Source: Allen Berezovsky/Getty
NBA Insider Adrian Wojnarowski announced that he was leaving ESPN and taking on a newly created role at his alma mater.
The sports world it was It was a shock Wednesday (September 18) when ESPN NBA reporter Adrian Wojnarowski announced he was retiring from his reporting career. “The craft has changed my life, but I have decided to retire from ESPN and the news industry. I understand the commitment required for my role and it is an investment that I am no longer driven to make. Time is not endless and I want to spend mine in ways that are more personally meaningful,” he said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, concluding with: “After all these years of reporting on everyone's teams , I proceed back to mine.”
The 55-year-old reporter started his career at Hartford Courantsteps up to become a national NBA correspondent with Yahoo Sports. There he delivered some of the most sensational news in basketball, from his coverage of LeBron James and “The Decision” in 2010 and coverage of the NBA draft to winning the championship on draft nights, which would be published in posts on X and became known as “Woj Bombs” by writers and audiences alike. “What he did so effectively was take a lot of that traditional journalism and use Twitter.” he said Hofstra University Assistant Professor of Radio, Television and Film, Laith Zuraikat. “I'm sure others thought of it, but no one did it as well as he did. He was the guy.”
Wojnarowski is leaving the network he has been a part of since 2017 to take a new position as CEO at the University of St. Bonaventure. The reporter is a 1991 graduate of the institution's Jandoli School of Communication in western New York. “It's a thrill of a lifetime to be able to give back to a university and community that I love as a service to our student-athletes, coaches and institution,” Wojnarowski said in a ESPN interview upon his departure. “I hope I can add value in many areas to our basketball program and open doors for the future of our young people in ways both professional and personal.” The GM role is a fairly recent position in college basketball, thanks to the creation of the transfer portal and name, image and likeness agreements for student-athletes.
