NBC Sports has its own Bobby Marks.
As the network prepares to return to NBA coverage for the first time since 2001-02, it’s been busy assembling a star-studded broadcast lineup. Alongside familiar play-by-play voices like Mike Tirico and Noah Eagle, and analysts including Jamal Crawford, Reggie Miller, Grant Hill, Carmelo Anthony, and Vince Carter, plus studio host Maria Taylor and special contributor Michael Jordan, NBC is now bringing on a front office insider.
On Monday, Front Office Sports’ Ryan Glasspiegel and Alex Schiffer reported that Grant Liffmann, a former Atlanta Hawks executive, is joining NBC’s expanding team. His exact role is somewhat open-ended, but he’ll focus on breaking down roster moves and front office strategy.
Liffmann is making a full-circle return to NBC. Before spending the last three seasons as the Hawks’ vice president of basketball operations under former GM Landry Fields — who was dismissed in April — the 38-year-old Liffmann built his broadcasting chops at NBC Sports Bay Area, where he covered Golden State Warriors games for over five years.
As FOS notes, NBC is betting on Liffmann to be its answer to the aforementioned Marks or The Athletic’s John Hollinger. His career path actually mirrors Hollinger’s more closely, a media-to-front-office-and-back-again trajectory that saw him help build the Memphis Grizzlies between stints at ESPN and the New York Times-owned outlet.
Having a front office insider has become a crucial component in how sports media evaluates transactions. From Mike Tannenbaum to Jim Bowden to Bob Myers, now a central figure — for better or worse — in ESPN’s NBA studio coverage, the presence of actual team-building experience brings credibility that traditional analysts can’t always offer.
Anyone can just react to any particular move. That said, the networks now want someone who understands why they happen in the first place.