Following somebody's recommendation on the ESB Discord, I'm starting a thread here so the community can try and sort out a debate that's been going on and off for the last couple months or so.
So... let me provide some background info first for those who haven't been a part of the discussion. My friends and I are very passionate collectors of old Nickelodeon TV recordings, and naturally SpongeBob falls into that category. For a while, we were stumped by a recording of "Your Shoe's Untied / Squid's Day Off" that is promoted as a "NEW!" episode with commercials that would place the broadcast on February 17, 2001. This is in direct contradiction with the ESB/Wikipedia/TV.com air date of November 2, 2000. Furthermore, "Wormy / Patty Hype" is said to have premiered on the February 17th date.
Confusing, right? We were too, but then somebody on the ESB Discord found air dates in the SpongeBob Exposed! book which largely differed from what's been assumed for years. And to my friends' and my surprise, "Your Shoe's Untied / Squid's Day Off" was listed for February 17, 2001 -- the same date that our tape indicated. Additional surprise were found, such as "The Chaperone / Employee of the Month" premiering during March Toon Mania and "Hooky / Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy II" being held over until 2001.
The Discord user provided images of the entire episode guide from that book, and for a moment it looked like the real air dates had been found! But some Discord users weren't convinced, claiming that the "Exposed!" book and newspaper listings weren't enough proof, and they made it very clear that they didn't think the newly discovered air dates should be added to the wiki. They stood their ground, and my friends and I stood ours.
Nevertheless, I continued to do research with my friends on other Nickelodeon recordings we've found since then. In the process, we uncovered forum postings on an old SpongeBob fan site where, naturally, new episodes were discussed. And to our surprise, many of these posts matched up with the "Exposed!" air dates and the ones indicated by tapes we've discovered since.
For example:
"Dying for Pie / Imitation Krabs" and "Big Pink Loser / Bubble Buddy"
"Your Shoe's Untied / Squid's Day Off" and "Wormy / Patty Hype"
Well-known TV archivist NickandMore has done similar research to me and my friends, and run into the same disputes.
It's extremely unlikely that fans who were consistently watching a weekly series would post excitedly about episodes being new if they'd aired that many months prior (surely by then, there would have been reruns), so I stand firm on the grounds that these four air dates are correct.
January 27, 2001 - Dying for Pie / Imitation Krabs
February 3, 2001 - Big Pink Loser / Bubble Buddy
February 17, 2001 - Your Shoe's Untied / Squid's Day Off
February 24, 2001 - Wormy / Patty Hype
Unfortunately, the forum posts aren't without their additional mysteries. While many mysteries are seemingly wrapped up, several posts exist on spongebobsquarepants.net which suggest that some Season 2 episodes originally premiered by themselves and then re-aired as a "NEW!" pairing. Regrettably, I haven't uncovered any TV broadcasts or schedule listings which line up with this suggestion one way or another, but I can say with full confidence that the airdates listed on NickandMore, SpongeBob Exposed!, and further supported by the TV recordings I have are accurate to the best information that currently exists.
Rather than continue this debate on the Discord, I'm carrying it over to the Wiki's forums directly, in the hopes that we can uncover more TV recordings and other resources which prove--one way or another--when these episodes truly premiered.