What makes a compelling sports story? Is it a tale about bitter rivals.
Fighting for a chance to even the score.
Larry Burn to Paris.
They give it a magic He's got Pooper on his.
Right time perfectly, the past was high, perfectly the bass.
Is it the underdog story, the team that mounts a comeback against all odds.
That's over, that's over. Cleveland is a city of champions.
Once again.
In the forty years I've covered this league, I've seen those portrayed as villains.
It's been Detroit and they open up with a hate to nothing leaves.
Do you think the Pistons have gained a little respect.
As comedic protagonists?
I don't know anything about Angola.
Angola's in trouble.
New characters introduced. Oh about destroyed.
And the occasional superhero who, of course can fly.
Michael taking off the patented tongue comes out just in front of that life.
Look this the devil clutch, the.
Reach out and the stuff you got forty.
Nine here's Bob Costas.
We covered these stories together on the NBA on NBC.
It was an ongoing soap opera, not just basketball drama, but personal drama. And you think of how vivid the characters were Jackson and Jordan and Pippin and Rodman, and then the antagonists Isaiah and the Pistons, Barkley on the Sons who gave.
Them a run triple overtime in the finals. I remember on my birthday in Chicago.
Two minutes ago, I us third overtime open champers James we in our sub track.
Now the field goal, now the shock shot kJ Barkley. Yeah, that was unbelievable or.
Even even think of their battles in the Eastern Conference with the Knicks.
For help, but caught what's up.
A great corner as.
The biggest star wasn't doing.
The biggest star was Riot, you know, right off the page's and GQ came from the Lakers, and he was going to pose a challenge and he did.
He scared me.
Pat Riley though. He was so intimidating. I had to interview him all the time, and you know, at halftime, and I.
Remember on the way to the locker room interviewing him. He was he was intimidating, Yes, he was.
I always got along with him because I had that buffer year in between the Lakers and the Knicks.
He was with us on the first NBA showtime.
Do I have to go first?
Yeah, the basket actually been moved a bit closer.
I don't mean to throw you off.
Riley does not get the boone an opportunity to move into a tie.
Wait a minute, I get to spin around on the wire.
Here, all right.
The one I remember with you in ninety four, the Knicks take on Elijah on and the Rockets and game seven is close, but lose it. They went to Houston up three games to two, and Houston wins six and seven. And we know how dejected Pat was, and it was your job to find him. And you actually walked into the locker room, into the coaches room and opened the door, and I remember that his back was to you, and he turned around and he realized, you know, he couldn't
blow you off. But that was pretty gutsy on your part because you didn't know what reaction you would get.
We're coming in the next locker room right now to talk to coach Pat Riley.
Pat, we're live on the air. If you can come up here, please.
Dick Eversaw, who at the time was the chairman of NBC Sports, so it was so involved behind the scenes, says, tell Hannah she has to go in the locker room live on the air.
I was terrified.
We came out of commercial and so I remember as I'm opening the door, I said, coach, we're.
Live on the air. Just somebody wouldn't kill me.
That was important.
Literally ask the John Starks question. Thanks coach, Bob. And then you had like fifteen seconds to get us off the air. Boom, We're done.
And at those times we used to fly charter, and so I remember getting on the plane and Dick Eversol standing up and slowly clapping, and I was like, Okay, I have a job. So many stories make up the fabric of professional hoops in our country. Here's longtime basketball writer Peter Vessie on the ABA days.
You know I can tell you stories off the record.
Nuts.
Oh come on, how about how about what come out? A couple on the.
Bring me upside gets inside of me?
So so I remember, you know, the league's fighting for talents, players jumping Rick Barry jumping cutting him the other way, Spencer Haywood, Brisker McDaniels, you know, going both ways. But then it's seventy again, I think seventy two Charlie Scott jumped from the Virginia Squires to the Phoenix Suns, and he gave me the story. And and so I go out to Phoenix, and and before I could even like pick up my bags, this Suns knew that this ABA
writer was in Phoenix. Jerry Colangelo was the president of the team in and he wound up telling me years later that a baggage handler had spotted me and had called him.
And I guess who else was in town?
Your father?
Oh, okay, and Johnny Kerr. Johnny Kerr was the general manager of the of the Squires at that time and also had coached the Sons in the NBA.
So so we're all in town.
So I go to the game, and I go to their practice. I'm allowed to interview him, and I remember, I remember Contind Simmons was the coach, and he didn't like the line of questioning. Throw me out of his office, throw me out, that's hard to imagine.
Throw me out of the.
Why that's what they were practicing at the Wye Christ And anyway, so your dad says to me, he calls me, he knows I'm there, calls me up. He says, look would you. He's going to get me in trouble.
I know.
But he says, would you mind cornering Paul stile Us and ask him if he'd like to jump to the ABA?
Wow?
I said, yeah, okay, no problem, sure, totally.
Unethical, but I said, so I got Paul.
I got Paul on the side, and he was with Clem Haskins, you know, vividly remembered saying that, you know, you guys, you guys could make an awful lot of money. The ABA is dying to get even with Jerry Colangelo, and you guys would easily, you know, make a fortune if you decide you want to go the next game, the next Sun's game. I'm at court side and I'm sitting next to David Wolf, two white guys sitting next
to each other at this game. And during the first half, a guy comes up to David and he hands them an envelope and then he just runs and David opens it up.
