Kenny Smith, former NBA star and current TNT Sports analyst, will be the host of Harlem Globetrotters: Play It Forward for Season 3, which premieres Saturday, October 5 in NBC’s “The More You Know” educational/informational (E/I) programming block. Hearst Media Production Group (HMPG) produces the 30-minute show with Herschend Entertainment Studios. 

Smith succeeds Craig Robinson as host. He is a panelist on TNT Sports’ popular studio show Inside the NBA as well as an analyst for TNT Sports and CBS Sports’ combined coverage of the NCAA men’s March Madness Division I men’s basketball championship. Smith won NBA titles with the Houston Rockets in 1994 and 1995, and played 10 seasons for the Rockets, Detroit Pistons, Sacramento Kings and Atlanta Hawks. 

“Kenny and the Harlem Globetrotters are an epic matchup of two iconic basketball brands that will resonate with viewers and attract a new generation of fans,” said Bryan Curb, HMPG executive VP and general manager, education/information.  

Harlem Globetrotters: Play It Forward highlights people and organizations doing good for education, health and wellness, and community empowerment.  

“The Harlem Globetrotters have been a part of my lifelong basketball journey,” Smith said.  “At 11 years old, I won the Globetrotters shooting competition at halftime of the Knicks game. Twenty years later, I participated as the GM for the Washington Generals. Shortly after retirement, I hosted Globetrotters tryouts in Houston for the team.  Now I have the pleasure of narrating this compelling and dynamic series. The Globetrotters remind us that basketball is more than just a game; it’s about bringing people together and having fun.”

Harlem Globetrotters: Play It Forward averages more than 900,000 total weekly viewers across all platforms, according to HMPG.  

“The Harlem Globetrotters, HMPG, NBC, and now Kenny Smith make for a powerful starting lineup. It’s one that we think will resonate with fans, our partners and the larger sports community,” Keith Dawkins, president of Harlem Globetrotters & Herschend Entertainment Studios, said.

The NBA playoff game between the Milwaukee Bucks and Orlando Magic Wednesday afternoon was postponed as Buck’s players boycotted following the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisc.

The game had been scheduled to be televised by NBA TV and regional sports networks in the two cities.

Players on the other teams scheduled to play Wednesday were discussing boycotting those games as well, according to published reports. Those games were set to appear on AT&T’s TNT network.

The NBA later announced that those games were postponed as well.

"The NBA and the National Basketball Players Association today announced that in light of the Milwaukee Bucks' decision not to take the floor today for game five against the Orlando Magic, today's three games--Bucks vs. Magic, Houston Rockets vs. Oklahoma City Thunder and Los Angeles Lakers vs. Portland Trailblazers--have been postponed. Game five of each series will be rescheduled," the league said in a statement.  

It was unclear when the league's playoffs would resume.

The Milwaukee Brewers and the Cincinnati Reds also decided not to play their Wednesday evening baseball game because of the Kenosha shooting.

In Orlando, where the NBA has been playing its games to avoid spreading COVID-19, the Magic players waited on the court until just before game time before returning to their locker room. 

Since returning, NBA players are wearing Black Lives Matter slogans on their uniforms to protest police violence against Black Americans as exemplified by the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.

With no games on, TNT aired a special episode of Inside the NBA and Kenny Smith walked out.

"As a Black man and a former player, I think its best for me to support the player and not be here tonight and figure out what happens after that," Smith said.

"I respect that," responded host Ernie Johnson.

For Ernie Johnson, the 30 years he’s worked on TNT’s Inside the NBA have zipped by.

“It’s like a blink,” Johnson said. “It seems like a couple weeks ago, I walked into that building and started doing the show.”

Initially launched on CNN, Inside the NBA this season marks its 30th anniversary. Johnson was joined by former NBA players Kenny Smith, Charles Barkley and Shaquille O’Neal, and the show grew into an unpredictable, engaging program that transcended basketball to become a pop-culture fixture and one of a handful of programs in Broadcasting & Cable’s Hall of Fame.

TNT will mark the anniversary by showing classic clips and memories from the show and asking viewers to vote on their favorites.

