“I call him Nick Young,” Jeremy Lin said when asked a question about “Swaggy P,” the nickname Young famously game to himself. “He’s super cool, but I find it ridiculous that everyone comes up and calls him ‘Swaggy.’ I feel like you got to earn it or something. Maybe he has, but I just got here. Maybe I’ll adopt eventually.”
Young was injured with a sprained right thumb and will undergo an MRI later on Friday. He injured himself guarding Kobe Bryant, Lakers coach Bryon Scott later confirmed. Lin was asked whether he saw how “Swaggy P” sustained the injury, and hearing “Swaggy P” didn’t sit right with the Lakers’ newest guard.
“I just guess it has to be something I see,” Lin responded when asked what Young would have to do to start being called “Swaggy.” “(Maybe) when I look at him, he just glows with his ‘swaggyness,’ but I’m not there yet.”
Lin, however, relented and said he would respect Young’s seniority on the matter.
“He’s hilarious. He’s really cool. So out of respect for him being eight years in, if he wants me to call him ‘Swaggy P’ I guess I will,” Lin said after Friday’s practice. “Besides that, I’ll call him ‘Nick Young.’”
Lin was then asked if he called Bryant “Mamba,” and Lin explained why he thought the idea of calling Young “Swaggy P” was absurd.
“No one calls me ‘Linsanity,’ no one calls (Bryant) ‘The Black Mamba.’ That’s why I think it’s ridiculous people call Nick Young ‘Swaggy P!’”
