PORTLAND, Ore. -- As the National Basketball Association's regular season winds down, a cult hero has emerged on a last-place team with absolutely no chance of making the playoffs.
He's Memphis Grizzlies rookie Hamed Haddadi, a 7-foot-2 center and the NBA's first-ever player from Iran. Mr. Haddadi has appeared in only 13 games so far this season -- and rarely for more than a few "garbage" minutes late in contests Memphis has little hope of winning. Yet he has managed to become an icon to thousands of Iranian-Americans looking to sports as a relief from the constant tensions between their adopted country and their native land.
It's the climax of a whirlwind 10 months for Mr. Haddadi. Last summer, he led Iran to its first Olympic berth in basketball, then became the first player in NBA history to need a waiver from the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control to sign with a U.S. professional team (because of a decades-long trade embargo with Iran).
Iranian Idol
Joe Murphy/NBAE via Getty Images
Hamed Haddadi looked to the basket during a preseason game against the Washington Wizards Oct. 8, 2008 at FedExForum in Memphis, Tenn.
Bouncing between the Grizzlies and a minor-league affiliate in Bismarck, N.D., Mr. Haddadi has barely had time to learn the names of his teammates, much less how to navigate life in America. He's self-conscious about the adoration heaped upon him from legions of immigrant fans, all eager for the day when U.S. arenas rock to chants of "Who's Your Haddadi?"
"This year mostly I am learning to be a better basketball player," the shy 23-year-old says, speaking with the help of a Farsi interpreter. "Someday, maybe, I will act more as a liaison between our two countries."
Barred by the trade embargo from seeking commercial endorsements, Mr. Haddadi nonetheless has inspired Iranians abroad. Fans download images of his brief appearances on NBA courts. YouTube contributors, shooting bootleg video inside NBA arenas, chronicled the first point Mr. Haddadi sank in a professional contest (a foul shot, in Phoenix) and his first field goal from the floor (a short jumper, against New York's Knicks -- watch here).
"It was from the middle of the paint," says Askandar "Alex" Chitzasan, a Portland high-school student, who says he scours Yahoo Sports each day for glimpses of his Iranian idol.
"He played 18 minutes against Denver," adds Alex's older brother, David. "And there were two amazing blocks on Carmelo Anthony."
Live action draws throngs of the devoted, including Ramin Tabrizi, a student at Stoller Middle School of Beaverton, Ore. The 12-year-old joined dozens of Iranian-Americans at Portland's Rose Garden two weekends ago -- some paying as much as $120 each to witness Mr. Haddadi's Portland debut from the pricey Lexus Club level of the arena.
It was his second attempt this season to see his hero. In February, Ramin, 12, brought a classmate to the game, only to learn that Mr. Haddadi had been sent back to Bismarck just hours before tipoff. "I wanted to say to kids at my school, 'See? Persians can play this game, too,' " the seventh-grader explains. More solemnly, he adds: "They should know not everyone who comes from Iran is a terrorist."
Iranians, over a million strong in North America, began coming to the U.S. in significant numbers in the 1970s, before Iran's Islamic revolution and the break in diplomatic relations with Washington. Among the most educated of all immigrants, Iranians -- or &am
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