Whenever NBA games were broadcast on basic cable network TNT, many basketball fans stuck around for the postgame show, Inside the NBA, which features former NBA superstars such as Charles Barkley, Shaquille O'Neal and Kenny Smith recapping the game's key events with their in-depth analysis mixed with healthy doses of humor.
However, the nine-time Emmy Award-winning program wouldn't have received such acclaim is not for its affable host, Ernie Johnson.
Johnson, not being a former NBA superstar himself, doesn't get enough credit for his amazing body of work as the glue who holds the show together. A fan of his by the name of Paul Trimmier actually did a paper on him in college and tweeted him about the news. Little would Trimmier know that his encounters with Johnson after that tweet would turn into getting a dream job in TNT.
Paul you've gotta send me a copy of that. Don't know if I could handle it if you'd gotten a C-
— Ernie Johnson (@TurnerSportsEJ) April 18, 2017
Trimmier shared his inspirational story on why he decided to use Johnson as his model for his paper on parasocial interaction, which he received an “A” for and quickly took to Twitter to tell Johnson about his work. What ensued then was a series of fairy-tale-like interactions between Trimmier, who now works for Turner Sports as a social media editor, and Johnson, whose amiable on-air personality could not have been more true to form in the retelling of Trimmier's experience.
Head on over to Trimmier's LinkedIn page for the full, captivating story.
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