One of the most important basketball reporters of our time has finally decided to call it quits, as Adrian Wojnarowski announces this week that he will leave ESPN to join the St. Bonaventure University men’s basketball team as general manager. Quite a turn of events for the iconic writer, who left an unerasable mark on everyone around the NBA.
Not only did the league’s communication department left his a tribute on social media, which ended with a sentimental “Sources close to the situation say that his future is bright,” but also many franchise executives have delivered words of gratitude for Woj.
For example, Oklahoma City’s vice president and general manager was one of the first to dedicate him some gratitude. “Skill is seen over a long-time horizon, and when you think about someone like Adrian, what’s clear is he always adapted to all the changes to the industry and the league over a long period of time.
Adrian Wojnarowski has retired from sports reporting.
Salute to a LEGEND 🫡 pic.twitter.com/KDPnza4BWR
— Whistle (@WhistleSports) September 18, 2024
“He’s regularly operating at ownership levels, with many people at the league office, and the agent community in ways that were not thought possible when he first began,” recalled Sam Presti, after years of dealing with news involving the Thunder.
Another GM that has been around for years is Justin Zanik, who is convinced that the reason Adrian has been so successful is due to the amount of empathy and goodwill that he carries. “He did it not only with hard work and drive, but he did it with compassion.
“He always tried to understand what was going on and the purpose, not just to break the news, which I think is what had made him so successful,” shared the Utah executive when heard about the news this week.
Due to his age, the Jazz manager sees it as perfectly natural to see him pursue a different future. “So when I saw the news, it made a lot of sense to me that he had standards for what he wanted to do for the rest of his life and the other dreams he wants to pursue. And his family, with his kids getting older and having a chance to be able to spend time with him, going out on top is never a bad thing,” Zanik concluded.
After decades of working as a reporter and insider, Woj also dealt in special relationships with player agents from both the NBA and NFL
Not only club managers hold Adrian in high regards, but to become the greatest insider in American sports, you also most entangle yourself in deep connections with the players and their agents. This is why many agents around the NBA have also given tribute to Wojnarowski. “It’s his work ethic, his character, his compassion, and his ability to build real, genuine relationships,” said Aaron Mintz.
“He was elite in all of those. And the trust you had with him because of his strong value system was huge. He’s sharp, and his emotional intelligence is off the charts as well. He was the best at what he did. He did it the right way. And it’s interesting, as shocking as this was to many people, knowing who Woj is, I think it’s fantastic that he retired on his terms,” added the player representative.
There are other such as Mark Bartelstein, who dealt with players from both the NBA and the NFL. “First and foremost, it’s his work ethic. He was relentless, but not relentless in a negative way. Sometimes in the media, relentlessness can get people in trouble.
“Where you lose trust, you lose respect because you’re more out for the story than you are about understanding people’s lives are involved. And to me with Adrian, where I have so much respect for him, is that he fully understood that,” said Bartelstein, despite recognizing that Woj sometimes announced things at the wrong moment.
