Jeremy Lin is ready to let the final buzzer sound on a remarkable 15-year basketball career that captured headlines across the globe and for a few weeks in 2012 made New York City the epicenter of the basketball universe.
The NBA icon announced his retirement in an Instagram post Saturday, writing that although he knew the end would come, it was the “hardest decision I’ve ever made.”
“It’s been the honor of a lifetime to compete against the fiercest competitors under the brightest lights and to challenge what the world thought was possible for someone who looks like me,” Lin, 37, wrote. “I’ve lived out my wildest childhood dreams to play in front of fans all around the world. I will forever be the kid who felt fully alive every time I touched a basketball.”
Lin’s career caught fire when he led the New York Knicks to a seven-game winning streak in 2012, his first year as a point guard in the team’s starting lineup. “Linsanity” overtook the Big Apple as his performance propelled the Knicks to the 2012 playoffs and turned him into an international phenomenon.
In the wake of his breakout stardom, Lin, then 23, appeared on the covers of Sports Illustrated (for two consecutive weeks) and Time magazine, which named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world.
“He’s dispelled the idea that Asian-American guards somehow couldn’t hack it in the NBA — and that being a world-class athlete on the court is somehow at odds with being an excellent student off the court,” Time wrote of his success.
Lin defied stereotypes as the first person of Chinese or Taiwanese descent to make it to the NBA. By the time he graduated from Harvard University in 2010, the Taiwanese American athlete had become the first player in Ivy League history to record at least 1,450 points throughout his college career.
After graduation, Lin was passed over for the NBA draft in 2010 before signing with his hometown Golden State Warriors as a free agent. After being cut by both the Warriors and the Houston Rockets in 2011, Lin signed with the Knicks at the end of the year.
For the first few weeks of 2012, Lin spent most of his games warming the bench. It wasn’t until February that he was given a chance on the court to turn around an abysmal season for the team.
At the height of his “Linsanity” run, he stoked even more audience fervor when he hit a winning 3-pointer against the Toronto Raptors with less than a second left on the clock. Lin also became the first NBA player to score at least 20 points and dole out seven assists in each of his first five starts.
Lin continued his NBA career with stints on the Rockets, the Los Angeles Lakers and the Raptors, among others. While with the Raptors in 2019, he became the first Asian American player to win an NBA championship.
He later took his basketball career across the Pacific to China’s Beijing Ducks and Guangzhou Loong Lions, as well as Taiwan’s Kaohsiung Steelers and New Taipei Kings, where he ended his career this year as MVP of the Taiwan Professional Basketball League.
“So many people have sacrificed and poured into my journey, more than I could ever repay. Thank you all for believing in me, for walking with me, for celebrating my highs and picking me up in my lows,” Lin wrote in his retirement post. “This is a ride I never wanted to end but I know it’s time. I will forever miss playing basketball in front of you all but our time will go beyond just playing. Here’s to what’s ahead.”
