"Tragic day in NBA community" - NBA Twitter in shock as Timberwolves Brasil's X account gets deactivated

The Timberwolves Brasil account on X (formerly Twitter) has become a major talking point among NBA fans. While some were in favor of the lewd and oftentimes outright crude posts that the Timberwolves Brasil account made, others have been eagerly awaiting its downfall. This week, fans noticed that the account had been removed from X, causing quite an uproar.

The account had gone viral on several occasions for posting photos and gifs of animated mascots doing sexualized acts, creating quite a stir. Some found the gifs to be good-natured fun, albeit a bit odd, while others have been waiting for the page to be suspended.

While it's unclear what led to the demise of the Timberwolves Brasil account, on Friday, photos began to surface of the account. The message that was displayed on the account simply read: "Something went wrong. Try again."

Some claimed that the page had been suspended by the platform formerly known as Twitter, while others said that the owner had deactivated the page. The main difference, of course, is that if the account was suspended, it may not return.

On the flip side, others pointed out that if the owner deactivated the account of his own accord, then it could return in the future. With plenty in the air, let's turn it over to NBA Twitter, which has continued to share mixed reactions to the news.

What has the owner of the Timberwolves Brasil account said about the page?

From the time that the Timberwolves Brasil account first rose to prominence, fans had questions. Was the account simply the result of a language and cultural barrier that led to some of the posts being misinterpreted? Was it all just part of an elaborate joke?

At the same time, with the team surging to their best record in years, the Timberwolves Brasil account couldn't have come at a better time. The questions continued to gain traction, with the biggest question being why the owner was combining fetishized 'furry' content and NBA content.

Last year, Rolling Stone caught up with Rodrigo Barbosa, a Brazilian NBA fan who had been cheering the team on from afar. As he explained to Rolling Stone, he first fell in love with basketball as a kid, playing NBA Live on PlayStation.

Beginning in 2004, he started watching the team, which at that time had Kevin Garnett at the helm, which led him to play high school basketball. When it comes to the controversial and now deleted account, he explained:

“I only look for funny videos that have wolves in them. Just that ... To be completely honest, until last year I didn’t even know what furry was, I always thought they were ‘funny wolf videos.’ I had no idea there was a community (or fetishes) about this. Timberwolves wins are my fetish. My only fetish!”

While the account appears to be no more, in the future, that could very well wind up changing depending on whether Barbosa deleted it or X banned him.