National Basketball
Association (NBA)
Services
Research, Design, Systems, User Testing
Team
Design Research, Product Management, Engineering, Analytics
Services
Research, Design, Systems, User Testing
Timeline
2021-2026
During my time as Director of Product Design at the NBA, I began by helping lead product design for the official NBA App (iOS, Android, connected devices, emerging platforms) and managed a team of 3 designers across mobile, design systems, and connected devices (tvOS, Roku, Apple Vision Pro). Users in 200+ markets, with over 1B fans globally.
By highlighting features like Tap to Watch, 24/7 live programming, and our unprecedented access, we show how the App streamlines the live game journey and keeps fans connected to what’s happening across the league at all times.
The reimagined app drove:
+43%
YoY growth in NBA Subscribers
+42%
YoY increase in downloads across iOs
4.7
Star rating on App Store (from 2.2)
Challenge
Inheriting a broken experience
The fans were losing trust in the NBA.
A legend in sports were losing viewership to the NBA had outsourced design work for years. The result: the app looked like it was built by different teams (because it was). iOS looked different from Android. Web didn't match either. Interactions were inconsistent. User flows contradicted each other. A fan could have three completely different experiences depending on which device they used.
Why This Mattered
User Trust: Consistency signals quality. Inconsistency signals chaos. Fans didn't know if the app was reliable.
Support Burden: Design inconsistency creates confusion. Support tickets spike when users see different UI on different devices.
Scaling Pain: Every new platform (tvOS, Vision Pro, web) meant rebuilding from scratch. No shared language, no shared components, no velocity.
Team Fragmentation: Design was distributed across contractors and agencies. No single person owned quality. No culture. No continuity.
Strategy
Build a system and the team to operate it
Kinetic Design System In an effort to fix The Design team bgean build the beginngins. We took cures from various souces built a unified component library, design tokens, and interaction patterns for iOS, Android, tvOS, and web.Before Kinetic, every platform reinvented the button, the card, the navigation. After Kinetic, there's one button. One card. One language. Consistency solved at the source.
Mobile: iOS + Android
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Caption for the image above will go here and be a nice little visual anchor point
Caption for the image above will go here and be a nice little visual anchor point
Execution
Building a platform for every surface
Kinetic Design System In an effort to fix The Design team bgean build the beginngins. We took cures from various souces built a unified component library, design tokens, and interaction patterns for iOS, Android, tvOS, and web.Before Kinetic, every platform reinvented the button, the card, the navigation. After Kinetic, there's one button. One card. One language. Consistency solved at the source.
[Collections of various inspiration pieces and thematics]
Mobile: iOS + Android
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
Make your personal leadership unmistakable. “We built” is good, but regularly specify “I set the strategy,” “I hired/managed,” “I aligned product and engineering,” and “I made the sequencing decision.”
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Connected Devices
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Top-Performing Features
Feature 1
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa.
Featurequis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum
Quick moments to digest
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum
Apple Vision Pro
We did some sick stuff for Apple Vision Pro, after studying it's HIG.
This involved understanding the platfoirm, the needs of our users
(Add photo of me in AVP)
https://photos.google.com/search/ChBhcHBsZSB2aXNpb24gcHJvIhIKEGFwcGxlIHZpc2lvbiBwcm8o37DXt%2FgzOAM%3D/top/photo/AF1QipNVaF8IWGuGzYPKclclGqWSGIV5CoyZXpdTkaqh
The court comes to life
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum .
The court comes to life
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum .
Results
Measuring what matters
Kinetic Design System In an effort to fix The Design team bgean build the beginngins. We took cures from various souces built a unified component library, design tokens, and interaction patterns for iOS, Android, tvOS, and web.Before Kinetic, every platform reinvented the button, the card, the navigation. After Kinetic, there's one button. One card. One language. Consistency solved at the source.
Mobile: iOS + Android
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
Make your personal leadership unmistakable. “We built” is good, but regularly specify “I set the strategy,” “I hired/managed,” “I aligned product and engineering,” and “I made the sequencing decision.”
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Connected Devices
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Top-Performing Features
Feature 1
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa.
Feature 2
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum
Quick moments to digest
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum
Apple Vision Pro
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Have me be a cool animation in “Don’t try to be original. Just try to be good.” - Paul Rand. Also, my professor used to say "Never give the client options, they'll always pick the wrong one". I
First Last
Results
Measuring what matters
Kinetic Design System In an effort to fix The Design team bgean build the beginngins. We took cures from various souces built a unified component library, design tokens, and interaction patterns for iOS, Android, tvOS, and web.Before Kinetic, every platform reinvented the button, the card, the navigation. After Kinetic, there's one button. One card. One language. Consistency solved at the source.
Mobile: iOS + Android
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
Make your personal leadership unmistakable. “We built” is good, but regularly specify “I set the strategy,” “I hired/managed,” “I aligned product and engineering,” and “I made the sequencing decision.”
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Connected Devices
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]
Top-Performing Features
Feature 1
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa.
Feature 2
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum
Quick moments to digest
quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Maecenas malesuada. Praesent congue erat at massa. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Phasellus accumsan cursus velit. Vestibulum ante ipsum
Apple Vision Pro
The iOS redesign established the new consistent design language. Android came shortly after as a thoughtful adaptation of the same language to Android conventions. For the first time, iOS and Android felt like the same app.
Android launched with [X%] feature parity and [Y rating]. Both platforms hit [X million] users combines.
[IMG: Side-by-side of iOS and Android showing how same component adapts to platform conventions — button style, navigation, color application]