He says, he says, this isn't for me, this is for him. It was a stubpoena whoa whoa. Colangelo had me subpoened, but he gave it to.
The wrong guy.
So hilarious. So you weren't served.
No, I wasn't shot. I left it halftime and went to the air. It's time to leave, Dodge.
I heard so many of these stories from my dad, Mike Storren, former ABA commissioner, and from my friends in the business, like former NBA entertainment boss Don Spurling with this from the Barcelona Olympics and the Dream Team.
I have a story that I actually beat Michael Jordan in a pig pong game and he got so angry that the next game I kind of had a play halfway. So the next game he won.
Because the next day we went.
Out on that famous shoot you know for his home video, and we walked around the street to Barcelona and went to the you know, and he played cards all night till five in the morning, and I was so upsetenting, Oh my god, he's going to crash and sleep. We only have one day to shoot with him. It was the day of the gold medal game. I followed him.
I'm standing over the card game watching these guys play, and it's burned and it's magic and it's and you know, Mod's in the room and Barkley and they're all teasing Michael. Michael your babysitters here, your babysitters here. I was getting crushed by all these guys. So finally, at five am he stops. He goes. She goes, I'm going to my room. I'll be out in a half out. I said, don't fall asleep on me. Comes out in that crazy Nike outfit.
We walked the streets and then he goes, do me a favor, drop me off at the golf There's one golf course right outside. I got my clubs there. I'm all set. He goes, what do you mean, how are you going to get back? He goes, I'll get a ride back. I said, Michael, you got a game tonight. You got the gold medal game against Croatia. He stayed up all night. He was up for twenty four hours,
shot with us all morning. Then he played thirty six holes of golf thirty six thirty six, showed up at the hotel five minutes before the bus left, walked out, got on the bus and played the gold medal game. Guy was up for forty eight hours. He truly is superman.
Larger than life. Characters have been the backbone of basketball.
Dolan I think by the doctor.
Yes, he's got it p carry count.
They rock the baby to sleep and slammed dump swung that baby.
And telling these stories in a deeper way was something Commissioner David Stern was determined to do alongside former NBC Sports president Dick Eversall.
But you know, you and I were both lucky enough to be smack dab in the middle of maybe the greatest ear Bird and Magic set it up on CBS and then handed it off and the NBA on NBC. In the nineties and early two thousands, you had the six Jordan Bulls Championships, you had the Dream Team in Barcelona, and then you think that almost immediately after that, when Michael retires from the Bulls, you get Robinson and Duncan with the Spurs, Kobe and Shaq on three championship run
in the early two thousands with the Lakers. That was a golden era and when you look at the ratings of those games, you know, I've often said this when people talk about Lebron and Michael. Statistically, you can make a case for Lebron, agreed, But in terms of impact, it's no context. No little old lady in Omah ever said I'd love to play bridge with you tonight, Mildred,
But I have to watch Lebron. But a million little old ladies like that all around the world said out about Michael Jordan, and they might not have known a pick and roll from a backdoor play.
The NBA became must see TV. Players were pitchmen, movie stars, and household names. As of twenty twenty three, the NBA is broadcast in more than two hundred countries and fifty languages.
The average NBA team is worth three point eight billion dollars. So how did we get here?
Now?
That's a good story. From the NBA and iHeart podcast.
This is NBA DNA with me Hannah Storm, Episode eleven, The Inside Stuff. May fourteenth, nineteen eighty one. It's Game six of the NBA Finals, Moses Malone's Houston Rockets against a young Larry Bird and the Boston Celtics.
Don Anderson, Doctor Willoughby, Dobin.
Garrett shot.
Y lelev was six seconds off the shot block.
Robert Lee?
Why will Rutor again?
The Rockets shouldn't be here.
They have the unfortunate distinction of being the third team in history to make it to the finals with the losing record. Tonight they're playing for their basketball lives. Boston leads the series three games to two. At the start of the fourth quarter, they're up eighty four sixty seven, but the Rockets go on a tear, scoring thirteen unanswered points to pull within three.
Unable hope by this, just dude, Boston is called tie up.
It's peak playoff basketball electric to watch, Hey.
Bird, and he's gonna hit those question shots now eighty eight eighty three, four minutes.
But there's just one problem. This game is tape delayed, meaning if you don't live in Houston or Boston, you're watching the latest episode of Magnum Pi. The Rocket Celtics game will air later at eleven thirty pm Eastern, and thanks to the eleven o'clock News, you'll already know the outcome one a.
World chappion by Boston Celtics.
Welcome to the NBA of the early eighties.
Between nineteen seventy nine and nineteen eighty one, seven finals games were tape delayed. One of the league's many issues. Attendance numbers were lagging. Drug use among players tarnished the league's reputation, but along came Deputy Commissioner David Stern to change the narrative. As the league changed networks from CBS to NBC, David Stern approached you, it was in nineteen eighty two about creating NBA Entertainment.
What was his vision for the brand In those early conversations.
David really was a visionary. We used to have these meetings this is waiting for Inside Stuff. We would have these marketing meetings at the league and I would come over from NBA Entertainment.
Don Sperling ran NBA Entertainment for fifteen years. He's the brains behind the iconic show NBA Inside Stuff.
