In Honor of Chinese New Year:The Top 10 Asian Athletes In Sports

Today is officially the Chinese New Year. This is a day where I celebrate half of my culture and ethnicity as a half Chinese/Caucasian American.

In case you are uneducated about the rest of the world, the Chinese New Year is the most celebrated holiday in China and it's in January. While the official holiday is only two days(New Year's Day and Eve) the entire country gets about a week off.

Growing up, I too was an Asian athlete like all of the people on this list and had to constantly disprove the following false stereotypes to every single redneck football coach from Texas I've ever had:

1. Asians are short

2. All Asian countries are communist

3. Asians are tiny/weak

4. Asians are nerdy and only book smart

5. Asians can't fight...they only do martial arts

These stereotypes have even kept Asian athletes off of the playing field.

Asian quarterback Timmy Chang, an NCAA record breaker was kept from being a quarterback because he was short. He's 6'1" which is about as tall as many current quarterbacks in the pros, if not maybe an inch short. When asked by scouts about his measurements their pathetic response was that he played short.

After an illustrious college career working alongside Pete Carroll at USC, Norm Chow was kept out of a job for the Tennessee Titans—despite the owner saying all the great things this guy had done.

When asked why he wasn't hired, he said "I didn't know Chow was Chinese!"

This article is about the celebration of Asian athletics, not their low points, but let me just say that the NFL needs to be more like the NBA and allow foreign athletes a chance at least.

Also, In case you didn't know: Martial arts these days are done by rich white guys who can't fight and have problems—like being short or weak.

In Asia, it's not a sport—it's a heritage and it's self defense—but the average Chinese person doesn't have the moves of Jackie Chan.

The four stereotypes that Asians are weak, short, tiny, and nerdy will be answered by this top 10 list of current Asian athletes (not just Chinese ones):

10. Yani Tseng (Taiwan)—She's like Michelle Wie but superior in every single way. With just one and a half years of experience, she already has three professional wins as opposed to Wie's three years without any professional wins. A winner of the LGPA championship, you cannot find another women golfer that's as on-fire as she is.

9. Vijay Singh (Fiji)—Singh has gotten better in his forties—not worse. He already holds the title for the most wins after turning forty, including last year’s FedEx Cup to recognize the PGA’s top golfer on the tour. But even if he stopped playing tomorrow, he’d still retire with 34 wins and 175 Top 10 finishes in 403 career events.

8. Yi Jianlian (China)—An incredibly talented and hardworking forward. He has the physique and nearly everything to succeed in the NBA. He's not as talented as many Asian athletes like Yao but he has everything else and might join the ranks of Yao in popularity and respect even if he's not as talented.

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