ESPN NBA Free Agency & Trade Tracker

Pulls NBA news and roster transactions directly from ESPN's API. Returns free-agent signings, trades, waivers, draft picks, and coaching hires in clean JSON — no browser, no scraping, no waiting.

The NBA calendar has one moment where everything happens at once. July 1 free agency open: 450 million dollars changes hands in 48 hours. This scraper is pointed at the right endpoints to catch all of it as it lands.

What It Returns

Two data streams, one scraper. Set mode: "news" for the latest NBA news articles, mode: "transactions" for roster moves, or mode: "both" to get everything. The default is both.

Output Fields

Field	Type	Description
news_id	string	Unique ESPN article or transaction ID
headline	string	Article headline or full transaction description
description	string	Article body summary (news items only)
publication_time_utc	string	Publication or transaction date in UTC ISO 8601
byline	string	Author attribution (news items only)
linked_player_name	string	NBA player name linked to this item
linked_team	string	NBA team name linked to this item
transaction_type	string	SIGN / TRADE / WAIVE / DRAFT / COACHING / OTHER
contract_years	integer	Contract length in years (when parseable from description)
contract_value_usd	number	Total contract value in USD (when parseable from description)
is_breaking	boolean	Whether the item is flagged as breaking/premium
source	string	Data origin: news or transactions

ESPN's transaction feed provides free-text descriptions rather than structured contract fields. contract_years and contract_value_usd are parsed from the description text when present — they're populated for most signing announcements and null for coaching hires, waivers, and other moves where no contract details are mentioned.

Input

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
mode	string	both	Which endpoints to query: news, transactions, or both
maxItems	integer	10	Maximum records to return across all sources

Keep maxItems modest during testing. The transactions endpoint has ~150 records in a typical off-season window; news returns up to 50 articles per run.

Use Cases

Free agency tracking. July 1–15 is the highest-velocity period in NBA roster movement. Run this on a schedule to capture each signing as it's announced, then join against Spotrac contract data for cap-context analysis.

AI sports content. Feed today's transactions into an LLM prompt for automated "NBA news brief" generation. The structured output means you're not parsing unstructured press releases.

DFS and fantasy prep. Waiver pickups and trades affect lineup decisions. Pair the transactions feed with game-day injury reports for a complete roster-movement picture.

Research and archiving. ESPN's API returns current data. For historical coverage, run periodically and accumulate — the publication_time_utc field makes deduplication straightforward.

Data Source

ESPN's hidden public API at site.api.espn.com. No authentication required. The endpoints are undocumented but stable — they've served the ESPN app and web for years. No proxy needed; the API is open to any IP.

Notes

• The news endpoint returns the 50 most recent NBA articles per run. It doesn't paginate — if you need more, run more frequently.
• The transactions endpoint paginates fully and returns all available moves for the current NBA season window (~150 in a typical off-season).
• Player names in transaction descriptions follow the format "Signed F John Doe to..." — the F is a position abbreviation that the extractor skips, returning John Doe.
• Coaching transactions (hires, extensions, resignations) are categorized as COACHING and never carry contract detail fields.