Tag: comparison

Cracker Barrel’s rebrand: the question stands

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

USA Today: Cracker Barrel unveils a new logo; the internet is unsurprisingly not impressed

When the day is over, I have no skin in the game of the existence of Cracker Barrel.  Full disclosure, I haven’t been to a Cracker Barrel since I lived on the south side of the city, when they opened a brand new Cracker Barrel not far (relatively) from my old place, and upon going there, all the big wigs and managers and trainers were there, so everyone was on their best behavior and it was actually a decent experience.

But no matter if people hate the new logo or people love it, I’m not going to lose any sleep over it one way or the other, and can only really share opinions and thoughts based on the creative direction of it, as well as relish in some of the less tasteful jokes that the internet is particularly known for generating about anything and everything in existence.

But my first blush impression and my knee-jerk reaction upon seeing the new Cracker Barrel logo was that of unsurprise at the fact that they removed both the man and the barrel, and have homogenized it down to an uninspired shape.  However, I am surprised at the fact that they did manage to keep the general wordmark of the text mostly intact, instead of just typing out “cracker barrel” in a variation of Helvetica Neue or Myriad, like so many companies inevitably do, as if they’re determined to not pay anyone for a font, and are completely at peace with just writing it out in system default fonts.

So it’s kind of a push in the sense that they did murder all the character and uniqueness of the logo by removing both the man and the barrel, as well as the unsymmetrical shape in which the wordmark was housed, but still managed to preserve some sense of character, familiarity and recognition by at least keeping the wordmark mostly the same.

A hexagon with rounded corners isn’t a vanilla rhombus or oval like so many brands have boiled down to in this modern business space, and at least they appear to have kept their primary color intact; however, it appears they’ve cheapened up by swapping out their brown for a black, thus making future production simplified in that they technically only need one additional color outside of black and white.

Honestly, the container looks a little too large for the wordmark, and in the event like creating signage and advertising materials, the general proportion of it compared to the Cracker Barrel name is might end up looking comical, or lead to some comically large signs in order to compensate.

But like I said, when the day is over, I do not care one iota about this rebrand, beyond the obvious joke that was made in the shown screen grab – why DID they get rid of both the cracker and the barrel??  Considering the brand is kind of synonymous for being a white people eatery, not entirely sure why they’d go to the lengths of alienating them by removing paw-paw from the logo, but whatever.  As far a corporate rebrands go, this one is far from the worst, and it’s not going to suddenly make me want to deal with the shitty parking situations enough to want to actually go to a Cracker Barrel again any time soon.

Phelps County probably smells delicious right now

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

The Hill: tractor trailer carrying 40,000 lbs. of ribeye steaks catches fire on I-74 in Missouri

Normally, I don’t bother writing about trucks full of food stuffs catching fire or overturning unless they happen in Georgia, but every now and then there are a few examples that pique my interest to the point where I can turn the clock back and write about truck carnage at the expense of delicious foods.

But headlines talking about a truck full of steaks catching fire got my attention, and specifically the fact that they weren’t just any old run of the mill steaks, but forty thousand pounds of ribeye steaks specifically that caught my attention.

The devil is in the details.

Sure, there is a time and place for every cut of steak, and sometimes I’ve just been in the mood for a good New York strip, sometimes a big ass porterhouse.  Sometimes just the filet is sufficient, if I want to luxuriate in all the other sides and courses.  But for the most part, there’s seldom a time when a good ribeye isn’t a viable option for a steak, and learning of this truck disaster where several tons of ribeye steaks went up in flames definitely got my big back attention.

Naturally, I’m long past the first person to probably make the joke about how delicious I-74 in Missouri must smell at the idea of all this succulent beef going up in flames, but it’s probably not wrong.  The whole region with a multiple mile radius probably smells like an incredible barbecue is going on, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned about Missouri is that the state knows how to barbecue, apparently even on the physical highways itself.

However, I do have to question the quality of the steaks, if they’re in a parcel of 40,000 lbs of other ribeyes.  I have to imagine that they were probably of the frozen variety to begin with, and probably nowhere near high-end restaurant quality cuts that most people fantasize about when they’re thinking about a good steak.  As I said, the devil is in the details, and I’d be curious to know if these were like Dollar General hockey puck steaks, or if they were closer to like Outback Steakhouse steaks.  That’s the intel that separates a ho-hum run of the mill truck disaster from one that people talk about for years to come.

