CHINA WINS IN MANUFACTURING–NOW IT WINS IN BASKETBALL!
JEREMY LIN
CHINA LEADS THE WORLD IN MANUFACTURING
AND NOW—IN BASKETBALL!
Jeremy Lin, Harvard Graduate, shows the world
that brainy people can shoot the hoop
by
Sanford Pinna, M.D.
Copyright 2012
When I was growing up in Cleveland, Ohio, I tried
every sport that existed.
I managed well in tennis, running and boxing.
But when it came to American Football and American
Basketball, I was an abject failure.
Cleveland, Ohio, at that time was a mixture of
European-Americans, commonly called “Whites,”
although our skin and hair colored varied from that of
the darker hues of the Italian South to the light blonds
of Norway and Sweden.
In contrast, the other part of Cleveland society
consisted of the “Blacks” or African-Americans, whose
skin color ranged from almost “white” to very dark
brown.
In terms of sports, all boys knew where they stood
in the hierarchy of excellence.
Blacks were unsurpassed in the short distance
runs, called the “Dashes.”
I would watch them with wonder running the fifty
yard or hundred yard dash, with their legs pumping so
fast the legs looked like a blur of a bird fluttering its
wings. The noise of their feet hitting the hard surface
of the track reminded me of a jack-hammer cutting concrete.
After seeing this, I decided on the one mile and two
mile runs.
In football, I tried out for the “back field” whose members
were called “Quarter-Back” or “Half-Back.”
There were too many whites trying out for these
positions. The coach decided to weed them out.
“O.K. “Heroes!”, he said sarcastically to us.
“Let’s see what you’re made of.”
He lined up twenty guards and tackles. Ten men
in two rows facing each other. They were all six feet
or taller and they all weighed over two hundred pounds.
They were solid muscle and had many years of experience
taking down small fast runners.
Our job was to run between them. The coach would
call a number and the tackle or guard with that number
would tackle you.
They gave me a football which I tucked under
my right arm.
“O.K. Pinna GO!”
I ran. A number was called. Something that felt
like a fast moving truck hit me on the upper body. I
found myself in the dirt spitting out blood.
I got up and ran again.
Another truck hit me. I spat more blood.
But, I got mad and determined,.
I got up and ran. Truck after truck hit me.
At the end I turned and looked at the two
lines. All the men were grinning.
The coach said:
“Not bad, Pinna. I’ll think about it.”
Instead, I thought about it.
“This is bull shit!” I said to myself. “I’m not an
animal.”
I went to the coach.
“I’m sorry Coach. I don’t think I could help the team.
My heart says: No!”
The Coach was an experienced man.
“O.K. Pinna. Tough call. But go with your guts.”
Then it came time for basketball.
All the boys in Cleveland knew the “Blacks”
were the best in basketball.
They were, on the average, a foot taller.
But, most importantly, they could Jump!
To emphasize this, a producer in Hollywood
came out with a movie in the 1990’s whose title
was “White Men Can’t Jump!”
Subsequently, after I became a doctor, I learned
why this was a very true fact of physiology.
In the voluntary muscles of the body, those of our
arms and legs, there are two types of muscle fibers:
Fast Twitch Fibers and Slow Twitch Fibers.
Africans have evolved with more Fast Twitch
Muscle Fibers.
However, there are many parts of Africa. In
East Africa, Kenya, the natives have more slow twitch
fibers and they are the world’s best in long distance
running.
In West Africa, where the ancestors of most
African-Americans came from, fast fibers predominate.
Europeans have mixtures of fast and slow fibers.
Europeans exceed in two areas of sport:
1. Sports that require outwitting the opponent; Racket Sports, Fencing, Soccer and Wrestling.
2. Sports that require instant spatial relationships: Diving,
All types of Acrobatics: Acrobatic Skiing, Acrobatic Motor-Cycling and Mountain Climbing.
Asians are very similar to Europeans in terms of their muscle
fibers and their spatial relations ability. Europeans are the
best in the “out-witting” sports such as Fencing and Racket
Sports.
THE CHINESE WONDER
Although the African-Americans have
achieved historical notoriety in Basketball, in the
last year we saw a relatively small Asian surpass
them in their own sport.
Jeremy Lin, a 23 year old Harvard Graduate, in
economics, has put it all together.
Jeremy Lin’s ancestry is from the island of Taiwan.
Taiwan has a complex human history.
The original inhabitants, forty thousand years ago,
were “aborigines” common to all of the islands of the
East Pacific. The Han Chinese invaded the island about
two thousand years ago and have dominated it to this
very day.
The Dutch and Portuguese colonized the island several
centuries ago and called it Formosa which means “beautiful”
in Portuguese.
Thus, we really do not know the genetic roots of
Jeremy Lin.
Most people believe that he is Han Chinese.
One thing is certain: Jeremy Lin is an exceptional
basketball player.
I watched him sink the ball from mid-court at the
end of the game, in a last second thriller, and found
myself shouting: “Bravo!”
This is evidence for all of us slow twitched men:
if you have the eye of an eagle and the control of a
watch maker, you can put that ball through the hoop
without jumping.
