Category: Sports News

Jerry Buss wouldn’t have wanted this. 

After the Lakers owner died in 2013, there has been acerbic in-fighting between his children, most recently culminating in Jeanie Buss’ five siblings voting to sell the family’s remaining 17.8% share of the franchise, while she contests the sale so she can remain governor. 

At this point, it’s time for Jeanie to just let go. 

Sure, Jerry wanted the Lakers to remain in the family. But he wouldn’t have wanted this madness. There’s so much undercutting. Backstabbing. Drama. 

He wouldn’t have wanted a franchise that won 10 championships under his reign to be dragged through his family’s mud for a decade. 

He wouldn’t have wanted the greatest show in the league to devolve into a melodrama with his surname surrounded by bright lights.

This isn’t an indictment of Jeanie’s reign as governor, which included her acquiring LeBron James and helping guide the team to its first championship in 10 years in 2020. 

There’s no doubt that she has so much institutional knowledge. She became the first female majority owner to win an NBA title. She’s a trailblazer. 

But there’s grace in knowing when to drop the rope. 

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Really, what is she even fighting for at this point? She was the catalyst for selling the Lakers to Mark Walter for $10 billion in October 2025. 

Yes, the deal was for her to remain governor through 2030, an arrangement new owners Bob Iger and Josh Kushner intended to honor after buying the team from Walter last week for $12.5 billion. 

But things have changed. 

They’ve gotten ugly again. The five Buss family siblings intended to use a tag-along provision to sell their remaining stake in the Lakers. They issued a statement to ESPN on Monday, saying, “It is time to use this opportunity to move on and exit gracefully while we still can.”

Jeanie, who was the only sibling who didn’t vote for the sale, dug her feet into the ground. 

Through her lawyer, Adam Streisand, Jeanie is contending that a court ruled in 2017 that the team can’t be sold without approval by the co-trustees, who are Jeanie, Janie and Joey Buss. 

Now everything is going to be up to lawyers and courtrooms. 

The losers of all of this? The Lakers, who will be paralyzed until this resolves, unless Iger and Kushner decide to cut ties with Jeanie. 

This is nuanced. 

Jeanie is the face of the Lakers. It made sense for Walter to keep her as governor after buying the team. Iger and Kushner were right to respect that. She provides a sense of continuity. Of oversight. Of comfort amid chaos. 

But if there’s a war raging in the background, that detracts from any good she could do. If her family drama is a distraction, that’s going to hurt the Lakers more than she could help them. 

The Buss family has overseen the Lakers for 47 years, turning it into the second-most successful NBA franchise with 17 championships. Under Jerry, the Lakers acquired superstars Magic Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. He created the Laker Girls. He’s widely considered one of the greatest owners in sports. 

Jeanie carried on his legacy. She’s respected. She’s beloved. 

But her reign has always come with an ugly underbelly. 

Jeanie fired her brother, Jim Buss, as the executive vice president of basketball operations in 2017 after the Lakers were heading toward their fourth straight losing season. 

Things got even uglier. 

Jim and Johnny Buss attempted a boardroom coup to oust Jeanie as the team’s controlling owner in 2017. She obtained a restraining order and filed a lawsuit against her brothers, with the siblings ultimately reaching a settlement that strengthened her power. 

The drama didn’t stop there. 

Under Jeanie’s governorship after the Lakers were sold to Walter, Joey and Jesse Buss were dismissed from their basketball operations positions in November 2025. Jeanie’s sister, Janie Buss, was also removed as the team’s longtime charitable services director.

A few months later, an ESPN story came out that undercut Jeanie’s relationship with James. 

The story alleged that Jeanie resented James’ “outsized ego,” adding that she even “privately mused” about trading the megastar to the Clippers in 2022 and that she “begrudgingly” gave him a contract extension in 2024 because she feared the public backlash if she didn’t. 

In a statement to The Athletic, Jeanie said, “It’s really not right, given all the great things LeBron has done for the Lakers, that he has to be pulled into my family drama.” 

James left the Lakers in free agency this summer after eight seasons with the franchise. 

Now, the drama is raging once again. 

Her siblings have banded together. And she’s refusing to wave the white flag. 

But at this point, is that what’s best for the Lakers?

Jeanie agreed to sell the team. The Lakers deserve a fresh start. The Buss family drama would get in the way of that. 

The Buss family was the greatest thing to happen to the Lakers. 

But all good things must come to an end. 

The state of the Lakers’ ownership continued to more turns.

It was just last week when Mark Walter agreed to sell his share in the franchise to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger at a historic valuation of $12.5 billion – just 10 months after Walter officially became the Lakers’ majority owner. 

This week, it appeared the Buss family voted to sell their remaining 17.8% share of the Lakers to Kushner and Iger.

Not so fast.

Lakers Governor Jeanie Buss is opposing her siblings’ vote to sell the family’s share of the Lakers, according to a letter from her lawyer, Adam Streisand. The letter, obtained by the California Post on Monday, argued her siblings can’t legally execute a sale without her approval and that any vote of the Buss family selling would be “void.”

Her siblings who are part of the Buss family trust (Jim, Johnny, Janie, Joey and Jesse Buss) fired back at Jeanie on Tuesday, making it clear they intend to go through with the sale.

