Every year when the folks at NBA 2K release their new batch of preseason player rankings, there are some that take offense to their position relative to their peers. Part of being an elite athlete is having immense self-confidence and belief in your abilities, and as such, their feeling about where they should be rated is often much higher than what a more objective observer would believe.
On top of that, sometimes the 2K folks whiff on ratings even relative to public consensus on a player, inevitably leading to backlash from fans when the ratings list comes out. Unlike, say, the ESPN NBA Rank folks, the way 2K goes about promotion is by working with players and as such they have a direct line to complain about their placement when new ratings come out. On Thursday, Zion Williamson — who is on the cover of the next-generation edition of NBA 2K21 — was told he was an 81 overall while doing some preseason media shoots with the Pelicans.
The second-year star was taken aback by being just an 81 and had to call up Ronnie 2K to lobby a formal complaint about his rating and try to get some answers.
.@Zionwilliamson wasn’t feeling his @NBA2K rating so he called @Ronnie2K himself to set things straight 😂 pic.twitter.com/HO4Ug0gKSi
— New Orleans Pelicans (@PelicansNBA) December 10, 2020
What Zion learned is that the Pelicans media team had pulled his rating from last year, and that he was actually an 86 currently, which seemed to appease Williamson. The funniest part is Zion telling Ronnie to “call Google” and fix what comes up when you search for his 2K rating, which is an incredible statement to make, but also given that he literally just effectively called 2K to get something straightened out makes total sense as to why he’d think that was possible.
