The Athletic Strives To Keep Shams Charania Amid ESPN Rumors

October 4, 2024

No one has been mentioned as regularly as The Athletic’s Shams Charania when it comes to the person who will replace legendary NBA insider Adrian Wojnarowski at ESPN.

After all, Charania is the most well-known insider in the business now that Woj has retired and moved on to St. Bonaventure, where he serves as GM of the men’s basketball program.

Interestingly, Charania is an NBA media free agent, the biggest name on the market. Without Wojnarowski, Charania is the obvious LeBron James of the NBA media landscape. And now his contract is up — again, making him a natural plug-and-play for ESPN.

As an added bonus, Charania is good on television. Many writers-turned-occasional-broadcasters are not. And we all know that the ESPN job comes with plenty of facetime on the air. Charania would be ESPN’s best over-the-air insider immediately — in any sport — if he got the job.

But several things are working against all of that happening. First, we don’t know if Charania wants the gig. He has a really good thing going with The Athletic and fast-rising FanDuel TV.

Second, we don’t know if Wojnarowski (who reportedly is acting as an ESPN advisor) wants Charania to get the job. ESPN very well could just fill the role by committee.

And finally, and perhaps most significantly, The Athletic really, really wants to keep Charania. With the New York Times behind it, The Athletic may have the money to do it, too. Granted, the publication doesn’t have ESPN money, but it does have plenty. (Though ESPN also created a massive payday for the right person, given that Woj retired and the network recently parted ways with respected NBA insider Zach Lowe.)

ESPN could potentially use Woj’s salary and part of Lowe’s to lure Charania, if he is indeed the primary target. If so, there’s no way The Athletic could come close to matching it.

Either way, let there be no doubt, The Athletic will make its bid, and highly likely a strong one at that. With a little help from FanDuel, it may have just enough to keep Charania in the fold. He seems to really like it there, primarily because of the freedom he’s granted and the ability to write longer pieces as much as he wants. ESPN is much more controlling.

So, before we hand Charania the role of his former protege, just know that The Athletic is very much in play here and has the respect and the resources to keep him right where he is today.