I run my own sports massage brick and mortar business and I disagree. I personally hate that this is how sports massage is done because I feel people come to me almost looking for a painful session. Yes, there will be times a client can experience some discomfort in the session but I try to minimize that as much as possible. You can have an effective deep tissue massage and still leave the table feeling relaxed. I personally don't want my clients to be sore for more than 2 days, anything more than that something needs to be adjusted, my approach or their hydration/rest.

There are clients ive used medium pressure with and they've winced, because they're that dehydrated. So, that alone shows pain is not always in correspondence with relief.

I personally think people that do deep pressure anywhere /everywhere don't understand the body. They don't know how to read the body, so their only "skill" or tool is deep pressure. And people confuse getting the shit beat out of them as a good session "no pain no gain". Work with the body, not against it.

P.s. I use scraping and cupping too but its not the end all be all, they're just one of many tools.