We would talk about how to change the look of the NBA. I mean at the time when I got to the NBA. I got there in eighty two eighty three, that was my first season, the year before the finals were on in you know, take delay. David's goal was to make sure we never had to go backwards again. So we talked about all the things that we do and how entertainment could support sponsorship, and how entertainment could support properties, and how properties and sponsorship can support our
network relationships. And we just kept building and we had CBS at the time, and then of course eighty four Burden Magic happened, Bird and Magic took the NBA Finals to another level.
Still by Magic Johnson, he anticipated that play by Bird.
Don't see Bird throw too many away?
Magic looking for Caren quickly back right over.
Sure, So that's what.
Moved the needle initially, was that rivalry. Did you see it coming? And how did you take advantage of it?
One of David's great sayings was it's better to be lucky than smart, And I've stuck by that because that's I think, that's my career. I've been in the right place at the right time. But you do need a little luck, but you also have to have smarts like David had. Okay, and when this rivalry which started in seventy nine when they played in college, and then they were kind of watching each other as Bird one in
eighty one and Magic one in eighty two. But then eighty four the world's collided and we got arguably the greatest NBA Finals of all time.
Magic Johnson goes up off the ball and here's Dennis Thompson two on one break and.
A rock by Cooper.
What a play by Cooper. He saved the basket. I's your basket by off seven games, really crazy, bitter rivalry took the Hot Garden, the Laker, you know, showtime pat Riley, who was really something to witness. And at that same year, let's not forget who was drafted.
The Chicago Bulls picked Michael Jordan at the University of North Carolina.
Right, Michael Jordan.
So you know, if you want to talk about timing, okay, that's I think that's timing.
During Stern's thirty years as commissioner, the league saw unprecedented growth, seven new franchises, the creation of the WNBA, a fortyfold increase in television revenue, zero tolerance for drug use. For years before becoming commissioner in nineteen eighty four, David had laid the groundwork for free agency, established revenue sharing by owners and players, and helped negotiate the merger with the ABA.
The app salute explosion, the proliferation of outlets to our fans provides new non game programming opportunities every time they are not watching us, because if they're not watching us, there's always a.
Danger they might be watching somebody else.
David understood the league was only as marketable as it stars, and the NBA set about taking fans behind the scenes to get to know them. That didn't actually start with Jordan, It started with his biggest nemesis.
Last year, the Pistons had a three two lead, couldn't weave one of the last two.
Now they'll do it.
Without Detroit Pistons, NBA entertainment would not have ascended to the reputation and the heights they did. Chuck Daly, Isaiah, they invited us in, let us go inside the huddle, let us go inside the locker room. It was the first time any team had allowed that. This was literally the first access, which is obviously a huge term right now in this day and age. So kudos to the Detroit Bistons and Chuck Dally love that guy love Big Daddy Rich as exactly the one of the greatest coaches ever.
Yeah, Olympic head coach of the Dream Team. I mean just he was. He was amazing.
What is it because now we see everything from you know, Hard Knocks to these access shows that lead up to Season X in Sport X.
You know, everybody's doing it.
But when you think back to the Bad Boys being the first team that allowed that kind of access, what do you think it was about them that they were confident enough to do.
That outside sixty shoot du Mars against Jordan's spins, in turns, fakes.
Lean in shot, got it.
What a bucket by Joe Dumars.
It was the world against them. I mean the bad boys. They were the bad boys. They loved it. They took that nickname and ran with it. You had even one of the greatest players in the history NBA, Isaiah Thomas, but there was that edge right bat Nol Lambert. You had Dennis Rodman. The cast of characters, the personalities was incredible. Plus at that time, they were playing against Jordan every year and they were They were the ones that Michael had to get passed, which he finally did in ninety one.
But every year, you know, people talk about you need a team. The Pistons needed the Celtics to teach them how to win, right right, and then the Bulls needed Pistons to teach them how to win. And it was it was like that. I mean the rivalries. You watched the eighty fourth NBA Finals, you watch eighty six, you watch the Celtics Pistons. Every single play was life and death.
He's got it, the two five seconds to go, Thomas wants to get it in quickly.
You know what it does to Lamberska.
You called David a mentor of yours. I mean, what kind of boss was he?
He was really tough. Okay, I mean I love him to death, but he was a tough, tough boss. But he was the kind of guy that would pull you back in. You know, if there was something going wrong, he would let you know in spades. He would he'd great you a little bit, but he'd build you back up, you know, so you would learn, and you learn from adversity. Right, things would go even things that weren't under control, you know, network games that would happen and we had nothing to
do with it. The network ran the games. Something would happen during the network games and Sunday night that phone would ring. If David was yelling, we were okay. If he was whispering, then I know I was in trouble. He could start a conversation of like, let me ask you something. When I hired you, Was I the one who made the mistake?
Or were you?
And then here it comes, here it comes. But then by the end of the conversation, he'd build you back up and go out there and you know, so you would want to go out there and just to do it three hundred percent better. And he was brilliant and he was amazing Marketer. He spotted the international opportunity before anybody did. Okay, I mean it is just incredible what he's done to set the stage for the NBA to be successful on a worldwide basis.
Hi, my name is Michael Jordan.
I want you to take a trip with me and discover the secrets that I've known for many years.
The man was truly destined to fly.
