Day: December 28, 2020

How to Combat Intentional Feeding in the NBA

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

After wasting 2.5 hours of my life watching WW84, I needed something to bring me back, something to make me laugh, and think about anything at all other than how much WW84 sucked.  And if there’s one good thing remaining about the NBA, it’s that they know no boundaries of how much to suck to the amusement of old man purists like myself who still think the 90s were the best era ever and that there’s no sports theme greater than the NBA on NBC theme, in history.

So when the Dallas Mavericks blew the LA Clippers out by 51 points, my interest was immediately piqued, because it always fascinates me just how pathetic the NBA gets year after year and that there’s basically no more pride and this defeatist mentality that pervades in all the players of today that allows for all of this to happen.

Like, back in my day, it was pretty rare to see a 20-point blowout, and those were pretty rare to begin with.  Shit, the most bonkers game I’d seen in my life at that time was this one Knicks vs. Bulls game where Derek Harper had the NBA Jam fire code going and the vaunted ‘96 Bulls got blown out by 30 points. 

But it was literal decades before I saw a game where a team got blown out by 40+ much less 50 points.  Ironically, this isn’t even the worst blowout that I’d ever seen, as I’d actually brogged about it in the past when the Memphis Grizzlies somehow got blown out by 61 points a few years ago.

The thing is, when I was really into League of Legends, and the professional scene specifically, I used to make tons of analogies about how basketball strategies translated very well in League of Legends, most notably when at the 2015 Mid-Season Invitational that mythical then-gf and I went to, Edward Gaming employed the MJ strategy against SK Telecom, let Faker have LeBlanc and do whatever he wanted, but built their team around stomping the shit out of all of Faker’s teammates, en route to a critical game 5 win.

However, this is a scenario where the tables have turned, and it’s about time we applied some League of Legends, or competitive gaming logic, to the NBA.  Primarily the idea that NBA games occasionally go full tilt, and the players ultimately end up griefing, intentionally feeding, and just plain forfeiting, regardless of if the fact that games don’t actually allow for unconditional surrenders, no matter how much the players probably wished they did, like when the Clippers were down 50 points at halftime.

Needless to say, the Clippers phoned it in super early, as if Luka Doncic got two early kills, and the Clippers basically decided that there was no more point in playing the rest of the game because he was fed and was going to snowball and dominate.  And as much as I find ironic amusement in the ownage the Clippers suffered, really it’s still no good for the NBA that teams phone it in and don’t seem to care that they’re allow themselves to be humiliated like such.

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I wish for the 2.5 hours I lost back

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

My job put me in a shitty mood today, which sucks, but for the sake of writing out a post of criticism, it’s actually kind of advantageous.  I tend to believe that intent is sharpest when paired with an emotion that rides along the same wavelength, so when I’m in a pissed mood, lighting into something might be the right mindset for doing such.

Frankly, I knew what I was getting into when I sat down to watch WW84 because making a title card “Wonder Woman 1984” would have been the hardest thing to do for this day and age where people can sparsely be expected to use vowels when writing their shorthand bullshit, even in a professional working environment.

But I had already heard that this movie wasn’t good, and I’d seen the memes, my favorite of them being the title of this post because I felt the exact same way after watching it.  However, out of one part morbid curiosity and another part simply because Gal Gadot is gorgeous and I could probably put up with watching Boys Don’t Cry or The Boy With the Striped Pajamas if had Gal Gadot in it, I decided to watch it anyway.

Despite knowing that it probably wasn’t good, and despite knowing that it was 2.5 hours long and I could have done a myriad of things with 2.5 hours instead of watching WW84, I did something stupid and watched WW84.

And it sucked.  Unsurprisingly.  Frankly, in spite of the praise of the original Wonder Woman received, I didn’t think it was particularly close to as good as the praise it was getting, and I hate to sound completely sexist, but I think films like it and shows like Jessica Jones get a bump in credit solely for the fact that they’re stories about strong female leads with mostly female production crews.  Frankly, the gender of casts and crews are irrelevant to me, and I’d rather not know it at all as long as captivating and entertaining stories and presented to me.

Regardless, it goes without saying that the original Wonder Woman was easily the strongest DC property film since the Christopher Nolan Batman trilogy, and easily the best DC flick in the supposed Justice League universe they’ve tried to cobble together with most notably a Ben Affleck Batman.

But ultimately, that’s like saying the least stinkiest turd in the punch bowl because for whatever reason, DC Comics can’t seem to get their shit together when it comes to translating their properties into film.  Wonder Woman was alright, which makes it the strongest DC film in their respective universe, but honestly, I’d rather have watched episodes of the lowly Iron Fist or the fairly mediocre Defenders shows than DC’s top film.

I kind of feel bad for DC comics.  Because in the actual world of comic books, DC has plenty of quality properties and capable writers and some legendary stories told.  Batman alone carries DC comics way more than any single Marvel property can take credit for carrying Marvel Comics.  But no matter what, they just can’t seem to make good movies, and it’s almost as inevitable that a non-Batman DC movie is going to suck as much as the Braves will always collapse in the most embarrassing or heartbreaking fashions possible.

So needless to say, a sequel to a marginal quality film was bound to be a downhill ride no matter what, and to WW84’s credit, they basically lived up to expectation.  Thank goodness this never made it to theaters, because I already want my money back for it wasting 2.5 hours of my life, despite watching from the comfort of my own home on HBOmax.