As you know — or may not know — U.S. President Barack Obama is a Harvard graduate. As you almost certainly know, Jeremy Lin is also a Harvard graduate and has become kind of a big deal over the past month. Had the coaches and front office workers from the NBA consulted Obama a while back, Lin may not have been cut multiple times and come close to leaving the NBA for good. During his interview with Bill Simmons that aired Thursday, Obama said he had inside information on Lin a long time ago.
“I knew about Jeremy before you did or everybody else did because Arne Duncan, my Secretary of Education, was captain of the Harvard team,” Obama said jokingly. “So way back when, Arne and I were playing and he said, ‘I’m telling you, we’ve got this terrific guard named Jeremy Lin at Harvard.’ And then one of my best friends, his son is a freshman at Harvard, so when he went for a recruiting trip he saw Lin in action. So I’ve been on the Jeremy Lin bandwagon for a while.”
Obama, who is a Bulls fan, said he is not worried about the threat Lin poses to Chicago since they have a pretty good point guard themselves. Like everyone else, the President wonders how so many coaches and talent evaluators overlooked Lin.
“What interesting is that somehow folks were missing it in practice,” he continued. “That’s what’s interesting because you’ve got to assume that during scrimmages he was running that pick and roll pretty well.”
One would think so. Or, as many like to think, Lin is simply a product of Mike D’Antoni’s system. Whatever the case, he seems to be a pretty decent fit at Madison Square Garden.