Under your leadership, the league started to numberly think about these games right, and how to broadcast the games? But these are How did to focus on feature production and nobody else was doing that at the time. You launched something called NBA Home Videos, and one of them was Michael Jordan Come.
Fly with Me.
A resplentless competitor fears No, he overwhelmed the opposition.
Patrolling the Airway.
Which was released in nineteen eighty nine and sold over a quarter of a million copies.
I mean, how do you view the legacy of those films?
Yeah, and I want to answer that still today because obviously they don't make his sell as many home videos. That's the largest selling sports home video all time.
It still is.
Michael Jordan, Wow, Wow. Now of course it's the production. It's something.
Right, It's that eighties production.
I mean that video really changed the home video business in sports. We had a great partner CBS Fox. We had Sports Illustrated using these videos to sell magazines, right, you know, you'd say, and if you get a subscription to Sports Illustrated, you'll get a copy of you know, you remember those commercials.
I remember that, yes, very well. And no other league was doing this at the time. There was the NBA was was way ahead of the game.
Yeah, I mean, NFL Films was putting out more football hardcore.
Like right, right, right, but not like feature videos music videos.
Superstars was a music video. We had Charles Barkley the Warrior. You know, we had you know, Magic Johnson Control, Larry Bird, you know with John Cooper Mellencamp song small Town Right.
I would also would like to thank you as a team for supporting this throughout the year.
It's been a great honor to be out here.
There's only one place I'd rather be, Frenchly.
We fit the player there to the pop song and this was the precursor to NBA inside Stuff.
I'm pleased to announce today that starting with the nineteen ninety ninety one NBA season, the NBA would be seen on the NBC television network.
In nineteen eighty nine, NBC purchased it's broadcast rights for six hundred million dollars. I joined the network in nineteen ninety two. David Stern had teamed up with a perfect collaborator in My boss Dick ever saw I'll.
Never think it at our first meeting, we went into the room and Terry O'Neill was there, who was the executive producer, and he was sort of like all sports guy. I'll never forget David and Dick kind of conducting the interview with Terry O'Neill, who you what a pretty big reputation at the time, is like going like this and looking back and forth and go, am I in the right room?
Yeah?
I mean David, And we're just talking about what we what we really should be doing with our sport more off the.
Court than on the court, right, Okay, Exactly.
The game is pretty solid on the court at this time, and that's where NBA and you know the idea of a television show that would appeal to teens, casual fans, women, marrying pop music to sports, marrying pop culture to sports, taking personalities and putting it on a national time slot.
Through the years, David Stern became my mentor, and it all started with weekly lunches in his office with the NBC crew. You know, I can't believe that when I think back on it now, before games, like before a weekend of games, you know, because we would air tripleheader and a doubleheader on NBC, myself, Ah Mod, Dick Eversol, Bob Costas. We would go to the NBA headquarters to David Stern's office, which he never went out for lunch, so we would have lunch there and we would literally
go over features with the commissioner of the NBA. His attention to detail and prioritization of telling those stories. You know, when I think back on it, that was incredible.
That just shows you how much he cared. I mean, Han, did you know this? In this business, you know a few young people for work and this and that, and you know they come from a good school and you say, hey, you're smart. That's great, but if you want to succeed this business, you have to have passion. Everybody who was around that NBC NBA relationship we had passion. We wanted to make this game better than anything. We wanted to change the way sports was broadcast game wise and also
looked off the court. And your example was perfect right there.
Yeah, And we always had turkey sandwiches, chocolate chip cookies, and diet coke.
Does that sound familiar?
I love cooking. Let me tell you what we would do with David when we go to meeting. We'd always put decaf in the container. He said, if you cassed him up, you were done. No, so I say, Linda, Linda.
Remember for the NBA on NBC, I was both a reporter and a studio host with analysts including doctor j John Sally, Bill Walton, and Isaiah Thomas.
Yes, Isaiah, let's see what we got all the way up. You know.
I laugh about the days that we spent together, you know, at NBC. I was talking to Bob Costas, believe it or not, the other day. We were just laughing about some of the stories that was going on back then and how we all worked together and how we all laughed. And I don't and I don't know if you remember. Do you remember my first my first game. It was Christmas Day.
We'll check the opening up here from a Madrashaan and I have the tip off in just a few moments on Christmas night in Chicago.
We have all we have our meeting, you know, our morning meeting and everything else.
And so now we get to the game and it's Bob and I I got, you know, David Neil in my ear.
I had never you know, I didn't know what buttons to push or anything.
They've been in They've been in eight of the last ten finals. End up taking different paths to get there. Righty believes in hard nose, in your face defense. Phil Jackson, on the other hand, believes in a triple post.
But in the opening and this was was this was great.
This was great.
So in the opening, right, Bob is going on about hey, we're here lovely Chicago, and Michael Jordan so forth and so on, and he's just going on and on, and I hear David Neil go, okay, Bob, wrap it up, wrap it up, wrap it up. And Bob is just going on and I haven't talked, right, I haven't spoken. I have just said anything. Wrap up, Bob. And so now David is like really like screaming in Bob's ear by Isaac like this be I don't know what's going on, and Bob is just like, oh yeah, it's so great.
And then he goes, so zeke, my man, what do you I'm like, uh, oh man, So that was my rookie moment when he broke me in.
