Following the profile of English, baby! in Reuters last month, CNA, the official news agency of Taiwan, asked English, baby! to weigh in on Linsanity. They published a detailed story about our basketball English lessons and the effect that Jeremy Lin may have on the English-learning youth of Asia. The story was picked up by Sina, Yahoo! and more. If you decide to read it using Google translate, it helps to know that “Linsanity” comes through as “magic forest.” See that? We are officially more on top of the trends than Google.

English, baby! co-founder and CEO John Hayden also appeared on a Taiwanese news program called Next TV talking about Linsanity.

Since so many of our members are in China, we like to ask the celebrities we talk to about their travels there. The largest English newspaper in China, China Daily, recently published a story about our interviews with Steve Nash and Dwight Howard.

Ironically, the biggest time for the NBA in China is actually the summer, when players do personal appearances and there are exhibition games. I can’t wait to see what heights the excitement reaches this year–and what new slang emerges in the meantime.

“The strategy seems to be a hit with teachers and students,” says the article. It was certainly a hit with media outlets that syndicate Reuters ‘ content. The story was picked up by the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, NBC, Yahoo! and many others.

This mainstream press follows some great attention from an outlet that is rapidly gaining attention in the education field, the PIE News (Professionals in International Education). They ran a profile of our company. We’re thrilled to be part of the conversation on their site.

Over at the Classical, a heady and fascinating culture and news site, a very well-respected basketball writer (formerly of Free Darko fame), put together a piece that goes behind the scenes of our English lesson with Dwight Howard. It’s definitely worth a read. And if there was any doubt that we are helping keep Portland weird, IFC’s Portlandia blog covered our unique way of teaching spoken English and slang as well.

We’re honored to have all these great words written about what we’re doing. Of course, we do love the camera here on English, baby! Fortunately, our local Fox station offered to produce a segment about our English lessons with athletes for a program called Oregon Sports Final.

Thanks so much Larry Fine,  Dan Thomas, Dan Sheldon, Bethlehem Shoals, Matt Singer and everyone else who contributed to these stories. We really appreciate it.

“Do you think he’d do a lesson for English, baby!” I asked?

“We can check,” he said.

So at the intermission, we edged our way through the crowd toward Jaleel. He immediately agreed to help us teach spoken English to fans overseas and suggested the alley behind the bar as a quiet place to do the interview.

I handed my friend my iPhone and asked Jaleel to talk about the title of a recent TVOTR song, “Will Do,” and explain how this phrase can be used. The result was this English lesson. He did a great job. You can’t even tell that he had no warning. Note the cars on the freeway overpass in the background.

Jaleel was happy to contribute to our mission to help people around the world learn slang, but after he explained the idiom “will do,” he took a moment to question its usefulness in present-day America. This didn’t make the final edit of the lesson video, but enjoy this outtake in which Jaleel expresses some concern that if ESL students from China come to New York and use “will do” in a conversation, it may not go well for them.

I may not be from Brooklyn, but I really think you’ll be fine if you use this expression anywhere in the US. And certainly, your girlfriend or boyfriend won’t mind if you use it like in the TV On The Radio song.

A two-time MVP, Steve Nash is famously good at assists and free throws. So we figured we’d stick to those areas of the game and asked him to start with a lesson on the term “dime.” He really went above and beyond by explaining the origin of the phrase.

Then we moved on to a lesson about the term “and one.”

It’s amazing to meet someone who fully embodies a quality all good players seek to have. Grant Hill has won the NBA’s sportsmanship award three times. So we asked him to teach a lesson about how the term “heart” is used in sports.

Finally, we were able to catch up with Jared Dudley, who we interviewed a couple of years ago. Jared is one of the most media savvy players in the NBA. He regularly posts behind-the-scenes videos of his teammates on JMZ, his own take on the gossip outlet, TMZ.

We asked Jared to teach a slang phrase that is popular at the moment, and he talked to us about the word “swag,” which is also the subject of a lesson by Zaza Pachulia.

These great new English lessons got finished up just in time for this article about English, baby! on the blog of Portlandia, a TV series on IFC that mocks our hometown.

Dwight also got creative with the slang he wanted to teach. As this article in The Classical explains, we originally asked Dwight to teach the term “rejected,” a common slang term for blocked shots. But he said he doesn’t really like that term. So since we only had a moment with him, we just turned on the camera and asked him what he would like to teach. Here’s what happened.

Personally, I had never heard the phrase “beat it up” before, although in a previous basketball English lesson, Dwight’s former teammate Marcin Gortat said something similar. And since we’re all about teaching the latest, most authentic American slang, I think it’s great Dwight shared this term with us.

But that wasn’t even the biggest surprise of the interview. I had no idea Dwight would break out some Chinese phrases when I asked him about visiting China. Since more of our members come from China than anywhere else, I loved seeing Dwight use the English, baby! forum to connect with his fans there. The moment shows a side of Dwight that appeals to native speakers as well. The Orlando Magic posted the video on their website to share it with the hometown fans, and our friends at Australian basketball site A Stern Warning, shared the interview with their readership, too.