Never before have NBA trade rumors and league whisperings been so important. In today’s social media age, sports news breaks in a matter of minutes. For the past several years, a “Woj Bomb” is the phrase coined for a breaking report or tweet by ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski—alerting the public about an NBA trade, transaction, or even just a rumor.
The phrase is aptly named, since Wojnarowski is almost single-handedly responsible for blowing up the internet, as well as sports journalism as a whole, with this seismic shift in the sports reporting business.
Wojnarowski, or “Woj,” started his journalism career in Connecticut, where he went to high school. As a high school senior, he started writing for the Hartford Courant, the largest daily newspaper in the state. After graduating from high school, and then college at St. Bonaventure University, Woj found his way to The Fresno Bee, where he wrote a sports column for two years. He had originally wanted to cover the Fresno State University basketball team, but ultimately lost the job to a reporter named Andy Katz—now an analyst for the Big Ten Network and a former ESPN reporter.
Two years later, Woj made his way to New Jersey, where he was a reporter for The Record, a New Jersey newspaper. There, he provided in-depth profiles of New York City sports teams, and was named “Columnist of the Year” in both 1997 and 2002 by the Associated Press Sports Editors.
For 10 years, Woj worked at The Record and grew in his reputation as a journalist. In 2006, he published a book, The Miracle of St. Anthony: A Season with Coach Bob Hurley and Basketball’s Most Improbable Dynasty. The book, which chronicled a season of St. Anthony High School’s basketball team and its famed coach, reached the New York Times best-seller list.
Then came his big break. In 2007, he joined Yahoo! Sports, a major player in sports media at the time. Seeing sports media’s trend towards the internet, he created a smart five-year plan for himself. Instead of investing in older NBA officials and executives, Woj focused on the younger group–assistant coaches and lower-tier officials. Over time, that young group went on to achieve prominent positions throughout the league, and Woj had connections with all of them.
And then came the 2011 NBA Draft.
Fans tuned in to ESPN to see their favorite teams select fresh college talent, just as they had done every year. But this time, a certain Yahoo reporter was about to upend the industry.
After the first overall pick was announced, Woj tweeted that Derrick Williams was going to be selected by the Minnesota Timberwolves with the second overall pick. Two minutes before the commissioner came out. Woj ended up tweeting out half of the first round’s draft picks before the commissioner made it official on ESPN. Fans on Twitter were sent reeling. Woj had 90,000 followers on Twitter at the time. Today, he has 3.7 million.
His rise to fame with Yahoo coincided with a strong hatred for ESPN. Woj was determined to fight against the large sports media conglomerate. From reporting breaking news before them to tweeting draft picks before they aired on the network, Woj made it a point to take down ESPN.
But in 2017, Yahoo had started to falter. And so Woj and ESPN worked out a deal that saw the two rivals reunited. Woj had previously written articles for ESPN earlier in his career–before his personal vendetta against them began.
Today, Woj is seen as the mecca of NBA news. “Adrian is basically a reporter on steroids,” Frank Isola–now a writer for The Athletic–called him. With his wealth of league sources and his tireless work ethic, Woj is often the first to report any breaking NBA news. And it’s a “#WojBomb” every time he does.
Indeed, blowing up fans’ phones and the world of sports journalism each time.
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