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Of all the things to pull out of a wacky, raucous, absolutely hilarious viral video that’s been viewed more than 5.1 million times, a one-second clip of some random Knicks fan uttering two seemingly anodyne words isn’t what you’d guess would take on a life of its own.
But social media works in mysterious ways. And five days after Sidetalk, the verified Twitter account run by a pair of NYU students, posted a video of Knicks fans going berserk outside Madison Square Garden following the season-opening win against the Celtics, Jordie Bloom’s life hasn’t been the same. Which is a good thing.
He’s the guy 22 seconds into the video—that perfectly encapsulated the energy and enthusiasm of the new Knicks season that tipped last Wednesday—who randomly says “bing bong.” It’s a phrase, an utterance, a whatever you want to call it, that’s quickly taken off amongst a subset of young, plugged-in Knicks fans who are just as hyped about the return of basketball as Bloom, a New Yorker through and through.
“All my boys call me Bing Bong Guy now,” he says.
The 26-year-old who grew up on the Upper East Side and now resides in Greenwich Village possibly inspired the unofficial slogan and rallying cry for the 2021-20 Knicks—who are looking to make repeat playoff appearances for the first time in seven years. But what has Bloom extra hyped over his sudden fame—he’s been recognized almost a dozen times, he says, as the Bing Bong Guy on the streets of New York and at MSG—is the opportunity to turn the phrase into a brand and, more importantly, a community of like-minded die-hard Knicks fans who expect bigger and better from their squad following last season’s surprise playoff appearance.
But before we get into where Bloom wants to take Bing Bong and/or Bing Bong Guy, we need to get into what, precisely, is “bing bong”? Or where does it come from? And why did he say it on the video?
Like the 19,000 other lunatics who attended the double-overtime win last week, Bloom exited the Garden onto 7th Ave. euphoric. “You walk out and all you see a bunch of people who all they have on their face is joy, excitement, happiness, it was a beautiful sight,” says Bloom. That’s when he saw a camera rolling and a microphone in front of jubilant New Yorkers saying the most hilarious shit—like “Tom Brady’s a bitch” and chants of “Fuck Trae Young.” It was the Sidetalk guys filming another video and Bloom was familiar with their work.
He knew, for instance, that “bing bong” was a phrase that popped up in previous Sidetalk videos and every Sidetalk video starts with the infamous sound warning New York subway riders the doors are closing. More specifically, after watching a few Sidetalk episodes about the characters of Coney Island, Bloom was uttering “bing bong” to his boys, like an inside joke, during a recent bachelor party.
“It had kind of popped into my head as a direct correlation with Sidetalk,” says Bloom. “But there was no correlation with the Knicks whatsoever.”
Now it feels like they’re inseparable.
