President Barack Obama called The Wire “one of the best shows of all time,” and curbed his Chicago bias enough to rave about New York Knicks sensation Jeremy Lin during a 24-minute basketball-centric conversation on Bill Simmons’ “B.S. Report” podcast.

Simmons: So you’re catching up, obviously, on the fact that you had been surpassed as the most famous person who was a Harvard graduate.

Obama: Jeremy is doing good. And I knew about Jeremy before you did, or everybody else did, because Arne Duncan, my Secretary of Education, was captain of the Harvard team. And so way back when, Arne and I were playing and he said, I’m telling you, we’ve got this terrific guard named Jeremy Lin at Harvard. And then one of my best friends, his son is a freshman at Harvard, and so when he went for a recruiting trip he saw Lin in action. So I’ve been on the Jeremy Lin bandwagon for a while.

Simmons: Are you taking credit for “Linsanity”? It kind of feels like you are a little bit.

Obama: I can’t take credit for it, but I’m just saying I was there early.

Simmons: I’m surprised you didn’t steer him toward the Bulls. He was floating around and getting waived by teams.

Obama: Well, we’ve got this pretty good point guard on the Bulls as well. So he might not have gotten as much PT as he did.

Obama: But look, it’s a great story. And what’s interesting is the fact that somehow folks were missing it in practice. I mean, that’s what’s interesting. Because you got to assume that during scrimmages he was running that pick-and-roll pretty well. And it is a terrific story. He seems like a wonderful young man. And, look, it elevates this great sport all around the world. It can’t hurt ratings for basketball in China.