Would you recognize Jeremy Lin on the streets of New York if you saw him? I would. I wouldn’t even play it cool. I would kiss him and hug him and massage his shoulders. I would.
Sports Illustrated did a social experiment where Lin would return to the city that loved him so much during his Linsanity run, sit on a park bench to see if anyone noticed the former city celebrity.
I loved the idea of this, but… that’s it? It’s kind of funny that the guy on the bench was a total New Yorker., but I thought the video would be a lot more compelling than that. I half expected no one to recognize him and half that the city would swarm him.
Notice that they didn’t have him walking down the street — surely people would have noticed his height.
You also have to consider that Lin had his head down the entire time, and I’m sure there were people (that the camera didn’t catch) that did a double take, recognized Lin from afar and didn’t say anything. I’d like to believe if I saw Lin on a public bench minding his own business, I’d respect his space, but Lin is the one celebrity I would actually gush over.