NBA Insider Shams Charania announced his new venture via his X account as Adrian Wojnarowski's replacement at ESPN. Plenty would probably be happy to have Charania replace Wojnarowski, but the Utah Jazz might not be one of them.
The Salt Lake Tribune's Andy Larsen explained why he's looking forward to seeing how this move will affect the Jazz.
"Really curious to see how this works out from a Jazz perspective," Larsen posted on his X account. "In general, Jazz like breaking news through ESPN, and Ryan’s a big McAfee guy who is a big Shams guy.
"OTOH, there are significant folks in the Jazz’s front office who strongly dislike Shams. So…"
Larsen then explained why they have people in their front office who don't like Charania.
"Partially a Woj/Shams rivalry thing, and I would say that it wasn’t just one instance that led to the negative feeling. That being said, there were folks in the front office that were furious, lastingly furious about the 'unsalvageable' article."
For reference, Larsen is referring to a 2020 article Charania wrote that detailed the friction between Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell. Tony Jones, the Jazz beat writer for The Athletic, and Sam Amick also contributed to the article, so it's not entirely on Charania's head for that article being published.
It was also pretty obvious to see that something was wrong with that team before the article came out.
Does this mean Jazz news will be leaked via local media?
Larsen also revealed how the Jazz have leaked things for the past several years during the Charania/Wojnarowski era while also predicting what will happen going forward with Wojnarowski no longer in the game.
"Significant effort over the last few years went in to sending news through Woj/ESPN and not Shams," Larsen wrote. "My guess? Cooler heads prevail, and news continues to flow through ESPN. Maybe even with Woj blessing. But it will be interesting to see how it shakes out!"
Only time will tell if the prediction comes true, but if the Jazz have a conflict of interest there, it's very possible news about the Jazz will get leaked via local media through reporters like Larsen or Jones.
It would be a change of pace compared to what we've all gotten used to in the Twitter era. Usually when information gets leaked, Charania and Wojnarowski have been the first to report it. However, the Jazz may break the cycle if they tell local reporters instead of the usual insiders about what they have done.
This is definitely something to keep an eye on regarding Jazz news going forward.