I would. It happens in every realm where human assessment is required. I've seen it in companies, where women and minorities get overlooked despite their superior talent and work ethic. I've seen it in the class room, where professors subtly undercut some students versus others. I've even seen it from parents, who can't even see the talent and potential of their own children. Scouts are Human. They have the same subconscious biases and preconceptions as everyone else. There's an old saying, if it doesn't *look* like what you expect, you're more likely to disbelieve it's true or possible. Even when it is. Expecting logical consistency from Human beings just sets yourself up for disappointment.
Personally, I've found most of the Asian businessmen the easiest to deal with. Straight forward and to the point. Obviously, we all work in different fields but I would likely to be hard pressed to find 5 people to agree with that stereotype (even though it obviously is prevelant due to reading a few articles). Women are a different ball game. Most "old school" people aren't going to defer to a woman and consequently a lot of them try too hard to compensate for that. Not sure I see that changing in the near future either. There's a lot of "sad but true" comments that I would have preferred not to nod my head in agreement with. Back to the NBA discussion, I can't see how every scout would be operating with a preconceived notion. Even if you go at 50% everyone technically missed on Lin. Even Najera got drafted and it's not like there probably wasn't a similar bias. Yao and Yi were lottery picks (one obviously deserving and one obviously not)
The guy's talking about who's playing the 1 role. Which on the Rockets is everyone and their mom Harden handles the ball more than Lin, has more TO's, and a lower A/TO ratio. But it's fine because his efficiency is sky high. You want to see a good comparison this season, compare Harden-Lin to Kobe-Nash. Both play the 2 as primary ball handler, leading the league in TO's but also leading the league in efficiency. Both have the 1 playing out of position half the time with crappy usage rates, yet they still manage a respectable efficiency rating.
Here's one truth~ His shooting's getting much better. This warm-up vid is just an example of how much smoother his shot got over the course of the season. I don't think he missed one! (You can't really see his first few shots, but the form is smooth. His last shots, money.) <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/a0ge0lonH8c" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
It's nice to see him hitting nothing but net and the arc is pretty compact. But practice and game time are 2 totally different thing. Apparently Dwight Howard shoots 80% FTs in practice.
How many times have commentators (who are basically play similar roles as scouts) say that Lin is "deceptively strong" and "deceptively quick"? We've heard it so much that it's practically a meme now. Lin is bigger (both in height and weight) than most NBA point guards, so how is he "deceptively strong"? When something as objective as size is vulnerable to perception biases, how easy do you think it'd be for someone to project their preconceived notions on much more subjective areas, such as talent? NBA scouts get it wrong all the time. If they didn't, then we wouldn't have infamous cases like those of Darko Milicic or Kwame Brown or Darius Miles or Joe Smith. I'm not quite sure where you're deriving your faith in scouts from.
Hasn't Lin been a very decent 3pt shooter excluding November? It seems like in most games, Lin will make about half of his 3pt attempts.
Preconceived notions are deeper running and more prevalent than you would think. As for undrafted players.... here's a nice little list from Sport Illustrated (including Jeremy Lin). Any names seem familiar? http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/mu...202/nba-best-undrafted-players/content.1.html Scouts miss players. They probably miss them as often as they miss when they do top picks. While very good players going undrafted is statistically going to be rare, the number of players that would have ended up being solid rotational players or even near all star players is probably significantly larger than we know. The difference is, everyone SEES when they blow a top 10 pick, but you rarely ever see the good ones that slip through the cracks. And the reason is simple... they never got the chance. Sad to say, but never underestimate the human capacity to make poor decisions, by themselves and especially as a group. That doesn't mean there weren't scouts that thought Lin could be good... however, how many would stick their necks out on that bet? Going against the grain in the face of peer pressure is more rare than we would hope.
he has been better as the season went on. he needs to improve his shot to the point where he is a 3pt threat. if lowry can do it, lin can too. our offense would be soo much better if he improves his 3pt shot
Exactly. And let's not forget that had it not been for a series of rather miraculous accidents, Lin never would've had a chance to play meaningful minutes for the Knicks. It's kind of disheartening to think of how many Lins are out there in the world who will never get a fair chance. Instead, the same untalented and unremarkable people are given the fast-track to success due to nepotism or being of the same race/gender as those in power.
This is from Sports Illustrated, Feb. 1, 2010 interview, http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1165302/1/index.htm. As a 6'1" senior, Lin led Palo Alto to the state Division II championship, shocking nationally ranked Mater Dei and showing flashes of the primary strengths of his game: fearlessness in the paint, unselfishness in the open floor (he takes only 19.7% of Harvard's shots) and an overhead, catapultlike jumper that is lethal from inside the arc (61.3% this season). The Kansases and Kentuckys, however, didn't exactly knock down Lin's door. He sent his CV (4.2 GPA, perfect score on his SAT II Math 2C in the ninth grade) and a DVD of highlights—edited by a friend of a friend from church—to all eight Ivies, Stanford, Cal and his dream school, UCLA. Only four schools responded. Out of the Pac-10, Lin recalls, UCLA "wasn't interested," Stanford was "fake interested," and during a visit to Cal a staffer "called me 'Ron.'"
I'm sure Lin wasn't picked because he was Asian but you do understand that every white player goes thru the same thing in the game of basketball.
Lin has been improving his in game jumpers, catch-n-shoot and 3 pointers... how is that not translating to in-game when the numbers show that he is.....
Maybe on a playground in the hood But in college/pro ball white players seem fine to me. I mean you guys get drafted all the time, make the HOF, run the league, and the NBA logo = Jerry West. I don't see how you're being overlooked
He probably forgot about this guy. <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/cqX_b_Bu4hI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
