Bleacher Report maintains a significant presence at NBA All-Star because of what Diament sees as the NBA and its players’ distinct influence on culture.

“Bleacher Report is there to report on it and amplify what those things are, so that can be in the form of sneakers, what kind of music they’re playing, what kind of cars they are driving, what they’re wearing, who their girlfriends or wives might be,” Diament said. “Typically, that NBA fan interested in that type of content is younger, and advertisers love younger audiences, so you don’t necessarily have to just advertise in a televised game to reach the NBA fan.”

They’ve got next

As Diament pointed out, Bleacher Report will still have rights to NBA coverage and content even after WBD’s broadcast deal with the league concludes. The company will also continue producing Inside the NBA for ESPN as part of a new deal that earned Shaq a $15 million contract and TNT Sports new rights to Big 12 college football and basketball games. 

That gives WBD some valuable NBA-related assets moving forward, especially as it’s lent talent and resources to All-Star events on the ground in San Francisco. TNT Sports opened All-Star Weekend by partnering with American Express on a live Inside the NBA broadcast at the city’s Pier 48 before hosting a show by Chance the Rapper. It joined Amex for another Pier 48 show on Saturday night with Noah Kahan and gave a great deal of its efforts to a department-store-sized American Express activation on Powell Street.

TNT Sports lent images and footage of Inside the NBA hosts to games taken right from broadcasts and, at one point in the week, had Ernie Johnson engage in a deeply researched interview with Detroit Pistons first-time All-Star Cade Cunningham and his family.

“We don’t take our relationship with the league lightly, and Ernie is a great example of that,” Diament said. “He didn’t mail it in: He genuinely cared about the interview and did his homework and did it as professionally as you possibly can. He’s a great example of what we try to do at TNT sports with our marketing partners, where we want to listen to them and do homework on their business objectives, and not just be a vendor, but also be a partner.”