In this week's Friday Five, Andrew offers up five more corrections to errors he's made in previous articles.

The post The Friday Five: 5 Corrections to Previous Articles (Part 2) appeared first on NLSC.

Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five provides five further corrections to some of my previous articles.

Many years back, I was having a spirited conversation in the Forum with one of our veteran members about some current event in the NBA. I mistakenly believed that I accurately recalled a statistic off the top of my head, which was the whole basis of my argument. I had no choice but to concede when I was fact-checked, at which point said Forum veteran – who frankly had an unhealthy love of debate and dislike for ever agreeing with anyone – scolded me for giving up too easily. I asked him, what did he want me to do? My position was based on an error. Debate over, first round knockout!

Unfortunately, online discourse is too frequently about performative debate. I wasn’t about to double-down on my own fallacious argument that had been disproven, and that meant I wasn’t playing the role that was expected of me. That’s too bad, because I have no interest in getting roped into that game! Similarly, I never want to be one of those content creators that refuse to admit when I’ve made a mistake, and I do make them! As I said when I previously made some corrections to a few of my articles, I like to think that I know my stuff and do my due diligence, but I have slipped up. As the saying goes, “fess up when you mess up”, so here are five more corrections!

1. The Hornets’ Valentine’s Day Jersey Had Multiple Appearances

As we all know, the red Valentine’s Day jersey that the New Orleans Hornets wore in 2007 to raise money for the American Heart Association only ever made one official appearance in a video game; specifically, as a retro uniform in NBA Live 10. That’s if we were to take my word for it, and we shouldn’t, because I was wrong when I said that! It’s true that the Valentine’s Day jersey makes a very rare appearance in NBA Live 10, but you can find it in other games as well. The catch is that it’s unlocked via a code in all of those titles, so it’s easy enough to overlook if you’re just firing up the game to check the uniforms on hand. Nevertheless, it’s research failure on my part.

So, which games did include the Valentine’s Day jersey? Well, NBA Live 07 for a start; years before NBA Live 10, and when it was actually current (albeit as a once-off). Sony’s NBA 07 features it as an unlockable as well. It doesn’t appear to have been included in NBA 2K7 as it’s not there out of the box and I can’t find a code for it, but if writing two articles issuing corrections for previous features has taught me anything, it’s to be careful about definitive statements! I can at least definitely say that it’s in those two 2007 season releases however, in addition to its surprising inclusion in NBA Live 10. It didn’t just appear once, as I’ve mistakenly claimed in the past.

2. MyCOURT on Last Gen Still Facilitates VC Grinding

In a Friday Five discussing five ways that VC earnings have been reduced, I noted that the removal of MyCOURT also removed a way of farming an extra 500 VC in between NBA games in MyCAREER. That is indeed a correct statement, but only in regards to the Next Gen/New Gen versions of NBA 2K, beginning with NBA 2K21 and the introduction of The City. MyCOURT is still available in The Neighborhood: the hub world in Current Gen/Prior Gen/Old Gen MyCAREER. Not only that, but you can still farm that additional VC by completing the same tasks during a shootaround on your MyCOURT. It’s not much to put towards the grind, but every little bit helps!

While I wasn’t wrong about the removal of that VC farming technique on Next Gen, nor did I claim that MyCOURT had been removed from Current Gen, the lack of that clarification does lead to some ambiguity. As such, when JuicyShaqMeat pointed it out, I made a note of it for the next time I posted a list of corrections. Beyond simply being correct about these things, I also want everyone who’s playing MyCAREER on Current Gen to know about an effective way to farm some extra VC. It’s important to know that that method is still viable for everyone aiming to go “No Money Spent”, which is the approach that I’ll always recommend in MyCAREER and MyTEAM.

3. Baron Davis’ Jersey on the NBA Street V3 Cover

Even if it’s a throwaway remark that isn’t really the point of an article, it’s still worth getting right! After all, it’s all part of the conversation once the article is published, so it’s only fair to provide corrections when I fail to fact-check. When I posted a third Friday Five article recalling cover players that often fly under the radar, one of the examples I gave was Baron Davis, who graced the cover of NBA Street V3. So far, so good! However, I proceeded to speculate that he’s probably overlooked as a former cover player because he’s not wearing his New Orleans Hornets jersey, meaning that many gamers might just vaguely recall there was a cover player wearing a headband.

