Atlanta Hawks Use OnlyFans Parody to Promote NBA's In-Season Tournament

The Atlanta Hawks' social media team is well known in NBA circles for its bold content choices.

On Thursday, the team made a splash once again. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), the Hawks advertised the NBA's in-season tournament with a parody of the content creation site OnlyFans, which is best known for hosting adult content creators.

In the tweet, the Hawks' mascot poses suggestively on a bed with soft lighting and light, jazzy music. Meanwhile, a female voice says, "Only Hawks fans know where the real action is."

"Only Hawks fans know what they really want to see, and only Hawks fans know just where to get it," the voice continues. "The all-new NBA in-season tournament. Join in and wake up your wild side."

Finally, the voice whispers, "Hot 5-on-5 action."

Newsweek has reached out to the Hawks' social media by email for comment regarding the post, as well as the production process behind it.

Fans seemed to enjoy the tweet, even if a number of them pretended to be upset by it.

"Admin im at WORK," one tweeted, to which the Hawks' account responded, "Oops."

"Everybody who had a hand in putting this together deserves a raise," another user posted. (Replies to that tweet included this: "Everyone who had a hand in this deserves to be fired.")

The official account for the team's mascot, Harry the Hawk, hopped into the replies as well. When one user tweeted, "[not going to lie] I'm a little attracted to the Hawks' mascot now," the Harry the Hawk X account dropped a reaction GIF.

The NBA's in-season tournament has already begun, and players don't seem entirely certain what to make of it so far. Los Angeles Clippers guard Bones Hyland admitted he isn't sure what's happening.

"I'm not even going to lie, I don't even know what's going on," Hyland said last week. "I don't even know how it works. I don't know anything, honestly. I'm just looking at the schedule, and I see on the schedule a trophy next to one of the games. I'm like, 'I feel like the trophy is supposed to be in July.'"

We would assume that watching the Hawks' promotional video did very little to clear things up for Hyland. (He did admit that the $500,000 prize money each player on the winning team will receive is some motivation.)

The Hawks play their first tournament game on Tuesday against the Detroit Pistons. The tournament begins with group play before it moves to a single-elimination bracket, similar to the UEFA Champions League. The Hawks' bracket includes the Pistons, Philadelphia 76ers, Indiana Pacers and Cleveland Cavaliers.