Absolutely, tons of rumors flying, always a lot of mudslinging between the fans of the top players. I used to dismiss them immediately because it just seemed like a bunch of angry haters trashing everyone they could, but in the past months there have been several accounts in which the naysayers accurately predicted the future or retroactively had far more accurate opinions/views than the mainstream fans. Obviously I still don't take them as gospel, but I feel they warrant some consideration so long as it's made clear that it's all unconfirmed.
As far as having shills trying to mislead the crowd, with the unnatural rate that random Chinese team members keep making it to Weibo's top searches list, I can't entirely dismiss the rumors that the team (or someone) is buying slots on the list and trying to generate publicity and popularity. ZJK's publicity team most likely does have shills (although tbh his crazy fangirls would probably do it for free lol), but I'm hard-pressed to believe that the team, or other players on the team, don't as well, not with players with less than 100k followers randomly making the top 50 without doing anything (for the non-Chinese peeps: this is a super small-fry number—this shit just doesn't happen on Weibo unless you buy it)
As for LGL, I figure it's either a power struggle (new guy coming up dethroning the local king in his jurisdiction), especially with reform efforts all across the board in Chinese sports (TT is far from the first since the Olympics), or, as rumors indicate, in investigating KLH they found dirt on LGL too.
Not entirely sure what you're saying for the last two lines, but I'll try to answer based on what I think you're saying? IF the latter case were true, then the government would be taking down LGL for reasons confirmed to the gov but thus far kept hidden from the public, so gossip to us outsiders but not gossip to the government. When I said "saving face" I meant that it would look really bad publicly taking down both older Grand Slam "kings" of the "National Sport," assuming they both had dirt, but as I said, this is a huge if. I guess we'll find out pretty soon though, I mean if LGL really isn't clean, I can't imagine the government would keep hiding it now that all this has happened. If the government doesn't say anything then I'm absolutely kicking this rumor to the curb as yet another dumb TT conspiracy.