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Congratulations are in order for “Inside the NBA” host Kenny Smith. The former two-time NBA champ and his fiancée, Croatian influencer Tia Jurcic, were married at The Resort at Pelican Hill, they announced Tuesday in a joint Instagram post. “Mr. & Mrs. Smith 🤍” the pair wrote with a white emoji.
Shamit Dua: Hello there. I'm moving my coverage to intheno.net If you subscribed to the substack, nothing is going to change for you. You will get all the content directly in your inbox. As always, the content will remain FREE, but you can choose to support my coverage by subscribing as a paid member.
Christopher Hine: After 8 years covering the Timberwolves, I’m off to my next step — covering the 76ers for the @PhillyInquirer .
Sam Amick: "I had a really strange experience about three weeks before (LeBron) made his decision. I got a reminder that in this job, on the one hand, we're playing in the sandbox, right? It's not that serious. On the other, you clearly have fans and people out there who think it would be funny to get us to report things incorrectly. So a few weeks before he made his decision, I basically got catfished from a reporting standpoint and it was pretty wild. Somebody gets your number, and I'm assuming maybe they used AI to write some of it, a pretty compelling text message, claiming that they were somebody else who I knew but didn't know all that well. Long story short, it was weird because it was like, they said that it was Philly. And on the one hand, you might go, oh, did you get an early tip? And it's like, without getting in the weeds too much, no, it absolutely was not an early tip. It was a total scam."
Michael Porter Jr.: "Especially during this time, I'm in contract negotiations. I was trying to stay away from the podcast world, but I thought this one would be unique because most of the stuff I do is with other guys. Obviously, you guys are going to have your opinion as women, so it's going to be fun."
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Jonathan Abrams: What if OKC had kept Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and James Harden? Excited to announce my next book, WHEN WE WERE YOUNG AND FEARLESS, coming 11/3—a deep dive into the trio that reshaped the NBA. Pre-order link: harpercollins.com/products/when-
LeBron James and ESPN are closing in on an agreement for a behind-the-scenes documentary series that will be similar to Michael Jordan’s “The Last Dance,” according to industry sources granted anonymity as they were not authorized to talk about the deal that is not finalized. One of the sources described the talks as being at the “one-yard line,” with the expectation that James, 41, will have a camera crew documenting his time with the Philadelphia 76ers, who James signed with this month. The 76ers are expected to be the final home of his legendary career.
For the James’ documentary, there is no set date for when it would be completed and air. ESPN and a representative for James declined comment. James recently signed a two-year, $8 million deal with the 76ers, looking to win his fifth championship in the NBA.
DAZN: Today, DAZN and @Timberwolves announced a local media rights partnership that will provide fans with an entirely new flexible viewing experience. This direct-to-fan streaming offering will make DAZN the franchise’s exclusive home for Timberwolves basketball throughout its local broadcast territory, providing access to Timberwolves games and broader team content through a new team-branded subscription service. Fans can also enjoy 15 free games available during the regular season.
Another host then asked whether Paul believed the meeting had escaped Charania's attention. "I thought it got by Shams because he never said anything to me about that," Paul said. "Nobody knew about that. It didn't get out anywhere. Nobody knew about that."
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DAZN will become the exclusive digital home of the MSG and YES networks this fall, in a breakthrough announcement Wednesday that is a likely precursor to deals with seven more NBA teams in the coming days and weeks. While paying undisclosed rights fees and sharing advertising revenue, DAZN will stream all non-national game broadcasts for MSG’s Knicks, Rangers, Islanders, Devils and Sabres and YES Network’s Yankees and Nets -- effectively a takeover of the entire Gotham Sports direct to consumer app. In addition, multiple NBA sources told SBJ that DAZN is close to acquiring full exclusive local broadcast rights next season for the T’Wolves, Cavaliers, Pacers, Spurs and Grizzlies, as well as DTC-only arrangements with the Magic and possibly the Hornets.
Sources said DAZN is also likely to add a non-exclusive streaming deal with at least one more NBA team in coming weeks -- perhaps the Wizards, who Segev specifically mentioned are clients of new DAZN partner ViewLift -- meaning DAZN could house one-third of the league by the start of the 2026-27 season. With the NBA about to launch a centralized hub for local broadcasts ahead of the 2027-28 season, the agreements would seem to carry both risk and enormous business upside. Outside of the Knicks and Nets -- who Segev said have multi-year deals -- sources told SBJ that each of the seven other potential NBA teams have asked for either one-year deals or one-year exit clauses in anticipation of the league’s aggregated hub.
The WNBA delivered one of its five largest audiences on record for Saturday’s All-Star Game. Saturday’s WNBA All-Star Game from Chicago averaged 3.2 million viewers on ABC, marking the fifth-largest audience of any kind in league history, behind only the 2024 All-Star Game, the winner-take-all Game 3 of the 1999 WNBA Finals, and two games on the league’s inaugural weekend of play in 1997. Viewership increased 44% from last year’s All-Star Game, which Fever G Caitlin Clark missed due to injury (2.19M), but fell short of the record 3.44 million for the aforementioned 2024 All-Star Game, which featured Clark and a WNBA vs. Team USA format. The past three years rank as easily the most-watched in the history of the All-Star Game, comfortably surpassing the longstanding high of 1.44 million in 2003.
Jaylen Brown on his decision to start his own shoe brand: "I decided with my time, because of my frustrations with brands, just to start my own. I've been a Top 5 MVP candidate. Should have been Top 1 one, but the media votes for that. All-star, all-star starter, all these different things, and they just keep moving the bar on me, and that's fine, because I'm not chasing their bar, I'm chasing my own. I'm going to get even better. That's why I'm here, to get even better at the details and efficiency, because people think they've seen the best version of me and they want me to see me fail or move the bar."