Either way, congrats to Missouri for having a truck catastrophe that sounded so grand and probably smelled so good, to where it warranted words to be spouted on my little slice of the internet.

Las Vegas sucks now, plain and simple

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Every time I come across posts or articles about the general downward trends of Las Vegas tourism, I just scoff and remind myself to hold my tongue and save it for the brog, because I think I’m in the minority now about my feelings and attitude about Las Vegas.

But as the subject of this post says, Las Vegas sucks now, and is a far cry from the place that I used to go to multiple times a year, and it makes me sad to see just how much it’s changed and how I just now have absolutely no desire to go back any time soon.  And like I said, I think I’m in the minority here, especially among my friends who all seem to think the place is still good, regardless of if they acknowledge the changes or not, and as to not be the Debbie Downer, I more often than not, keep my feelings unspoken since I don’t want to be accused of peeing in the pool.

But yeah, Las Vegas sucks now, and I fully understand why their tourism and revenues are trending downwards, and feel little opinion other than the euphemism that this is the bed they made, and they have to lay in it.

Sure, COVID had a lot to do with their state of collapse, as a city so reliant on tourism was absolutely decimated when the whole world was encouraged to stay put, but the whole city didn’t do themselves any favors once things started to return to normalcy.  It’s like the whole place went into this determined recoup-mode, and decided to up the cost of just about everything in sight in order to make up for lost dollars from the pandemic, and as often the case whenever any business raises costs to justify something, once that something has been justified, they grow so used the revenues that they make no attempt to revert or reduce, and as is the case with Vegas, they actually doubled down and kept increasing the cost of everything to further push people to see how much they can get away with.

See, the Vegas I remember and loved, it wasn’t $Fuck you.99 per night to stay anywhere on the Strip, and there weren’t Ticketmaster-amounts of resort fees every night.  Parking was often free, which justified getting a rental car so we didn’t have to get taxis everywhere, and could occasionally explore the city beyond the Strip.  Food, sure, had its upscale joints where you could feel like a baller, but there were also plenty of options where you could get a cheap meal or just enough to satiate hunger, and it not be an automatic $100+ bill.

Every resort had a buffet, and I can say that I’d been to almost all of them at various points of my life, from the Riviera’s, Aladdin’s, MGM’s, Mandalay Bay’s, and my guiltiest of pleasures was the Rio’s Carnival World Buffet, where on two different times, separated by years, I managed to get the same server who had this creepy, Igor-like demeanor, but was still nice and did his job well.  But, they’re all gone now, with to my knowledge, the only ones truly left and worth a damn, being like Caesar’s Palace, Bellagio and Cosmopolitan.

Drinks were plentiful, and thankfully is still the case, free as long as you’re gambling, but for when you weren’t blowing all your money away, a domestic beer didn’t cost $20 plus a tip.

Which brings us to gambling, where across the board, the cost to play has risen to where the last two times I went to Vegas, I was basically done after a single day’s gambling.  I used to be able to bring $500 in cash, and manage to have a pretty fun long weekend; I could be lucky enough to play with some house case from time to time, and when the trips were over, be able to come back with a little left.  Now, $500 can’t get me through a single day, which was almost literal when my last trip was just 24-hours, with gambling time being less than four of those hours.

Casinos hardly bother with fluctuating table minimums anymore, and the lowest on the Strip is like $15, which is a perfectly uneven number to where anyone who wants to play a hundo, has almost no possibly way of playing an exact amount at $15 a hand or spin of anything without having an embarrassing remainder, or need to buy back in, and it makes me think of the New York MTA and how their fares are mathematically strategized so that it’s almost impossible to zero out a fare card, and the city rakes in millions a year on forfeited remainders.

The bottom line is that Las Vegas has completely abandoned even remotely trying to cater to anyone that isn’t at the very least, upper class, or can at least pretend to be for the duration of a trip.  Middle-class and lower schmucks like me can no longer afford to go there comfortably, much less have a good time, when we’re being gauged left and right, having the city wishing they could charge us to breathe.

I’m of the belief that there’s way more money to be made in catering to everyone, and my favorite stories in business are always ones where companies have embarked on such strategies and have found immense amounts of success in doing such, like sports teams that lower their tickets, concessions and accessibility and then they make record profits.  Apps that are released for free, but then rake in millions on ad revenue and in-game micro-transactions.  Look at Wal-Mart, whose last time I checked was #1 on the Fortune 500 for the last 30 years, because they cater to the lower class, and they make fuck numbers of profits every year in doing so.

