It started with 2K Sports tweeting out screenshots from NBA 2K18 that included the overall ratings of the players depicted. Here is our man John Wall’s edition:
A 90! Not bad, I guess? I am told that John Wall’s rating as of the final update to NBA 2K17—player ratings are updated periodically to reflect trends in player performance—was also a 90. It makes sense, then, that Wall’s rating for the next annual iteration of the 2K series would start where the previous version stopped. When you consider that Wall’s best and highest-rated teammate, Bradley Beal, came in with an 87 overall, 90 seems about right.
This did not please Mr. Wall! Wall took his gripe straight to Twitter user Ronnie Singh, a 2K Sports employee who tweets under the handle @Ronnie2K.
A brief, testy back and forth ensued, with several passive-aggressive “lols”:
That is where the public portion of this Twitter exchange ended. But here is a report from CSN Mid-Atlantic, indicating that Wall’s beef with Ronnie 2K over his rating in a video game did not end there. Apparently, after the salt shaker GIF, and Wall’s subsequent and ominous lack of response, Ronnie 2K tried to reach out to Wall via direct message:
“I don’t really care for games. I play them for fun. He just tried to say my rating was a 93 when it ended last year. No, it wasn’t. It was a 90,” Wall said. “Well, so what? Then, he sent me a DM after and was like ‘I’m just playing.’ I was like ‘don’t try to be friendly with me.’”
Don’t try to be friendly with me. Pretty strong sentiment to end a statement that began with “I don’t really care for games” and “I play them for fun.” Wall is not even mad. In fact, he doesn’t really care at all. It’s funny to him! Ha ha! But also, Ronnie 2K is totally dead to him.