The Knicks didn’t think Jeremy Lin could keep up with Kim Kardashian.
A year after the former NBA player retired from basketball, he recounted the dating rumors that swirled between he and The Kardashians star back in 2012, during his “Linsanity” winning streak with the New York Knicks.
“This is what I’ve heard and I don’t know if it’s true or not,” Lin explained during a June 9 appearance on the Pablo Torre Finds Out podcast. “That request did come into the Knicks and it is a real request. I think basically, she at that time was filming her show.”
Lin couldn’t remember what show Kardashian might have been filming—her and sister Kourtney Kardashian’s Keeping Up with the Kardashians spinoff Kourtney and Kim Take New York ran for two season between 2011 and 2012— but he noted, “Whatever show was happening back then, but I know that she was looking for a New York athlete to kind of be on this show essentially.”
E! News reached out to reps for the Knicks and Kardashian but has not yet heard back.
But Lin, who was then in his early 20s, never heard directly from the SKIMS founder, who was in her early 30s at the time.
“This is what was told to me afterwards,” he continued. "The request came into the Knicks and they immediately declined it without even asking because they were like, ‘We're not allowing our young, second-year player to go down this route right now.’”
Host Pablo Torre at least concurred with the Knicks’ strict access to Lin at the time, adding, “They wouldn't let me interview you. That's how protective the Knicks were of you at the time.”
However, even Lin, who after leaving the Knicks in 2012 went on to play for the Houston Rockets and more NBA teams before his retirement from the league in 2019, himself wasn’t willing to step into the Kardashians limelight. In a paparazzi clip from his early NBA days, he noted that dating the middle Kardashian sister was the “weirdest” rumor he’d heard about himself.
As Lin, now 37, told an interviewer in an archival video shown on the recent Pablo Torre Finds Out podcast, “I don't think I'm that type.”
Meanwhile, Kardashian, now 45, has shown more interest in a different type of athlete as of late. Earlier this month, she went hard-launched boyfriend Lewis Hamilton on Instagram.
Alongside several sweet moments of the pair’s romance—which took off in February—Kardashian sweetly wrote in the caption, “Lately.”
For a deeper look into the Kardashians’ love lives, keep reading…
Why, yes, Kris Jenner and longtime love Corey Gamble are still doing amazing, sweetie. In 2014, the music industry insider approached the world's most famous momager at fashion designer Riccardo Tisci's 40th birthday bash in Ibiza and "I just tried saying, 'You're beautiful. I'd love to get to know you,'" he shared on the family's OG series, Keeping Up With the Kardashians, "and it went from there."
With all due respect for all the small things, Kourtney Kardashian's husband has made some pretty grand gestures throughout their yearlong marriage. Take her 44th birthday that saw her and Travis Barker take a trip up the California coast to Santa Barbara. The Blink-182 drummer marked the occasion by filling their room at the famed Kennedy Cottage with rose petals and gifting her with a $161,819 piece by artist Yoshitomo Nara. The Poosh founder has fully embraced her new life as the girl at the rock show. And in November 2023, she and Travis welcomed their first child together, son Rocky Thirteen Barker.
As Kim Kardashian put it in a trailer of The Kardashians, "Things change really quickly." When season two wrapped, the SKIMS founder was still living it up with then-Saturday Night Live standout Pete Davidson. She later got fans hoping she was getting back in the dating game with retired NFL quarterback Tom Brady. Alas, the mom to North West, Saint West, Chicago West and Psalm West—with ex-husband Kanye West—wasn't on the hunt for a new teammate. "They have friends and business partners in common, but [are] not dating," a source told E! News in May 2023. "Kim is very focused on her kids, her businesses, law school and preparing for American Horror Story."
She briefly dated Odell Beckham Jr. until news broke of their split in April 2024.
As a source told E!, Kim is "open to finding love again if she meets the right person." In early 2026, she fueled romance rumors with Lewis Hamilton. And in June of that year, the reality star hard-launched her relationship with the F1 driver on Instagram.
In a 2023 episode, Kris shoots her shot while chatting with Khloe Kardashian about Tristan Thompson, asking, "How's everything going with Tristan?" Safe to say the Good American founder has the basketball player benched for now. Though the exes have worked out a game plan for raising daughter True and son Tatum, Khloe shot down the idea that they're back together in May 2023, calling the narrative "tiring." She's more interested in starting a fresh story. After meeting Love Is Blind star Alexa Lemieux the following April, Khloe pitched a winning idea to Netflix, writing on Instagram, "I think some of us single K sisters should go on LIB. What do you think?"
Months after Kendall Jenner's split with NBA guard Devin Booker in fall 2022, the model's love life got an assist from friends Justin Bieber and Hailey Bieber. The married duo were spotted enjoying a double date with the reality star and musician Bad Bunny in February 2023. The following December, it was reported that the two had called it quits.
Seems Kylie Jenner has found herself a new beautiful boy. Last seen publicly with rapper Travis Scott—dad to her daughter Stormi and son Aire—at an Art Basel party in December 2022, the beauty mogul, has been linked to Oscar-nominated actor Timothée Chalamet since April 2023. Now, rise and shine because you don't want to miss the glimpses they've given us of their romance at New York Fashion Week and the US Open, as well as live on TV, when they showed PDA while seated together at the 2024 Golden Globes and 2025 Oscars.