And Las Vegas turning their back to those under the upper class line, screams of elitism, catering to the wealthy and those arrogant enough to demand exclusivity, I enjoy reading and seeing things about how their numbers aren’t doing as hot as they probably wish they were doing.  I love reading comments full of shade and criticisms from people who feel similarly to how I do, abandoned and resentful, and pining for a Las Vegas that they once loved so much, they used to “joke” with their friends about exploring looking for a rental property.

Like I said, this is the bed that they made, and it’s what they have to lay in, and I hope that one day, Las Vegas can get back to closer to being the city I once loved and hopefully in time for me to have some more memorable trips with my friends and my family.

Mickey 17 and the Korean curse of producing for The West

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

One of the things I watched during my staycation was Mickey 17, for really no other reason than it was directed by Bong Joon-ho. Parasite was truly a best picture, and I always exert a little more effort to support those from the Motherland, so I had high hopes for Mickey 17, being (I think) Bong’s return to the screens since Parasite.

When the film finally ended, I was left with this disappointed feeling, and worst of all, the feeling that I had wasted my precious time.  At 2:20, it’s what I would classify as “a long movie” and if I’m going to sink that much time into something, I’d hope it’s got some redeeming quality.

Like lots of films, I felt the film prioritized its named stars, leaning on Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie and Mark Ruffalo to hard carry the film in spite of the weak story, but obviously a film is only as good as its story, and the cast of the Avengers would struggle to make Mickey 17 decent.

Mythical wife, being a K-pop snob, had begun distancing herself from BTS fandom, once BTS really came into the global mainstream, and wasn’t just a niche phenomenon within Korea and those who knew them from long ago.  She cited that their sound had immediately morphed into a more vanilla, cookie cutter sound, clearly catered to wider, global audiences instead of sticking with the formula that made them who they are.

Frankly, this is nothing out of the ordinary, nor was it remotely surprising to me, because Korea has been notorious for changing shit up in all facets of media when it comes to seeking validation from The West, most specifically from America.

Once anything starts to receive any praise or acclaim from The West, Koreans have shown a tendency to lean hard into it and try to squeeze out more validation, even if it means compromising the foundations of said things.

Music, food and in the case of Mickey 17, film are all fair game when it comes to this general practice, and in the vast majority of cases, it doesn’t result in as much success as they hope it will, and they’ve compromised their concepts and alienated those who were fans before the mainstream rub.

Take Squid Game S3 for example; the first season was brilliant from nearly start to finish.  It couldn’t escape all Korean tropes but frankly those tropes really are things that make Korean media, Korean.  But when S2/3 came, I still enjoyed it, but there were clearly ideas incorporated into it that were clearly influenced by their knowledge that The West, would be watching.

Top from K-pop group Big Bang as the colorful Thanos, spouting horribly broken Engrish every chance he could, the ending that basically had kicked the door down that they want to go Westward Ho.

But nothing was more evident that they’re seeking Western acceptance than the character Hyun-ju, which most casual Americans simply recalled as “the trans one.”  It’s changed a little for the better these days, but LGBTQ+ concepts are still considered taboo and not nearly as accepted as they are in America.  Although I had no problem and appreciated Hyun-ju’s inclusion in Squid Game, there’s no part of me that believes such would have ever happened if not for the influence of potential Western viewers.  In this case it’s a positive result, but I still chalk it up as a decision made to appease The West.

The reason Parasite was so good was that it was inherently a film for Koreans, telling Korean stories and describing Korean struggles. It showed the cultural differences in setting and appearances but at the core of it, it’s a relatable story that sucked audiences from all over the globe in and deserved all the praise and accolade and the Oscar it got.

Mickey 17 was clearly made for The West, with its  Hollywood cast, and evident copious budget.  The core story was an interesting concept that provokes discussion about ethics and morality, but to me, it was like asking Bong Joon-ho to direct Starship Troopers or something out of his element.  It would be like asking Francis Ford Coppola to direct Parasite or something completely different than his own background and expecting it to be not full of holes as the result of cultural unfamiliarity.

Needless to say, in spite of energetic and enthusiastic performances by Pattinson and Ruffalo most notably, they couldn’t rescue a weak story.  Halfway through the film, I started to glaze, and by the time the last quarter was around, I was already dicking around on my phone and half listening.  And by the time the credits started rolling, the seed for this post had already been planted.