Yeah, that's Bob. I mean, you know you can't get a word in edgewise, right.
And listen to the roar at Market Square Arena, sro Brout sitting in on History.
Let you folks can join us too.
Hi, everybody, I'm Bob Costas.
What Michael Jordan does today and what he will attempt to do in the next several.
Months and maybe years is truly unprecedented.
It's never happened in team sports.
How great was the whole bunch.
But when we walked into an arena for those games, or sometimes we were in the studio together and we have a triple header, a triple header of playoff games on a Saturday, your Sunday, and.
We told fun early round, early.
Round playoff games, not just the finals, in prime time on the Netflork. And you know when you mentioned like must see Thursdays. It wasn't just the games.
The promos are on during Seinfeld, they're on during Letterman and Carson and brons whose cast.
It's just in the water supply in a way that it isn't anymore.
Okay.
One of my favorite, speaking of promos all time things that you did is so one of the hugest movies box office movies, was.
The original Jurassic Park.
And you said, you know where I'm going, right, So you said, you said, do we have something special coming up?
You bet Jurassic Right.
We ran down the whole lineup which had the NBA playoff games, and then in prime time Jurassic Park is one of them.
And so I'm like, is it a big day and night at NBC? You bet Jurassic Everybody, it was like, my god, did you say that?
I know that was Edgy back then, Bob.
Everybody.
John, you have been all over the place on this next team without Patrick Ewing. On Christmas you said they're not going to make the playoffs, and then a week ago you said they're playing great team basketball, which is it?
Well, I'm a New York about heart. That means I'm an overreactionary, right, so I'm gonna go away ever to win Shakespeare.
Here's another one of my former analysts, John Spider Sally.
David gave me a shot. David Stern, God rest his soul, gave me a shot. And everything you can possibly do wrong, I did wrong. And the colors I was wearing, the suits I was wearing. You know, It's just it was I was showing you what not to do, so I think, and then when guys came out doing the same thing, I was like, oh my God, like what I.
Mean, what do you feel?
So you replaced Julia serving as a studio analyst, and you wanted to quit basketball, you wanted to go You have this grand plan, right. David start was so intimately involved in every segment of what happened on TV.
Yes, he would haul us.
Into his office and talk about what features are you running? You know, how are you covering this? Here's what I think about what happened here. So was this a discussion between you and him initially that you were like, hey, Commissioner, this is what I want to do.
You guys had auditioned certain people, and I remember my agent at the time, John Ferreda. He was like, do you want to do this, and I was like yes, and he was like, well, you got an audition.
I was like cool.
I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, Bill Walton can do this.
I can do this.
Peter Vessi is right there. I've been reading him and writing it forever, like he's a New Yorker and to get in there and do something. Because doctor j is very.
Control measured, very very measured, and he was very He had a very kind of elegant way of doing things.
He didn't want to make anybody mad.
I like that.
Now he'll tell you what he thinks now.
But back then he realized, well, I realized I wasn't trying to be a player of apologists, but I also understood the mentality of trying to be civil or human and also be a superhuman by being a professional basketball player. When you got a coach yelling at you and you do something wrong, you deserve to be yelled at, even if you're a superstar. I know Bill Amber was kind of sensitive, but he knew when he did things wrong, and Grant playing forty five minutes and being that kind
of star, he has to be bulletproof. He has to let it, you know, just roll off. So I knew the difference. I knew it was hard to do, and I knew it was needed. And I walked in and I David was like, you can say this and this and this, but don't ever do it this way, this way and this way. And he was building the brand. I had to remember since nineteen eighty four, he's been building this brand to what it is.
The NBA on NBC provided a perfect opportunity for players to get into the broadcast business. For me, it was also a chance to work closely with people who knew my father, like Doctor j and Peter VESSI points and just two rebounds and eight minutes of plays and early foul trouble, just like he was in Game four.
Peter, the way I read his game plan, hatter is he's just determined to make it.
Peter Vessie would literally sit around and tell us all these war stories from back in the day, and he would also, it's a good thing you have a good sense of humor, because Peter would always try to crack jokes on the air, and he has a very specific sense of humor, you know, so luckily, you, being you, you would always laugh and make it work.
Which was I I love best, right and the thing that I used to always loved, like like he could never say your name right.
Remember it was always Hannah, that's right.
He called me Hannah with this accent Hannah, and you used to think that was hysterical.
And he was trying so hard to.
Like say your name right.
He was like, and Hannah.
Every time.
A great times.
That was a great time.
NBC had a huge opportunity with the Barcelona Olympics, able to lean fully into the superstar power of the Dream Team and the Jordan years, culminating in the Bulls sixth title.
Seventeen seconds from gage seven or from Championship number.
Six Michael against Russell twelve seconds eleven Chen Jordana.
Dry thanks yes.
The scores for balls lead eighty seven eighty six were five at two.
Cats game six in ninety eight in Salt Lake City. It's still the highest rated NBA game ever. You couldn't ask for more drama than that. But almost forgotten. Early in the game there was no replay. Then Howard Eisley hit a three for Utah that beat the shot clock and was waved off. Would have been reversed easily today.
The second half.
Ron Harper hits two that didn't beat the shot clock, and they allowed it. That's a five point swing. Now the game ends. You couldn't script it any better. We're all celebrating it for thegetable.
