Michelle Peralta

For those of you who don't know, Michelle Peralta is kind of a legend here at BYU. Not as much as a legend as Jimmer, but we'll get into that later...

It all started when Jimmer Fredette started scoring ridiculous points every basketball game. I mean, we're talking 40, 50 points in a single game - and not just because he's a ball hog, he's just that good!
And because BYU has been starved for a winning... well, anything... fans have been going nuts. BYU Bookstore even made T-shirts with Jimmer's number for fans to wear to every game.

Where does this Michelle girl come into play? Well, she wrote a letter to the Editor in our (really-poorly-written and not-so-great newspaper), The Daily Universe, and it said:

I can’t walk across campus without hearing Jimmer Fredette’s name a dozen times. His name comes up everywhere: in class, at work, during lunch …  really, people? Cut it out with the Jimmer worship. Last time I checked, idol worship was very much frowned upon in the scriptures.
Don’t you have a life to live? Then quit wasting it in front of the TV or in lines at the Marriott Center.
At the very least, stop trying to convert those of us who don’t follow BYU sports and don’t care that baseball and badminton are two different things. Pushing basketball on us isn’t going to make us like it any better.
I’m not blaming Jimmer for all this; was it Nephi’s fault in the Book of Mormon when his brothers worshiped him? As far as I’m concerned, Jimmer is perfectly free to live his dreams. If he reaches his goals and lives his dreams, more power to him. I would like the same courtesy from his fans: let me live my own dreams in peace, even if they don’t include ever sitting in the Marriott Center screaming my brains out.
Michelle Peralta
Apple Valley, Calif.

Excessive? Perhaps. Offensive? Probably.

Within a half hour she had thousands of posts on her facebook, ultimately forcing her to delete her account. And it doesn't stop there - ESPN has posted her story, and groups on Facebook are being dedicated to making fun of her. So I'll be the one to say it - I feel bad for the girl.

Because despite what she said, she had a point. Like this post I found saying

Yes Michelle Peralta, We Worship Jimmer Fredette. Out of respect to The Jimmer, please capitalize all pronouns that are used in place of His name.

Really? Replacing God with a basketball player? Now, I'm all for the Chuck Norris-like jokes (Jimmer was dropped twice as a baby... once on Hiroshima and once on Nagasaki.), but this is just taking it too far. It makes me cringe.


Don't get me wrong, I love BYU basketball.  I'm all for Jimmer Fever, but even more so, I'm for supporting the whole team. And I'm definitely against blasphemous jokes that make my college, and my religion look like a joke.

Michelle, it probably wasn't a great idea to have said what you said. But I think you had a point, and I certainly don't think that you deserve being made fun of on a national level. You're not a celebrity, and I'm sure you weren't prepared for this level of ridicule.

Here's a (small) snippet of the original facebook post. In case you were wondering...