So I probably overreacted. Still very frustrating to speak to my friends in real life who view Reddit as this "national pulse" type source.
I can't get myself too worked up about the opinions of little teenagers. Sometimes that place does annoy me or frustrate me, but then I remember that a lot of them just started watching basketball like 5 years ago and can't form their own opinions. The level of group-think can be ridiculous at times. I knew Reddit was crap when u could say something in November and get downvoted to hell, but say that same thing in December and get a ton of upvotes. That place is too fickle. Your opinion gets dismissed based on what flair u have.
IF you're on Clutchfans, you shouldn't even be going to any other basketball related forum. Period. I don't care what reddit or realgm or TMZ say about the Rockets and you shouldn't either, I hope.
Lemme get this straight...you're proposing a forum war to defend the honor of the city of Houston, the Rockets, and Clutchfans... This thread is a great example as to why Clutchfans is, increasingly accurately in my opinion, perceived as a bunch of overly sensitive homers and why I head to Reddit first.
Are you one of the wusses that apologizes for our team over and over on that board then? The problem with giving an inch to those people is that, it completely allows for the opposite to occur, for us to get zero calls and for others to continue flopping on and fouling us because the perception is that we do it back just as much. Perception is reality in the NBA, and the Rockets are a better team than the Spurs. We are only losing to them because the nation can't believe that it's true.
I don't even know how to read Reddit. I'm constantly amazed at the popularity of the site given how bad the navigation seems to me to be.
I'm going to side with you, OP, even if I disagree somewhat. Yes, Reddit is a cesspool of trolls and idiots who think they know basketball but mostly just love the narratives (e.g. Harden is a flopper and a terrible defender). However, I will cautiously agree that an NBA player's image on the internet seems to have at least some impact on how they are portrayed by the media. Consequently, how a player is portrayed by the media then somewhat affects how referees and the league perceive a player. These seem to be subtle psychological issues related to bias. Nonetheless, I want the Rockets to win, so if changing the narrative on Reddit helps us win, I'll do it. What exactly are you proposing as a solution?
I like r/nba a lot for its non-rockets coverage of just highlights, news etc. But OP has a point the overall group over there dislikes the Rockets a lot. After every Rockets win in the playoffs there are a few posts that are on the front or at the top. After every Rockets loss in the playoffs the majority of the front page is posts about Rockets doing bad etc. The greatest example was how it was after game 1 of this series to how it looked after game 2. Its kind of surprising, but i think the posting there is also an accurate reflection of the overall media. The mainstream sports media collectively are low on the Rockets - be it Harden or D'Antoni or maybe hangover from Dwight but first the Rockets beat one of their darlings in the OKC Westbrook and now could prevent the anticipated GSW/Spurs matchup. People will post tweets/articles etc from whats available and there is way more pro-"other team" stuff out there than pro-rockets.
I have seen sports writers take things from Reddit frequently, especially on online articles. But, what can we do? I'm too lazy to "engage" idiotic casual fans masquerading as know-it-alls online.
They go back and forth with favoritism with Rockets wins and losses. Wins="rockets are scary, rockets are spooky" Losses=#notmymvp, flopper, choker, lol rockets" circle jerk They absolutely hate Lou Will and Harden
I think it's definitely associated. Now as to which one is causing the other, that's harder to determine. Is it Skip Bayless and Max Kellerman always taking the anti-Rockets stance on vapid ESPN pundit shows? Is it Marc Stein and Tim Cowlishaw and Tim McMahon and whichever other Dallas-based reporter giving subtle jabs to the Rockets on print media? Or have the internet trolls run amok, and the cart has now overtaken the horse in propagating a narrative that is clearly damaging to our team.
I agree with this also. I will say that the national media has been kinder to the Rockets than in past years. One reason is because of D'Antoni. His redemption from the Lakers and Knicks years is juicy for the media and affects two of their largest markets. The amount of scoring is exciting, so the media doesn't have a problem with that either. The main issue seems to be Harden. From what I can tell, Harden seems like a great guy and well-spoken. He has a chill, interesting style. Yet it's Westbrook's quest for personal glory that is idolized rather than Harden's transition to the team-first offensive havoc run by D'Antoni (and Harden). His ridiculous numbers will never be as good as Westbrook's triple doubles. Why were we (nationally) talking about Oscar Robertson's record instead of Tiny Archibald's? I don't get it.
Such a dumb thread. YES R/NBA does swing from loving Harden and the Rockets to hating on them. That's the nature of the sub. They do that with ALL TEAMS and PLAYERS. This thread is a microcosm of our political opinions. People can't take being disagreed with. You all want a safe space and look at outside sites as biased and untrustworthy. Get over it and grow up. R/NBA is more informative than the shitposts that come out of the GARM 60% of the time.
Harden has a game based on flopping, deceiving the refs, throwing his hands up and his head all the way back on minimal contact. If he wasn't a rocket, I'd hate him too.
@OP: If it bothers you that much, don't go to Reddit for your NBA / Rockets fix. It's that easy. If you can boycott ESPN, you can boycott r/NBA. The people who are positive are quickly destroyed by the people who are negative. Sadly, this is human nature. The solidarity for criticism is more than the solidarity for optimism, usually.
It's not about how much I am bothered by it. It's about how much the Rockets' chances for a championship are damaged by the national perception of our team. The Warriors in 2015 were a team with comparable talent to those Howard Harden Rockets. In 2014 with Mark Jackson they had a worse outcome than us. What changed in one year? Steve Kerr figured out which fouls were not called in today's NBA (the moving screen while Bogut / Draymond rolled into the chasing defender pretending to look at the rim for a rebound) and exploited the hell out of it. All of a sudden an injury prone no-defense Curry went from lovable loser fan favorite into MVP favorite, all because he could make that open three off the dribble while his teammates protected him on the other end and allowed him to pretend to be Chris Paul, doing nothing but patrolling the passing lanes. The narrative for GSW changed, and almost overnight they turned into NBA champions before the playoffs even started. This is the way things happen in the NBA. If you want the Rockets to win anything you have to start from the ground up, because without your voter base you aren't going anywhere.
r/nba isn't for great or even good analysis. It's for getting league wide news fast, looking at clips, etc. And its great for that.