OLEAN, N.Y. (AP) — Adrian Wojnarowski was dogged in cultivating relationships over the past 37 years that distinguished his peerless basketball reporting.
Leveraging those connections with the same drive and passion that introduced the phrase “Woj bomb” into the basketball lexicon for his numerous scoops, the former ESPN NBA insider believes his journalism experience will boost the men’s basketball program at alma mater St. Bonaventure.
Reintroduced on Wednesday at what he called “a magical place,” Wojnarowski made clear he would remain in the relationship business in his new job as general manager of the Bonnies.
“I learned about the importance of relationships at St. Bonaventure,” Wojnarowski said. “How to build them, how to nurture them, and how to value them. That has carried me through my life. And it has carried me right back to be here.”
His decision, announced last week, was considered stunning. The 55-year-old left behind his high-profile platform and a contract extension he signed two years ago that pays him $7 million a year, to return to his modest roots.
St. Bonaventure is a private Franciscan school with an enrollment of about 2,000 students, and located in the Allegany Mountains in southwest New York, about a 90-minute drive from Buffalo.
Bonnies officials are counting on capitalizing on Wojnarowski’s name recognition and network of sources in following other schools which have created GM positions in the new age of name, image likeness (NIL) opportunities, transfer portal management and recruiting.
Wojnarowski’s drew laughs during his introductory news conference. When asked about his decision to leave ESPN, he turned to athletic director Bob Beretta and said, “I’m getting a pay cut?” in mock surprise.
And yet the emotional ties he maintains to the school he graduated in 1991 with a journalism degree were readily apparent.
“It’s a reflection on why so many of us never leave,” Wojnarowski said. “And why so many of us find our way back here.”
As NBA training camps open this week, Wojnarowski noted that in his previous job at ESPN, where he worked since 2017, “I could be anywhere in the basketball world today.”
“And I chose to be at St. Bonaventure,” he said while choking back tears.
Having already helped St. Bonaventure establish an NIL collective over the past two years, Wojnarowski initiated conversations last spring with Beretta and Bonnies coach Mark Schmidt about creating a GM position. Little could the two have envisioned how he would be the one to fill the job.
“It floored me,” Schmidt said. “When we talked about it, and we threw out these names, I couldn’t even imagine. I didn’t even think of Woj. Because why would Woj want to be the general manager of Bonaventure basketball?”
Schmidt then joked how had Wojnarowski entered his name in the transfer portal, “it would be Kansas, Carolina and Duke after him.” Calling his hiring “a grand slam,” the coach said: “The relationships that Woj has, we couldn’t develop in the next 50 years.”
Added Beretta: “He’s a competitive guy who was the preeminent journalist in his field. And he didn’t come here to finish second to anyone.”
Even before his retirement, Wojnarowski was working the phones in an effort to enhance NIL opportunities for St. Bonaventure athletes.
“Since our announcement last week, I’ve been absolutely blown away with the incoming opportunities coming our way from national sponsors and entities who want to be in the NIL business with St. Bonaventure basketball,” Wojnarowski said.
Wojnarowski’s relationships with NBA front office personnel and scouts, player agents in the U.S. and overseas, and grassroots basketball coaches, will be an asset to the mid-major school, said Mike MacDonald, a St. Bonaventure grad and basketball coach at Division II Daemen University in Buffalo.
“It’s a whole new frontier,” said MacDonald, who also coached at Canisius University. “When Woj was a columnist, I thought he was a tremendous writer. As he got to ESPN and his job evolved, he became a tremendous tweeter, a tremendous Woj bomber. He adapted to what had to be done. And I think he can adapt to this job.”
Wojnarowski said, drawing on his many NBA relationships to recruit players to St. Bonaventure in his new job will be much the same as his old one.
“Nobody just gives you good players,” Wojnarowski said. “Just like nobody gives you a story as journalist. You work for them. You earn them.”
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