You knew you were witnessing history.
Yes, yes, I hope that we did a good job document And then David is in my ear and I know, now this is coming from Dick mention Issley and harping.
And then you know, oh, Dick, long enough, I knew what he was thinking. Damn it.
I don't care about Jordan's drama. If those two shots aren't reversed. We're playing a Game seven on Wednesday to an even bigger rating.
A game seven.
The only guy outside of Jazz fans that isn't happy about this. I figured the whole thing out in a practice of a second. I figured the whole thing out. So I take a beat and I say something like when a series in a game is this quose? There are so many things to look back on during the offseason, but the Jazz, for sure, we'll think about the Isley three that was disallowed and the harp or two that was allowed that might have.
Changed the outcome of this game and set us to a game seven next day.
In the New York Times, Richard Sandomir, why is Bob Costas talking about that?
Well, the bulls are pumping each other and flipping each other on the back. I'll tell you why, because my woff wanted to be.
At the time, NBA Entertainment was documenting every minute, much of which would be used on their flagship show, NBA Inside Stuff.
Now on NBA Inside Stuff. As he makes the move to Golden State, Ronnie Ceygele's Loving is New City had his new teammates.
Those guys are so good.
It's scaring.
It's really scary.
And it's high noon in Dallas. As a cowboy named Jason arrives in the wild West, it is a new kid.
Yeah, how did you come up with the name?
I know, like you filmed a pilot in nineteen eighty nine and James Brown he was the host and it didn't have a name at the time. How did you guys come up with Inside Stuff?
There's a lot of revisionist history on this one. I bet them. Yeah, we all really sat in rooms and went over this said, you know, we wanted this to be something inside and then I think it was either myself or Greg or somebody throughout the word. You know, there's a lot of stuff here, and we were kind of like inside stuff, insides, and all of a sudden we started saying it and then that's the inside stuff
would be the tail end of the promos. And we said, we think this can work, and we went to David and we went to Dick and they kind of looked at us and said, all right, you guys think so. Obviously if it if it worked great for everyone. If it didn't, Greg and I probably would be looking for work. But we just kind of like ran with it.
Hi, everyone, I'm a little bit man, I'm a mad shod. We were addressed like because earlier this morning we had an appearance where we sang Michael rollebot ashore to some children that we did the show. Now today I'll catch up with Ronnie Slackly, a guy who's been all over the world vacations.
The show was hosted for sixteen years by a Maud Rashod, half of those with my longtime friend will Obey, who auditioned for the role with no TV experience. Is it true that preparing for your interview, did you read like a year's worth of Sports Illustrated.
Yes, I did.
I did, because you know what, back then, we had these things called magazine, right, that was our bible pages of them.
You held them in your hands, you know.
I approached the show as a fan. I didn't pretend to be anything other than that. But I knew that I had to go to the NBA and be interviewed by the NBA. And so I went to the New York Public Library and read, literally read through a year's worth of back issues of Sports Illustrated, just the basketball sections.
That is classic. That is exactly like something I would do. Exactly. Do you remember your interview and did you have to talk to David Stern Commissioner Stern before taking the job, Like.
What was that? Like? I did?
My final interview, final round interview was with Commissioner David Stern and his deputy at the time, Gary Bettman, who was now NHI Commissioner. And I thought it was sort of interesting that these two highest ranking officials who were
lawyers were interviewing the TV person. I thought it was a little unusual, but still, how cool is that to go meet with Commissioner Stern and now commissioner Betman, super cool experience, and we have this interview and I'll never forget David saying to me, you know, we have these two women both okay on television, but you have an MBA, so we're going to I think, go with you because if the TV gig doesn't work out, we'll find a spot for you in the marketing department.
That's fascinating.
Inside stuff was part of the NBA's push to draw young kids and women to the sport of basketball.
I paid a visit to Michael's Golf Center to check out the tournament.
He held a loose kids.
Well, I give him some lessons.
Actually think he is trying.
To promote golf among young people since many of them have never had a chance to discover the game.
I'm not being able to go for my favorite.
But back then, there were only two women covering the league on a national basis, and we sort of looked alike. Everyone used to call me Willow and pull Willow. Hannah, you're being very you're being very circumspect.
As you know. The way I used to describe it is two.
Tall, skinny, white girls with banks covering the NBA. You were interchangeable interchangeable in the minds of something.
Hilarious, because to this day I always have people hit me up on X or Instagram or whatever and they're like, oh my god, I loved you so much on Inside Stuff, you were so great.
Do you ever have people to know all the time all the time, some of them with names that everybody would recognize, I won't out them.
It's really funny.
I actually consider that a great compliment to be confused with you and I am just going to ride. So Inside Stuff was the brainchild of something that doesn't exist really anymore in terms of making content, but it was NBA entertainment, and it was really derivative of David Stearn's idea of how to market the league. Since you were there from the beginning, can you take us through the inception of that show.
Yeah, so I.
Arrived in year two, and really the idea of the show was, you know, in the way that I would describe it now, to open the aperture on what it means to be an NBA fan. It was a show designed for all fans, not just hardcore sports lovers, and I, as a fan, was paired with a mad Rashad former athlete sportscaster to really again broaden this perspective of what it meant to be a fan, and the focus was on the players and the human experience of those players.
