The Most Unplayable Maverick of the Week

[DallasMaverick]

I’m wondering how this psychological quality affects people’s perception of players:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativity_bias

Here’s my theory:  

Players who make highly visible negative plays (whether mistakes, or just misses) receive significantly more scorn and hatred than players who don’t.

Examples of highly visible negatives:

THJ’s “heat check” 3-pointers early in the shot clock (when he misses, of course).

Powell fumbling a rebound, or being pushed around inside.

Hardy missing some contested shots.

Luka turning the ball over or misssing a three at a critical time.

Green choosing to pass rather than shoot.

So what?

It takes significantly more positive performance to have the same psychological “weight” as negative performance.

So, although Powell’s metrics are almost always pretty favorable, they aren’t highly visible. So he gets very little positive “weight” in many people’s minds.

THJ’s shooting numbers are good, but it’s the misses that make many people want to trade him.

I haven’t seen anyone clamoring to trade or cut Luka yet, but massive criticism about his conditioning, his style of play? Sure, after a loss.

Green is a pretty solid, borderline starter. He makes lots of winning plays. But only after hitting a couple of recent game-winners are people “forgiving” his hesitation to hoist up shots.