I mean, it’s a nigh impossible task to hit a home run after winning an Oscar, so it’s no surprise that Mickey 17 wasn’t that great. But considering the heights that Parasite climbed to, it’s extra disappointing to see just how far down Mickey 17 fell to.

Must every successful Korean thing get white people’d?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

[This post is about Squid Game S3, there will likely be spoiler-ey words]

However, since I write for basically zero people, it’s merely a formality that has no real meaning.

Anyway, mythical wife and I just wrapped up watching S3 and the supposed finale to Squid Game, and I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about how the finale transpired and the events of the how it all wrapped up.  Fortunately for me, I managed to hold off on watching it for a few days and managed to not get spoiled along the way to which I am very grateful.

So, as far as S3 went, it was as well executed as I would have hoped it would be.  Frankly, the original season was great on its own, and I didn’t think it really needed to have a sequel season(s), but Netflix is rich as balls, money talks, and moar Squid Game we got.  Thankfully, the moar Squid Game was pretty decent as far as sequels go, and wasn’t just a shitty Ocean Twelve-like cash grab of a turd sequel, and although it wasn’t as flawless as the original was, and some Korean storytelling trope cracks did show, overall it was still well acted, visually compelling, and had a storyline that made sense for the most part.

Without giving too much away, one thing I found to be hilarious was when the VIPs showed up to the mysterious island of games, is just how poor the acting was from them.  It’s like Squid Game clearly is a global phenomenon that most any Hollywood A-lister would probably love to participate in, in a cameo capacity, and I imagine it wouldn’t be a difficult ask for any agent to get some known global stars to play the layup roles of the VIPs.

But instead, we get these no-name clown actors whose acting is terrible, and I can’t help that it was probably cast in such a way deliberately, so that the Korean showrunners could passively flex how great their Korean cast was compared to the scab foreign cast who couldn’t act their way out of a preschool play.

Anyway, as the final episode began winding down, I said to mythical wife, that I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if the episode ended in an open-ended manner, because regardless of their association with Netflix, Korean television shows are notorious for always ending in open-ended manners, because they seem to always want to keep the door open for potential sequel seasons, spin-offs or moar content. 

No matter if this was supposed to be the final season of OG Squid Game, I wasn’t going to be surprised if the general plot was left with gaping holes for moar Squid Game to manifest in the future, because despite their massive steps forward culturally in some regards, Korean media can’t stop being so Korean in others.

[Okay, here come abject spoilers to those who might not have seen it]

Naturally, as all the arcs start wrapping up, there are massive hints that things aren’t going to be over when it comes to The Games, and the season wraps up with a teaser of a new, American, Recruiter character, played by none other than Cate Blanchett, goading some white bum in an alleyway in Los Angeles, in a game of all things, ddakji, leading to the obvious conclusion that Squid Games are most definitely not over, but are now beginning to take place internationally, most notably, America.

Mythical wife had already heard about news that there was going to be a Squid Game: America in the works, and I can’t say that I’m the least bit surprised, but at the same time, I’m also irritated that yet another successful Korean property is selling out for white people to white people all over it, and make their own variation of it.

It’s like Parasite, and the success and buzz of its rise to the top of the mountain couldn’t even cool off before news started swirling about how it was going to be remade by Americans, inevitably going to be cast with an entirely, for lack of a better phrase, deliberately forced woke DEI cast.

It’s like shows like Physical:100 and Culinary Class Wars and Street Food, that were so good in their original Korean iterations, but white people couldn’t just accept watching good television with subtitles on, so instead they just have all their shit remade for the comfort and convenience to white people.

I mean a story like Squid Game isn’t solely exclusive to Korea; despair, poverty, desperation, violence and empathy can be told in any nationality, so I’m sure Squid Game can easily be picked up by any other culture, even if it’s not white people, but it’s just the fact that white people are clearly so eager to white up the property, that they can’t even wait until the flowers for OG Squid Game to stop coming in before they shoe horn their own introduction into the ending of the finale, and set the stage for their impending colonization.

I digress though.  Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and all that bullshit, and even if the Squid Game creators resisted a white spinoff, white people would just inevitably just rip it off and release something on their own in the future anyway, so might as well have the Korean creators get the bag in the process of having their shit stolen.

