Middle school Jorden pops up every once in a while. He stays deep down in some place where I keep the memories that only pop up after midnight when I need to remember the most awkward moments. Every once in a while, a keyholed memory will re-appear. Usually, that’s some late-noughties pop song or iFunny meme that was never funny. This time, it’s Jimmer Fredette. This may be some SEO manipulation because Jimmer is not on that Team USA. He’s on the 3×3 Basketball team; wholly different from the redeem team we’re running with up top. But just like the Golden Plates reappeared to Joseph Smith years later, Jimmer has reappeared to all of America.
If you had asked me back in 2010 who I thought the next NBA superstar was, I would have told you Jimmer. I have these memories of him being hyped up constantly by the sports media; a constant on Sportscenter. As I’ve grown, I’ve realized he was a March Madness cold-ass white boy, who played BYU’s style. Short shooting guard with poor defensive skills, but boy can he shoot like a beauty. Obviously, his career did not turn out as I expected, even if he has had a very stable basketball career just making players in the Chinese league look like the Washington Generals. He never really stood a chance because he was built for the college game, especially back in the 2010s.
With all that said, I still have this deep fondness for Jimmer. Maybe it’s a nostalgia for the times when I was first awakening to the beauty of all sports in some sort of grand tapestry. There’s also a chance it’s because I always saw myself as a shooter (I was terrible at shooting and basketball), and ESPN hyped him up as such. As the game has continued to evolve (obligatory I hate Daryl Morey), I have become more of the opinion that Jimmer was just set in the wrong generation. A shooter like him would be a killer in this NBA. And the man agrees. The beautiful thing about sports is that no one ever forgets. In some ways that’s the worst curse of all; Altuve will always be the guy who cheated to so many fans. But it also means the image of a man can stand still.
Last I had heard from Jimmer he had reappeared on the Shanghai Sharks. The Wonton Don is fully responsible for that. Outside of his NBA appearances, he would have just faded into what once was. But now every time I hear about Shanghai I think of Jimmer. It’s somewhat weird to associate a foreign city that is China’s largest and an actual financial institution with a college basketball player from the 2000s.
Which leads to this point, where I got on The Ringer yesterday only to see that Jimmer Fredette was on Russillo because he was on the Team USA 3×3 Men’s Basketball Team. I was actually writing a completely different blog (Who is Having the Most Brat Summer?) when I learned about the return of Jimmer into 3×3. It was like watching Mitt Romney become the Senator from Utah; yes it’s because they’re both Mormon, but also they just reappeared in another place after becoming famous running for President/BYU.
There’s a YouTube playlist of Jimmer’s highlights from 3×3. I feel even more vindicated in my thoughts that he would have made a stellar NBA player in today’s league. Maybe not stellar, but he could come off the bench for a solid 10 points a night. And he’s playing the Case Keenum role of that veteran who’s been around so long they just know more than you could ever learn.
There’s probably some great lesson in this, like a fable about continuing on. I, along with everyone else, probably thought we had seen the last of Jimmer Fredette. He had ridden off into the sunset like a Deonte Burton, forever enshrined in college basketball glory. But at the age of 35, he is on his way to Paris for a shot at a gold medal. I’m really happy because, in truth, I love stories like this. Toiling in the background for years after being gifted a moniker of potential. It is in some ways the most American story.
I’m wholly unsure what the competition looks like. But I don’t really care. Jimmer could go to Paris and lose every game, initiating a Redeem Team in 2028. It wouldn’t matter to me, because this is bigger in every way. I’m just happy to see him again. I know he’d tell you he’s happy with the way his story is ending, but I’d prefer that end to come at a podium, enshrined forever as a world champion.
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