Looking back on it now, it wasn’t a particularly good theory at all! Davis not being as big of a name as other cover players from around that time, and NBA Street V3 being generally overshadowed by other releases in the NBA Street series, are more likely theories than “people just remember it was some player in a headband”. However, the real blunder, as Pep pointed out, is that in the original photo the cover art uses, Davis is actually wearing a Hornets jersey! It’s cut off on the box art, but clearly there in the promotional images. As a side note, in that same article, for some reason I forgot to mention Shaquille O’Neal among the Miami Heat alum that have appeared on covers.

4. NBA 2K Online Does Technically Have (Some) Matchmaking

Although I’ve given up playing MyCAREER in recent NBA 2K titles, and thus have nothing do with the online team play modes anymore, I still want the scene to be as good as it could and should be. A key improvement that is sorely needed is proper matchmaking. I’ve said that in several articles and on various episodes of the NLSC Podcast, and I stand by it. Newcomers need to face competition at their skill level, so that they can get “get good” as they’re so often told to do. If you’re an elite player, you shouldn’t always be feasting on those newcomers for easy wins. Proper ranking, as well as unranked play and other matchmaking options, are an absolute must for 2K.

However, there is some semblance of matchmaking in the connected experiences of MyCAREER, as well as multiplayer games in MyTEAM. I do need to acknowledge that, because it isn’t technically accurate to say that there’s no matchmaking at all. To that point though, what the games do have leaves much to be desired as far as fairness and scope. The Theater isn’t nearly enough. Broad matchmaking for MyPLAYERs in The Rec based on Overall Rating – and even then, only at certain times of the day – is likewise insufficient. So, I will correct myself on this point because it’s important to be accurate, and frankly, it only strengthens the argument for proper matchmaking.

5. Rasheed Wallace’s Hawks Stint Did Appear in One Game

This is one of those corrections that I have mixed feelings about. On one hand, I’m annoyed that I overlooked something while doing research, particularly since I did try to be as meticulous as possible. On the other hand, the correction alerted me to an interesting new fact that I can now share moving forward! When I covered five stints that never appeared in any official rosters, the first example on the list was Rasheed Wallace’s one-game stint with the Atlanta Hawks. I combed through every game in my collection that’s set in the 2004 season, and looked up the rosters in the few that I don’t own, to make sure that stint wasn’t represented in any of them. I found it wasn’t.

Not so fast! As it turns out, Sheed is on the Hawks in Midway’s NBA Ballers! I do have that game, but given that it was released in April 2004, I figured that no further research was necessary. Rookie mistake! Though he only played one game for the Hawks, Sheed was actually on their roster from February 9th to 19th, which clearly allowed the trade to be a last minute addition to NBA Ballers (and provides some fun insight into its development). Funnily enough, I did change Dominique Wilkins’ Spurs stint to an honourable mention after finding its official appearances, so I thought I’d covered all my bases. I hadn’t, but at least the correction is fun trivia in its own right!

Not Quite Examples, But Worth Mentioning

Speaking of honourable mentions, in compiling a list of corrections for this article, I came up with a couple of other examples that aren’t errors as such, but are still worth following up on. The first is an addition to my article on Shaquille O’Neal’s Superman tattoo. In that Wayback Wednesday feature, I covered how Shaq’s Man of Steel ink has had some interesting depictions over the years, most likely to avoid any copyright issues. I included some fun examples, but neglected to mention the solution that San Diego Studio came up with in NBA 07. As you can see from the above screenshot, in that game, it became “Man of Stone” along with a jackhammer. That’s a good one!

Meanwhile, in a Monday Tip-Off article published back in 2019, I boldly predicted that we wouldn’t ever see another retro mode in NBA 2K. My main argument was that it wouldn’t make money, which made it highly unlikely. Fortunately, I was wrong! Not only have we had a redo of the Jordan Challenge in NBA 2K23 and a celebration of Kobe Bryant with Mamba Moments in NBA 2K24, but MyNBA Eras has added a ton of historical content to the franchise experience! These are slightly different to the other corrections – one’s an additional example, the other a (well-reasoned) prediction that was happily proven wrong – but I still feel the need to acknowledge them here.

Have you encountered any other mistakes in my features that require corrections? As you can see, I’m willing to admit when I get these things wrong, and follow up with the correct information! If nothing else, it often leads to more interesting stories and trivia for us to enjoy. In any case, hit me up with any corrections in the comments or in the NLSC Forum, as well as any tales of when you found out you were mistaken about a basketball video game! Hopefully, I’m not the only one! With that being said, that’s all for this week, so thanks for checking in, have a great weekend, and please join me again next Friday for another Five.

The post The Friday Five: 5 Corrections to Previous Articles (Part 2) appeared first on NLSC.