It’s just obnoxious how often and how quickly Korean successes become marked for white people-ization, and as much as I loved Squid Game and the cultural phenomenon it became, it irked me to see just how fast white people had to inject their sniveling little tentacles into the property, and sour the general ending for me.

Imagine if your work bonus were based on how much you ran

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

BI: Chinese paper company bases annual bonuses on running milestones

Apparently this is a story back from winter 2023 that came across my radar recently, but it doesn’t matter.  My knee-jerk reaction was that this was something I would probably dominate pretty easily, and I could become rich on bonuses, but after reading through the article a little more thoroughly, I come out this with more mixed feelings.

The TL;DR is that in order for the employees of this paper company to get the maximum bonus of 130% of their annual salary, they basically have to run about two miles a day.  Extrapolated to a month, that’s 62 miles, which means in a year, they’re at around 744 miles. 

I have confidence that I could tackle two miles a day, since I basically did that when I was at my probably physical fitness peak, and was running around 3-3.5 miles a day five days a week.  I don’t run nearly as much as I used to, but when I do, it’s more than two miles, and I think if I set a goal of two miles daily, I could probably do it, but then there’s something about obligating myself to such a thing because there’s an incentive at the end of a very long annual road, that makes me feel like I’d probably get sick of it eventually, and really begin to resent running more than I already do at times, because it’s no longer about my health, but it’s also in order to gain a measure of financial benefit.

And as much as I came into this post full of confidence and cockiness that I’d absolutely slay it, the reality is that 744 miles a year is really quite lofty.  I’m pretty sure it was only at my peak did I ever come close to hitting that mark in a single calendar year, and this also leaves very little margin of error for sicknesses, emergencies, the general business of life at times, and if you miss a day or three, then the backlog becomes daunting, and then everything falls apart in the end.

There are secondary and third-tier bonuses, but they’re not nearly as lucrative as nailing the primary bonus, and I have to imagine nothing would be more demoralizing if any of these Chinese guys finished out their year with like 735 miles logged, and fell short of the big bonus on account of a vacation, injury, or some other variable that the whole challenge doesn’t leave much room for, Chinese work ethic not withstanding

Yeah, I think I could probably do it, maybe once, but then be all sour and not wanting to do it again another year, because it would have killed my general sense of importance of running.  But the thing is, this isn’t something that I would have to do, because at my current, American job, I already get an annual bonus that maybe wasn’t exactly 130% of my monthly intake, but it was close, and I got it simply for, doing my job.

I didn’t have to run 62 miles a month and 744 miles a year in order to gain it, and frankly I think that’s the whole point of a bonus is to reward those who do the grind with a little bit of coin at a set time of year, to where people could feel like they have some discretionary income for once.  Making employees have to do something they might not be open-minded to in the first place seems cruel and well, very Chinese, as far as expecting extra effort in order to receive incentive, as opposed to more American ideals of rewarding those who put in the work daily.

Digging deeper into this story, there’s all sorts of gray area as far as the requirements go; sure, the information is tracked presumably through fitness trackers and watches, but those things can be easily manipulated, especially in a cheating-friendly culture like China.  There’s also no clarification if walking is allowed, or if it specifically has to be running.  Unless there are specific running zones or treadmills in which the running has to occur, I have to imagine these employees are probably all cheating like motherfuckers in order to meet their mileage requirements and they’re all succeeding at meeting their marks.

I also love how the article’s choice of words make sure to point out that the boss of this company, as far as his own physical prowess:

My business can only endure if my employees are healthy,” said Lin, who claims to have scaled Mount Everest twice — once in 2022, and another time in 2023.

“Claims” as in even the writer of the article doesn’t believe his own physical capabilities and the slight shade implied that he is subjecting his employees to monetary hostage-held physical activity while not being held to the same standards himself, seeing as how he’s the owner of the company.

It’s funny that it’s a paper company that all this happening with, because it seems very much like a Chinese version of The Office kind of thing that Michael Scott would subject his team to incentive-based physical activities, all under the guise of, healthy employees are happier employees, not while realizing he’s making their lives miserable.

But on the flip side of things, the snark they’re getting from Weibo users, makes me understand why companies like this probably create initiatives as such:

You’d have to run two miles a day to meet the monthly target of 62 miles. So the company wants their staff to be track athletes?”