It was really and it's impossible to even like when we think of it from today's vantage point, it seems impossible to think that back then there really wasn't a program that was designed to take you into the lives of the players off the court, to understand who they were as people, what motivated them, how they grew up, where they went to school, what their hobbies were, what
they cared about off the court. And that's what was so revolutionary about it, And I think that's what was what is so foundational to the changes that we're seeing in the way players present themselves, the way players communicate directly with their audiences and their fans.
Today.
Here's Don Spurling.
We did the testing. The chemistry was great between her and between her and a mod Hello, everybody, I'm will obey and I am very upset that feeling it's taken shat to me.
I usual would challenge right here now, me and him one on one, bringing his brother Richie, because he'll need him when he plays me. Because he doesn't remember that.
Shot and he doesn't know they call you ironbod shot.
That's right because of the shape. I mean I almost forgot that because.
It just seemed to It really seemed to work. And I do want to say something about a MOD. People now associate him with basketball. At the time when we hired a MOD, people were like, isn't he a foot? He's a foot and he's a great football player, exactly unbelievable. Yeah, isn't Ay a football player? He does football? He does football. Mod. You know, when he hits that camera, it's magic, okay, And the audience and interfacing with kids. Once once we talked to a MOD, we knew he was the guy.
And then he became kind of the face and voice of you know, entertainment basketball from there.
On it And he was very close to Michael Jordan and so that didn't hurt. You know, Michael trusted a MOD and he would always talk to a MOD, and a MOD would cover the Eastern Conference and I would cover the Western Conference. But that was you know, I think besides the mods, like you said, incredible presence and just personality. It also so happened that he had a great relationship with the preeminent player of the day.
Yeah, that was really helpful. I will tell you something. We didn't totally focus The great thing about Insight stuff. We were able to dig into the second and third tier players. Oh yeah, I'd showed that they have police because you didn't really need to promote Michael. He's facing Nike and Lada Reide and all the other all his other partners were doing a pretty good job at that.
So yes, of course we featured Michael whenever we could, but we really went after, like, you know a lot of those you know, Tim Hardaway and you know and Charles Barkley and yeah, guys, we're ready made for insight off, let's face it.
Yeah, I mean, and you had a lot of signature segments. You had rewind right, so that recap the games that have been played that week, including bloopers. You had the jam session, so you set the highlight to music and longer features which really followed players off the court, again, something that hadn't been done maybe outside of the Olympics. Right when we got to know athletes as people. This
really sort of borrowed that that Olympic philosophy. How did you come up with the segments, and some of them were addressed very serious issues.
Most of them were liked. But obviously, when you know, it was our first year of the show when Magic had to retire and so forth, and we covered that, you know, and followed that as the story progressed.
Because of.
HIV buyers that I have attained, I will have to retire from the Lakers today.
There was no you know, there was no nothing to sweeten up there because at the time, as you as everybody well remembers, people thought AIDS was a death set.
Oh yeah, it was terrifying, terrifying.
Terrifying, and and the NBA family was shook and the world shook. But obviously Magic being Magic and every and the story everybody knows he's you know, he's obviously gotten through all that and and and going beyond that. But the going to the other side, like for instance, where Shack was drafted, I will tell you something to me the most memorable memorable part of NBA in side stuff. Before Shaq ever played an NBA game, we did a
feature with him. Okay, he was drafted by Orlando. We went to this he was at this gym and he was practicing at a Mod and Shaq are playing one on one.
Right, I'm gonna show you what it's gonna be like in the NBA. Are you ready?
Huh?
And a Mod goes out and he hits the shot from way out and Shack goes really so he says, come in here, come in here, and Shaq like backs the Mod down. What's he gonna do? Right? And he goes up in dunks and he pulls the basketball the basketball hoop and the glass shatters falls on his best We're all there like this, Oh no, we just named the number one draft pick. We're all getting fired tomorrow. And this is That's what Shack all of a sudden,
he just kind of like gets up, shake, smiles. Amad comes over, leans over and says, is that all you got?
Is that all you got?
And that became more open to that whole season, and it came and it became a video that we played over and over again. I would say it's one of the first viral videos that you know that was in sports.
Inside Stuff helped change the way sports were covered.
First of all, the team at Inside Stuff, the producers were insanely talented. Amad and I were front and center. But that production team was made up of incredibly talented shooter, editors, writers, thinkers who also shared a love of the game and a love of the sport, but a real appreciation of the people that they were covering. And I honestly think that was so foundational. And they brought the spirit of
fun to the storytelling. Not that the stories weren't serious often, and not that we didn't get into often, you know, the challenges and the struggles that you know players encountered in their lives, because that's important, But I think this sense of joy, the sense of fun, really shaped the storytelling that we did.
A part of that foundation is the league taking on social issues head on. David Stern's support of Magic Johnson after he announced he was HIV positive set the tone at the highest level, and Adam Silver has continued that legacy.
He's taken the legacy that David built and left to him and made it his own and advanced it in truly significant ways, right both in terms of league operations,
in league business and league cultures. It is Adam's league, but you know, David and his leadership in the league provided kind of cultural guidance at some very important moments and I think specifically of Magic Johnson announcing that he was HIV positive in the fall of nineteen ninety one, which was my literally first weekend on the job of the show. I mean, I'd worked there for the summer, but it was our very first show and this news broke.