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During the playoffs Inside the NBA really takes off. Over the past five years, it averaged 2.3 million viewers, topping all of the broadcast networks’ late night shows among viewers and men in the key demos. There are some viewers who skip the game and watch the studio show, and there are also some advertisers who don’t advertise in games but run commercials during the post-game festivities.

Johnson said the show became fun when Smith — a two-time NBA champion with the Houston Rockets — retired as a player and joined the show full-time. “The show hit a new level when Charles came aboard,” Johnson added. “He changed the landscape for shows like that in any sports.”

The show has endured because of its chemistry in front of and behind the camera, Turner Sports executive vice president and chief content officer Craig Barry said. Early on, it was decided not to rehearse and to make the show’s discussions spontaneous.

“We don’t produce the guys,” Barry said. “The guys produce themselves.”

Now that the show is 30 years old, Barry said, it is looking to gauge what kind of impact it has had not only on sports, but on culture in general.

Barry was a production assistant on Inside the NBA 30 years ago. He helped steer the show towards including pop culture and was in favor of adding players to the on-camera mix.

His first encounter with Barkley came when he was given a company credit card and told to take the player known as the Round Mound of Rebound out to a club in Atlanta’s Bucktown neighborhood.

“Charles was the most gracious guy ever,” Barry recalled. When people would try to talk to Barkley or get his autograph, Barkley went out of his way to introduce them to “my friend Craig,” Barry said. Then Barry went to the bathroom. When he came out Barkley was gone and so was their car.

The prank-filled atmosphere is good for audiences and also good for business. “It’s not your traditional studio show,” Turner Sports senior vice president for ad sales Jon Diament said. But Inside the NBA is so entertaining, advertisers are eager to be included.

Prices for spots during Inside the NBA averaged $46,517, according to SQAD MediaCosts: National, not much less than spots in regular season NBA games, which cost $48,388.

Kia, the presenting sponsor for the past eight years, congratulated the show on its longevity. “Kia’s ‘Give It Everything’ brand mantra syncs perfectly with the show’s ‘Win or Go Home’ approach and we look forward to many years of continued future success,” said Michael Cole, chief operating officer and executive vice president of Kia Motors America.

“They’re not your average studio guys,” added Madhavi Tadikonda, senior vice president and group director, investment, at media agency Canvas, which handles Kia. “They have fun, they make it relevant not just to sports fans, but to pop culture in general. It’s a ton of everything you could ever want in a sports show, and there are a lot of non-sports watchers watching the show. So it’s a great property for us to associate ourselves with.”

Kia is looking at opportunities to participate in the anniversary celebration, Tadikonda said. Among the options is creating branded content with the hosts.

Last year, fans were invited to take shots at a basket on the back of a Kia driven by O’Neal. “The show knows the brand so well that they come up with a lot of creative things with the Kia team and they get executed flawlessly,” Tadikonda said.

No Nostalgia Overload

Barry said TNT won’t be overdoing its 30th anniversary celebration. “We’re not going to paste it all over,” he said.

The show also plans to put together the 30 greatest Inside the NBA moments and have fans vote on them.

Many of those best moments live on YouTube: Ernie running down Kenny as Kenny tries to duplicate Kobe Bryant’s leap over a car; a diaper-changing contest between Barkley and new father Kenny; the set being turned into a champion’s lounge and Barkley being excluded; Shaq knocking down the set while running to the video board.

How much longer will Inside the NBA go on? “I can go on as long as you want me to,” said Johnson, noting that they’ve been fortunate that other job offers never came to pull the cast apart.

After 30 years, Johnson doesn’t expect the show to change much this season. “I think we’re very fortunate to be in that situation where the folks at Turner look at us and say, hey, let’s not mess with it,” he said. “Let’s let those guys do their thing.”

TBS has greenlight unscripted series The Smiths, centering on ex-NBA star Kenny Smith and his family, the network said Tuesday.

The six episode series The Smiths, produced by Good Clean Fun and executively produced by Jason Carbone (The Bachelor, Tia and Tamera, Run's House), Nick Lee (The Bachelor, High School Reunion, Run's House), Jeff Altrock (The T.O. Show, Mac Miller and the Most Dope Family) and Smith, is scheduled to debut is spring of 2015.

 The series will follow Smith, is currently an NBA studio analyst for Turner Sports, his wife and five kids as they manage their large family on a day-to-day basis, said the network.