Column: Lin emblematic of golden point guard era

Lin’s incredible play has exposed a little-known phenomenon in the NBA: the point guard renaissance. He has become the eighth point guard under 24 years old who looks like a future all-star in the NBA. Derrick Rose (23), Russell Westbrook (23), Kyrie Irving (19!), Ricky Rubio (21), John Wall (21), Stephen Curry (23) and Ty Lawson (24) all look like they are star-quality players in the NBA. Of these players, Rose has already won an MVP award, and Irving is posting an incredible rookie campaign that suggests a possibility of MVP-caliber play. These very young players join a slightly older crew of Kyle Lowry (25), Rajon Rondo (26), Chris Paul (26) and Deron Williams (27) to form a 12-deep group of point guards who have already elevated play at the point.

According to statistical analyst John Hollinger’s metric PER, 11 of the 33 players in the NBA who have been most productive on a per-minute basis are point guards. Tony Parker and Steve Nash remain in the upper echelons of NBA point guards, but, besides those two, the remaining elite point guards will probably still be playing at a high caliber in five years, and those in the 23-and-under crowd may just have hit their peaks.

What is perhaps most exciting about this set of young point guards, however, is their diversity of play. Rondo and Rubio are exceptional passers and defenders who are testing the limits of how bad a shooter a good point guard can be. Westbrook and Lin are exceptional scorers with high turnover ratios. Paul has a rare combination of incredible scoring and passing ability, and Rose seems to bend his way around defenders in physics-defying ways. Point guard is not only the league’s strongest position, but it also seems to be a position in which players such as Lin are innovating the most.

Lin’s rise is also suggestive of the internationalization of the sport. Though Lin was born in America and basketball was already quite popular in China before Lin — or even Yao Ming — arrived in the NBA, he will increase the popularity of the sport in China. Still, the emergence of Lin is just the latest development in a decade full of successes for players with international appeal. Foreign-born players such as Dirk Nowitzki (Germany), Parker (France), Pau and Marc Gasol (Spain), Manu Ginobili (Argentina), Luol Deng (Sudan), Andrei Kirilenko (Russia), Nene (Brazil), Anderson Varejao (Brazil), Peja Stojakavic (Serbia) and Andrea Bargnani (Italy) have also played at or near all-star caliber in the last decade. Globalization has also afforded media-savvy American stars like Kobe Bryant to become international celebrities, and the outpouring of American basketball players has increased the quality of play in a variety of overseas leagues. Basketball, though it will not approach soccer’s international appeal, is probably the world’s second most popular sport. With regard to the international market, Lin’s rise and foreign appeal is worth celebrating, not so much for its novelty but for the continuation of recent tradition.

The media narrative around Jeremy Lin has largely been that his rise is a singular event. But as Linsanity dies down a bit, it might be worth appreciating Lin’s rise as emblematic of basketball trends in our era. From Rio de Janiero to Beijing, from Chicago to Berlin, an incredibly diverse group of people are learning the art of basketball from an exceptional young crop of point guards with wildly divergent styles of play. These intersecting basketball phenomena will probably be of greater interest in the long run than Lin’s admittedly unique and captivating personal story.