But what was so interesting to me was the way in which David and his team determined they were going to follow the science, and they brought in the very best AIDS researchers, doctor David Hoe among them to really help guide first the League but secondly like the American public through the realities of what it meant at that moment to be HIV positive, using science and facts to deepen our unders standing and erased stigma, and for me that that is one of the most powerful kind of
cultural touchstones in the in the legacy of the League, and by the way they did the same thing through COVID.
There were three themes we focused on. Number one, of course, was can we bring the NBA back? Number two was the health and safety of everyone involved, And then as events unfolded in the country, social justice became one of those themes as well, and.
So just interesting and reflective of the of the power of sports, I think, and the power of a sport run exceedingly well as the NBA is to really not just reflect culture, but to shape it.
That's a moment we got to keep pushing forward.
Looking back, NBA entertainment, namely Inside Stuff, created a model for tackling social issues, and other broadcasters ran with it. Today, players are visible on all platforms. We care about their lives, their personalities, their passions, and their opinions.
Let us be perfectly clear, Black lives matter.
The kind of humbling responsibility of telling the stories of these players, I mean, that's a responsibility that somebody is trusting you, sitting down with you, opening up their home to you, opening up their heart to you. That's a responsibility that I always took incredibly seriously, regardless of how much fun we were having. And the way I think I demonstrated that is I didn't come to this sport
as an expert. I had to study all the time, and I I know that when you go into a situation where trust is essential, and particularly when somebody doesn't know you that well, doesn't have a history with you, coming in really prepared demonstrates your respect.
I've not only found that preparedness is essential to what you're saying, to storytelling, to respect for your subject and your audience.
But that the more prepared you are, the more comfortable you are.
Yeah, I wonder how gendered that is.
It must be. What do you think?
Oh?
I think it is for sure. I think there is a tendency for women to say, oh, I'm not prepared to do that. Oh I've never done that. Oh boy, and then to prepare and maybe even over prepare in order to get ready.
I think there's a notion and I think you know, obviously, you and I were really in the national spotlight as the two women who are covering the NBA, and there's a fear of failure or being criticized, and maybe some of the over preparedness can come from that. But there's also this huge feeling of responsibility that if you don't do it and you're not successful, that down the road another woman might not get that opportunity. So that's a
pressure that I've always felt. I'm wondering if you felt that absolutely.
I mean, I suspect that that's somewhat universal for women who were the first or even the seconds or thirds, you know, going in going into spaces, and you know, I'm very mindful of that when you and I kind of came of age in our careers when we were
the first. But you know, in relative terms, we are women of privilege, right, we are white women of privilege, and there are women following in our footsteps who today have to fight those fights, you know, have to fight those fights to be accepted, have to fight those fights for opportunity. And it makes me very mindful of ways in which we can all work much more effectively having done it to open doors, to open doors for others, and to make sure that the opportunity is universal.
I began this series by talking about the challenges of covering this sport and others as a woman, and the fact that growing up around basketball gave me the strength and desire to follow a path that was not traditional for women at the time. Along with my dad, former ABA commissioner Mike Storren, the NBA's commissioner. Stern was a sounding board for me throughout my career. I miss him, me too, me too. I miss him and would see him every year.
We would always go to a conference every year in the summer together, so I would get you know, my NBA career is long over. I would always get a check in with him, And famously one day we were I was with my son, who was a toddler at the time, and we were near a pond, and from across the other side, I hear, hello, watch.
That child, because he was worried that that toddler was too close to the pond. And people said to me, oh, is that your husband? And I said, uh no, Not only is.
That not my husband nor this child's father, but he's not even my boss anymore.
He hasn't been my boss in decades. He had no problem telling you what to do, right, worrying about.
Worrying about you know, that child, that child I was going to, let you know, dive headfirst into the duck pond. And it was just it was so David, because like David was right there alongside you. Yeah, I just jump right in the mix, in the mix, which I so love about him, and I miss I really miss him.
Here's my dad, Mike Storn.
When I think about David Stern and his legacy, I think about the fact that always in the back of David's mind is the development and the creation of the history of basketball and what that means as a commissioner, your background and the things that you do are always done under the theory of what can I do that is in the best interests of the league, or in David's case, what can I do that is singularly in
the best interests of basketball. As I look at his legacy, I think the highest compliment that I can pay to David is that he always did everything in the best interests of basketball. He never deterred from making those kinds of decisions.
It's crazy how my life has come full circle from a little girl the city courtside to becoming the first woman to solo host a major sports league on television. The NBA, ABA and WNBA are truly part of my DNA, and I'd like to thank all the guests and storytellers who took us along on this great journey. This has been NBA DNA with me Hannah Storm. Thank you for listening. NBA DNA with Hannah Storm is a production of iHeart Podcasts,
the NBA and Brainstorm and Productions. The show is written and executive produced by me Hannah Storm, along with Julia Weaver and Alex French. Our lead producer and showrunner is Julia Weaver. Our senior producers are Peter Kouder, Alex French, and Brandon Reese. Editing and sound design by Kurt Garrin and Julie Weaver. The show's executive producers are Carmen Belmont, Jason English, Sewan Ttone, Steve Weintraup, and Jason Weikelt.