(Video doesn’t show the end result of the heave but we all know that was buckets)

Woooo! EA Sports really putting the old “no such thing as bad publicity” adage to the test here. Yes I know it’s a demo, the product is unfinished, yada yada yada. That gives you some wiggle room if someone steps out of bounds and it isn’t called, or if a player slides through another on a pick, or if Dion Waters passes the ball. Those are excusable for a basketball video game demo. But short of having the actual basketball missing, a player shooting at the wrong hoop on a FREE THROW is just about as bad as it gets. I was watching a re-run of that Rachel Ray cooking show last night that pits 12-year-old chefs against each other. A twelve year old kid was making rice. It came out too sticky. So he didn’t serve it. A twelve year old knew not to put out a product if it wasn’t up to par.

Free throw development team. One job guys. One job.

“Alright guys…today’s the day. Everyone go through your code. Should we have the only player doing anything at all in this particular moment of the game shoot at hoop 1 or hoop 2?”

“Let’s try……hoop…2?”

“F***.”

This isn’t even close to the only problem people are seeing with the NBA Live demo either. Check out these headshots….

There’s a ton more in this story from the Sporting News. Now I know player likenesses are never perfect. This is a video game after all. But I think maybe hair color and race are realistic goals for NBA Live 17. Shoot for the moon, EA.

Loose ball! JR Smith grabs it….

That’s…..well that’s actually pretty spot-on.