil Yu, and Philip Wang. To be published on March 1, 2022, by Mariner, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. Reprinted by permission.