Really, when you think about it, the Lakers and the Dodgers – or, if you prefer, Dodgers and Lakers – maybe should have been corporate siblings all along.
They are the dominant teams in North America’s most diverse sports market, the biggest dogs in an awfully competitive kennel. And this might not be 100% accurate, but it would be my suspicion that the vast majority of those who root for the Dodgers also pull for the Lakers.
(How else, after all, to explain those thunderous boos in The Ravine any time a Clipper is shown on the video board?)
So now it will be official, according to news first reported by ESPN on Wednesday afternoon. Mark Walter, the controlling owner of the Dodgers, will purchase a majority stake in the Lakers from the Buss family, and ESPN’s Shams Charania reported that the purchase price is approximately $10 billion, a world record for a professional sports franchise.
This is worth noting: The Boston Celtics, the Lakers’ ancient rivals, had just changed hands in late March for $6.1 billion. The subliminal message: “Touché, Celtics. You may have one more banner at this point, but this is the REAL method of keeping score.”
You think Earvin Johnson might have been a go-between here? Magic is part of the Dodgers’ ownership group and a high-profile, front row spectator at home games. And, as befits a Basketball Hall of Famer and five-time NBA champion who spent his entire career (including comebacks) with the same team, he still refers to the Lakers as “we.”
“Laker fans should be ecstatic,” he began a post on X on Wednesday. And, well, he’s biased and entitled to it, but he’s not wrong.
Walter and his ownership group already own a portion of the WNBA’s Sparks, the Professional Women’s Hockey League, a Formula 1 racing team and the Billie Jean King Cup women’s tennis tournament (and King and her partner, Ilona Koss, are also part-owners in the Dodgers).
Walter’s day job? He’s the founder, CEO and co-chairman of TWG Global, a multinational conglomerate holding company with headquarters in Chicago and New York. It’s affiliated with Guggenheim Partners and owns several financial services companies under its subsidiary, Delaware Life Holdings, LLC.
Walter has owned a minority share of the Lakers since 2021 and had a right of first refusal to buy the majority share of the franchise, which probably helped bring us all to this point. As NBA franchise values have gotten bigger, with Mark Cuban selling his majority stake in the Dallas Mavericks two years ago for $3.5 billion and the Celtics changing hands earlier this year, it only makes perfect sense for Jeanie Buss to decide it was time, after 46 years of the family’s ownership, to sell.
The differences here?
In the Dallas transaction, Cuban sold to Las Vegas casino magnates Miriam Adelson and Sivan and Patrick Dumont, was assured he would still have a say in club affairs but as it turned out he didn’t. (If he had, would Luka Doncic be a Laker today? I suspect not.)
Here, Jeanie Buss will remain the Lakers’ governor, the family will retain about a 15% share of the franchise – and, it can be assumed, the people who have been running the franchise’s day-to-day affairs will continue to do so.
Also – and this is significant – the state of mind around the franchise won’t change. The Lakers, like the Dodgers, measure success in championships, which is as it should be in this country’s second-largest market. Right now, midway through the 2020s, the Dodgers have two titles and the Lakers have one. That friendly competition should make everyone better, right?
Really, with the similarities between the franchises you would think they already had the same DNA. They shoot for championships. They bring in stars, recommending the wonderful peculiarity and the intense competitiveness of this market. (And as anyone following baseball and the constant push-pull between big payroll and small payroll teams in that sport is aware, resources aren’t going to be an issue here, though navigating the various aprons of the NBA’s salary cap could be.)
And this is a match made in heaven from a fan perspective. Other L.A. franchises have had their moments – and, in truth, the Dodgers and Lakers have both had their down periods in the last couple of decades – but from the standpoint of historical success, memorable personalities (at the microphone in Vin Scully and Chick Hearn, as well as in uniform) and intense fan loyalty, the Dodgers and Lakers are 1 and 1A. Really, for sustained excellence, no one else in town comes close.
Consider: Since Jerry Buss purchased the Lakers, as well as the Kings and the Forum, from Jack Kent Cooke in 1979, the Lakers have had a winning percentage of .604, 301 playoff victories, 11 championships and six league MVPs – the NBA’s best in each category over that span.
“Jeanie Buss and the Buss family seemed like they were poised to keep this team forever,” ESPN’s Charania said during a SportsCenter segment on Wednesday afternoon, noting that front office executives Joey and Jesse Buss “are known in NBA circles as really rising executives in that front office even as part of ownership.” Joey Buss, 40, is the team’s vice president of research and development, while Jesse, 37, is assistant general manager and director of scouting.
“For the family to now sell for $10 billion, it’s an astronomical figure … something that of course is now going to set an immensely high bar,” Charania continued.
But consider: Thirteen years ago Walter and his group purchased the Dodgers from Frank McCourt for $2.15 billion. Many observers felt at the time that they had overpaid … and then they went and sold the TV rights to the entity then known as Time Warner for $8.35 billion over 25 years.
It’s best, then, not to second-guess Walter’s purchase, or the price, this time.
jalexander@scng.com