Yahoo Sports' Adrian Wojnarowski is profiled in a lengthy piece by THE NEW REPUBLIC's Kevin Draper, who writes Wojnarowski "mixes his reporting and opinion writing in improper ways, rewarding sources with flattery and punishing the uncooperative with nastiness." It often appears that Wojnarowski "lets his sourcing dictate not just the topic but also the tone of his writing." NBA reporters privately "complain endlessly about Wojnarowski’s methods." Some of it "is undoubtedly professional jealousy, but his body of work shows they also have a point." He has "needed more than just a strong work ethic" to develop "the best sources in basketball." For one to "truly understand how Wojnarowski and his sources operate, there is no better place to look than his relationship" with former Pistons President of Basketball Operations Joe Dumars. While the Pistons during Dumars' final six years with the franchise were "one of the worst teams in the league, largely because of a series of disastrous decisions Dumars made," you "would never know about it" from reading Wojnarowski's Pistons coverage. Wojnarowski "broke nearly every significant -- and insignificant -- Pistons story for a half-decade," but from '08-12, "didn’t write a negative piece about Dumars or the Pistons." Instead, he "penned several sympathetic profiles of Dumars." Sources said that the NBA in '10 "fined Dumars $500,000 for leaking multiple confidential league memos to Wojnarowski" after a "sting operation over several months." Draper wrote Wojnarowski's reporting "is rife with opinion, conjecture, and speculation -- whether his own or an anonymous league source’s -- and it can be impossible to tell what he is actually reporting." What makes Wojnarowski "different from other reporters" is that he is "allowed to write in a way they are not." Still, when he began at Yahoo in '06, the site "wasn't known for its sports reporting." He has "singlehandedly changed that" (NEWREPUBLIC.com, 12/16).