Say you’ve never run in your life without saying it – two miles a day in the grand spectrum of things isn’t really much.  If people still utilized step counters, they’d probably realize that most able-bodied people probably clear 3+ miles a day just with ordinary activities; again, not sure what the specific criteria is on the bonus challenge, but clearing two miles a day isn’t that difficult.  I’m basically living proof that two miles a day doesn’t make a person a track athlete.

These requirements would be considered excessive even for sporting school students. It will hurt their knees. Depending on one’s age and physical condition, it could also trigger acute heart failure,”

Disagree.  Two miles a day would be frankly pretty minimum for those focused on athletics.  I mean look at Manny Pacquiao, man probably ran upwards of 10 miles a day during his boxing peak, and that was in the tropical Philippines no less.  Sure, depending on age and physical condition there are risks, but in that case, don’t do it.  It’s for a bonus, and not for actual wages.  But I do think it’s funny how this user specifically zeroed in acute heart failure as the primary concern, and not exhaustion, dehydration, or any sort of tears or breaks, very typical Chinese worst-case scenario mentality there.

Either way, it’s not a perfect system, but at the same time, I don’t hate it.  If this, or any company offered a physical activity bonus on top of existing annual bonuses, I would definitely be all over it and be in it to win it, but if I also didn’t want to burn myself out, the secondary +30% your monthly wages for half the distance doesn’t seem so bad, and would be a sorely welcome bump in pay that I’d definitely be all about.

Heat check: Kelsey Plum’s fan interaction

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

SI: debates churn over WNBA star Kelsey Plum’s conduct when encountering an autograph seeking fan outside of the team hotel

My knee-jerk reaction when I saw this clip, was along the lines of lmao, the WNBA hasn’t ever had fans since before Caitlin Clark that their players have no idea how to conduct themselves when it comes to interacting with people who want autographs. 

I didn’t think the fan was overstepping any boundaries beyond being an obvious autograph seeker-slash-reseller, but it didn’t sound like he was being a pushy dick, and I thought Plum’s reaction and conduct were unnecessarily rude and combative, which led me to immediately think about how ironically funny it was that she probably just wasn’t used to there being such an interest in women’s professional basketball, and her going off the deep end as a result.

But I’m also a man, and I understand and can see both sides to the debate.  Women have gotten the short end of the stick when it comes to respect in athletics no matter how much they excel at the crafts in which they apply to, and so many men in the world are just fucking creeps, so I don’t really blame many women for having their shields up by default, especially when it comes to seeing men, looking for them specifically.

Autograph seekers-slash-resellers aren’t exactly the most savory people in the world, but they’re one of those things that comes with the territory when it comes to being a professional athlete and/or a celebrity.  Some people want autographs because they’re fans, and there are unfortunately people who want autographs because they see them as a way to make a quick buck.

It also doesn’t help that like 100% of them are dudes, which they already have one strike against from women, being men, but then they’re doing something that is most likely for selfish purposes which doesn’t help.

The fact that this story is a story goes to show that the WNBA has garnered more interest than it did a few years ago, and although I imagine that a lot of its players have grown to resent the Caitlin Clark train, she clearly has helped bring an increased level of focus onto the league as a whole, to the point where autograph seekers are now seeking autographs from other players.

Who really knows what was going on in Plum’s head at the very moment of this interaction.  Maybe she was having a bad day, the Sparks were coming off of an L or something, I don’t know, and neither does anyone else.  But I do feel like coming out firing with criticism probably wasn’t the best approach, regardless of if anyone feels she should be grateful that people have grown to care enough to want autographs, regardless of their motive.

Honestly though, Kelsey Plum kind of had it easy with this fan.  Female professional wrestlers have it way worse, with creepy wrestling fan incels not only doing the exact same thing, hanging out at hotels, but also following them at airports or public places, with a few having been noted to following them in parking garages.  Plum having a guy waiting outside the team hotel, in daylight, around other people, maintaining a stationary, manageable distance away when asking for autographs is nothing on the creep scale in comparison.

My personal conclusion is that Plum was in the wrong on this one, she could’ve been a little more polite and not come out guns blazing.  Her criticisms potentially make future fans think twice about trying to have an interaction with her or any WNBA player, and those fans could be the little girls and women that the league is trying to inspire.

Perhaps if more people get interested in the WNBA, the lesser we’ll see such weird and uncomfortable interactions between their players and potential fans.

CAITLIN CLARK CAITLIN CLARK CAITLIN CLARK PAIGE BUECKERS PAIGE BUECKERS PAIGE BUECKERS lol