Mark Lazarus was an executive at Turner Broadcasting in the 1990s when the company was the NBA’s sole national cable-TV partner. As such, he had a front-row seat for the hand wringing that occurred…
Mark Lazarus was an executive at Turner Broadcasting in the 1990s when the company was the NBA’s sole national cable-TV partner. As such, he had a front-row seat for the hand wringing that occurred when Michael Jordan abruptly left pro basketball in 1993.
“It was not completely predictable when Kobe got drafted in the middle of the first round out of high school,” said Lazarus. “It was so odd that a guy would come straight out of high school at that time. But when he came into the league and found early success,” Lazarus added, two things became clear. “One, that he was an incredible talent. Two, that he was on a great team in a great market that was really good for the NBA and good for television audiences.
When Lazarus was at Turner, the company would, every season, broadcast the maximum number of Lakers games possible. “Even post-Jordan, people were still skeptical that the NBA was ever going to be a product that would rival the popularity of the NFL, but that certainly has happened,” said Windy Dees, a sports-administration professor at the University of Miami. In the 2017-18 season, the NBA topped $1 billion in corporate-sponsorship revenue for the first time — and in 2016 it became the first league to pass one billion social media followers.
But Bryant’s marketing prowess was not on par with that of Jordan or James — and many non-fans found him problematic. In 2003, Bryant was charged with felony assault after a 19-year-old woman accused him of raping her at a Colorado hotel where she worked. The charges were dropped in 2004, and a year later Bryant agreed to pay an undisclosed amount to settle the civil suit that followed.
Bryant had, however, in the latter years of his career and the early stages of his retirement, begun to successfully transition into a media heavyweight. The 2017 animated short film he produced, “Dear Basketball,” won an Academy Award. His production company, Granity Studios, was in the process of ramping up multiple projects. A series he created for ESPN Plus, “Detail,” premiered last year on the streaming service.
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