The Houston Rockets have fired the employee responsible for sending an offensive tweet to the Dallas Mavericks on Tuesday.
With the Rockets leading late in Game 5 and set to eliminate the Mavericks, the Rockets' official Twitter account sent a tweet with a gun emoji next to a horse head emoji, the implication being obvious that Houston was about to put Dallas out of its misery.
AWKWARD TWITTER TENSION pic.twitter.com/uRZSebMZ1D
— rach (@RachaelHoops) April 29, 2015
The Rockets immediately deleted the tweet and issued an apology, later confirming the firing to ESPN.
Our Tweet earlier was in very poor taste & not indicative of the respect we have for the @dallasmavs & their fans. We sincerely apologize.
— Houston Rockets (@HoustonRockets) April 29, 2015
It wasn't exactly an appropriate tweet, but the employee's firing surprised many on Wednesday. Chad Shanks, the employee in question, and the team's now-former digital communications manager, sent out a three-part tweet addressing the situation while also changing his Twitter bio to read: "Will probably be tweeting less about basketball now."
Sometimes you can go too far. I will no longer run @HoustonRockets but am grateful to the organization that let me develop an online voice.
— Chad Shanks (@chadjshanks) April 29, 2015
I did my best to make the account the best in the NBA by pushing the envelope, but pushed too far for some and for that I apologize.
— Chad Shanks (@chadjshanks) April 29, 2015
I hope there's another organization out there in need of someone willing to take chances and create engaging social content. I hope.
— Chad Shanks (@chadjshanks) April 29, 2015
Again, the tweet was in poor taste, but the basketball community on Twitter seemed taken aback by the swift and harsh punishment.
I also continue to be disappointed that the only way we feel we can make the world a better place or learn is for someone to be fired.
— Hardwood Paroxysm (@HPbasketball) April 29, 2015
Really silly, IMO, that a kid would get fired over using a couple emojis in a tweet. Not the most tasteful, but so what? And I love animals.
— Chris Herring (@HerringWSJ) April 29, 2015
Fire everyone, for everything.
— Zach Lowe (@ZachLowe_NBA) April 29, 2015
Oh, man. Rockets fired the guy that sent that tweet last night? I don't think they had to go that far.
— Rey-Rey (@TheNoLookPass) April 29, 2015
maaaaannnnn...FIRED?
— Robby Kalland (@RKalland) April 29, 2015
Even Dirk Nowitzki found himself asked about the tweet, using the opportunity to take a jab at Gersson Rosas, the former Mavericks general manager and current Rockets VP of basketball operations.
Dirk on "unfortunate" @HoustonRockets tweet: "The guy behind the mobile phone was a little too excited or something. Maybe it was Gersson."
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) April 29, 2015
Shanks spoke to The Sporting News about his termination and explained his thought process with the tweet, taking full ownership of the situation:
Once we had the game (and the series) locked up with a minute or so left, I wanted to take a jab at the Mavs (something I’ve done every so often with other teams), and that idea popped into my head. I meant it to just be a play on taking an old horse out to pasture that would get our fans even more pumped up and agitate Mavs fans. Obviously, things didn’t turn out that way. I didn’t think people would equate pretend violence on an emoji horse with actual violence on a real horse. That’s not what I intended, but my job was to anticipate how these things would go over, and I failed.
