Jeremy Lin, who plays for the Guangzhou Loong Lions in the Chinese Basketball Association, was fined 10,000 Yuan, or $1,400 for criticizing the league’s COVID-19 quarantine facilities.
The Associated Press reports that the CBA fined Lin for “inappropriate remarks about quarantine hotel-related facilities” that the Lions were using on Wednesday. The Paper, a Shanghai news organization, first reported that Lin posted a video complaining about conditions in the city of Zhuji.
“Can you believe this is a weight room? What kind of garbage is this?” Lin reportedly said, before the video was deleted for what The Paper said “the situation was clarified” that the team was staying in that hotel only briefly.
Lin became the first player of Chinese descent to win an NBA title, doing so with the Raptors in 2019. The 34-year old, who had a brief stretch of stardom with the Knicks, has played for a CBA team every year since 2019 and had a stint with the Warriors G League team last year.
This year, China has used strict “zero-COVID” lockdowns to stop the disease’s spread, which involves isolating every infected person in the country. As a result, the country has shut down schools, offices and shops consistently to isolate everyone necessary. This has led to mass protesting against these anti-virus protocols throughout the country after a spike in infections in October.
The Chinese government has tried to stop these protests, as pictures and videos of the protesting on Chinese social media have been deleted while police have been deployed to stop the protests.
