In recent years, there has been an uptick in NBA misinformation circulating social media. Things kicked off with the "Ballsack Sports" account, which would frequently post misinformation disguised as relevant news. However, then "NBA Centel," an account parodying "The Dunk Central" account, formerly known as "NBA Central," entered into the mix.
Since then, the two accounts have dominated the misinformation news niche, inspiring others to create their own spoof accounts. The content has been somewhat controversial in the sports community, with some finding humor in the situation and others left fuming after being duped.
Now, following a wildly popular season that saw the league reach a bigger audience than ever before, a "WNBA Centel" account has popped up on X, formerly known as Twitter.
In an interview with FrontOfficeSports, the anonymous creator weighed in on the situation, giving credit to "Ballsack Sports" while refuting claims that he also runs the account. Per FOS, the man is from Toronto and said:
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“Ballsack Sports inspired me and many other troll accounts on this platform. He was the first to truly embrace this style of content, which encouraged me to give it a try and have fun with it. I didn’t expect it to gain as much traction as it did. And yeah, it definitely evolved from the beginning.
"I only manage @TheNBACentel. All the other ones are just copying me.”
Ballsack Sports founder weighs in on NBA Centel's virality
While the anonymous Centel founder praised Ballsack Sports for paving the way for the rest of the spoof news accounts, the respect between the two seems to be a two-way street.
While speaking with FrontOfficeSports, the Ballsack Sports founder, who also wanted to remain anonymous, spoke about the virality of Centel's posts, estimating that only 5% of users are actually in on the joke. He said:
“Centel has a knack for going viral consistently. I think you have those 5% of users that are well-versed on the inner workings of the basketball Twitter space and are ‘in’ on the joke. Then you have the rest of that 95% that probably aren’t as engaged with the app and so are more vulnerable to the bait.
“I’ve seen time and time again users post screenshots of their friends, coworkers, and family getting ‘cracked,’ ‘sacked,’ or ‘centel’d.'"
With the 2024-25 season upon us, both satire pages are already hard at work dropping hilarious content for the season ahead.
On Tuesday, the Centel account posted a photo of Crypto.com Arena ahead of the Lakers' season opener against the Timberwolves, alleging that the team is giving fans shirts with Bronny James on them.
In reality, the team is actually giving fans Jerry West shirts for tonight's game.
What are your thoughts about the X account? Have you ever been "centel'd"? Let us know in the comments section below!