Mavrelous wrote:shrink wrote:Dallas/Fort Worth is the fifth the largest DMA in the United States, and McMahon has a national stage. I don’t think you are seeing typical small market coverage “all the time” watching the Mavs.
And I’m not sure I believe the assumption that local coverage is inherently biased. I’m in Minnesota, whose market is a third the size of LA, but three times bigger than teams like OKC, MEM, UTA, and SA. The Wolves longtime color man Jim Peterson is frequently critical of the team, and he’s had plenty to criticize over the last couple of decades. Meanwhile, national reporters don’t come to Minnesota (“bring your ass, Barkey”), and no reporter here has a national voice like McMahon. National sources, even the Athletic, generally interview Jon Krawcinski, who I agree probably spins things towards management. Ergo, the national media doesn’t often have a good picture on the Wolves, either because they don’t get the right sources, and/or are too lazy to investigate themselves.
I understand the need for balance between local fans that might be too homer, and national fans who may be less biased, but aren’t getting great info nationally to form good opinions. This balance is one of my favorite parts of the RealGM community. The truth often lies between these two positions.
Wolves will get national coverage soon because of Ant, Dallas simply got coverage because Dirk then Luka, Cuban also made sure to put Dallas basketball on the map in the early 00s with his loud mouth and brazen tactics.
Beat writers have to meet the personnel every game they travel with them, they have to tame their criticism, even popular podcasts, have to toe the line to get media access, that's not to day they don't criticize the team, but it takes a lot, for example, 22-23 was a complete disaster for the Mavs, you didn't get any peep in the local media about what went wrong, 24 was obviousely a massive success, but if you listen to local media, you won't necessarily know that Mavs paid huge price for the roster overhaul and lost control of their draft for 4 years, while national podcast the the Hoop collective will certainly say this.
Speaking of national podcast, the Hoop collective, to emphasize my point, Tim Bontemps is a straight shooter when it comes to 29 teams in the league, he doesn't sugarcoat anything, with the Sixers he tones it down and goes out of this way to complement them, I'm sure the fact it's his own turf and needing to keep good connections plays a big part in that.
Don't forget though, at least for now we also get the Gobert and Towns hot takes garbage. So I wouldn't call the national takes as unbiased quite yet.