But how did the Lakers, and the Buss family get here? And what exactly are the two sides arguing? 

Court order details 

At the heart of Buss opposing her siblings’ vote to sell their share of the Lakers is a 2017 court order, with Streisand saying that no sale could happen “without approval by the co-trustees, i.e. Jeanie, Janie and Joey Buss.”

Jeanie didn’t vote to sell the family’s ownership stake in the Lakers, while the other five siblings in the trust did.

The court document from 2017 stated that the co-trustees of the Buss family trust are instructed to take all “actions reasonably available to them, including voting the Trust’s shares” to ensure that Jeanie was elected as the Director of the Board of the Lakers on an annual basis during her lifetime.

The document goes on to state “absent a further order of this Court modifying the Trust based upon proof of circumstances justifying modification under applicable law.”

The document also added that the co-trustees of the family trust are “instructed to take all actions [reasonably] available to them, including voting the Trust’s shares” to ensure that Jeanie is elected as the controlling owner of the Lakers on an annual basis during her lifetime.

One of the main problems of the Buss family attempting to sell their share of the Lakers: It would result in Jeanie no longer being the team’s Governor, since she would no longer have the qualifying 15% ownership stake in the franchise required to hold that position. 

She has been the team’s Governor since 2013 after Dr. Jerry Buss’ death.

When Walter purchased the majority ownership of the Lakers from the Buss family, the league announced that Buss would remain the team’s Governor for a period of at least five years (through 2030).

Iger told the California Post last week he and Kushner intended to honor the agreement made between Walter and Buss. 

And based off of the last couple of days, it appears Jeanie wants to remain Governor of the Lakers. 

Streisand wrote in the letter to the Buss siblings’ attorneys: “No sale of the JAB Trust’s 17.8% ownership interest in the Los Angeles Lakers, Inc. can be effectuated without approval by the current co-trustees, i.e., Jeanie, Janie and Joey Buss.

“Pursuant to the JAB Trust and the attached Court Order, the co-trustees are bound to vote the Los Angeles Lakers, Inc. shares to ensure that the minimum 15% ownership requirement is maintained in order to ensure that Jeanie Buss may remain Controlling Owner. Any attempt by the co-trustees to do otherwise, and any attempt to aid or abet the co-trustees as such, would constitute a breach of trust, breach of fiduciary duty and be in contempt of court.”

The Buss siblings’ side

Jeanie’s siblings believe they have the right to sell the family’s shares of the Lakers via a “tag-along” provision that was included when the Buss family sold the Lakers to Walter in June 2025. 

ESPN reported the provision gave the Buss family the opportunity to “tag along on any sale and valuation Walter secured for his shares.”

The siblings believe that the family trust, which includes six of Jerry Buss’ children — Johnny (69), Jim (66), Jeanie (64), Janie (62), Joey (41) and Jesse (37) — needed a majority vote (four out of six) to allow the trustees to sell the family’s shares.

What happens next is unknown, with the potential of this dispute having to be resolved through a legal process growing unless the side can come to an agreement without litigation. 

Once again, we have a whole host of news, rumors and updates around the Buss family’s feud, Mark Walter and even a cameo from Shams Charania to defend himself against a claim from Jeanie Buss.

All that and it’s not even been 24 hours since we posted one of these roundups. What an exhausting week.

Let’s dive into the latest headlines and reports.

Jeanie Buss buying sibling’s shares?

While it seems like the Buss family drama may be destined to end in a courtroom, there are other ways things could play out. One of them could involve Jeanie effectively taking control of the Buss Family Trust.

In a piece by Dan Woike and Sam Amick of The Athletic on Wednesday, they raised the possibility of Jeanie buying the shares from the rest of the family.

Could there be a way for the rest of the siblings to sell and Jeanie to remain as governor? That would require her finding a way to still own at least 15 percent of the shares, but it is possible. Per a league source, Jeanie would be open to exploring that scenario.

The first reaction to this is ‘Duh, of course Jeanie is open to it.’ The second reaction is that it feels like there is no chance the family is interested in selling those shares to Jeanie.

That said, we don’t know the siblings’ intentions. Perhaps they just want to cash out it doesn’t matter whether Jeanie gives them that money or Bob Iger and Josh Kushner do. Does Jeanie even have enough money to do that, though?

While this option is on the table, it doesn’t feel particularly likely.

The contract to keep Jeanie as governor

Another aspect of this is whether Iger and Kushner have an interest in even keeping Jeanie as governor. However, it might not be under their control.

In the same piece for The Athletic, Woike and Amick reported that the contract she signed with Mark Walter to remain governor for at least five years might be part of the deal for Iger and Kushner.

It’s fair to wonder how Iger and Kushner see this situation, with some wondering whether they’d want to choose a different governor simply because of the messiness of it all. But Walter’s choice to have Jeanie serve as governor for the next four years is known to be part of the contractual agreement from the sale 14 months ago, and a league source close to the situation indicated that it is now considered part of the deal with Iger and Kushner. In essence, if that proves to be the case, Iger and Kushner would be assuming Walter’s ownership role and the governor that comes with it.

If so, it makes sense why Jeanie is fighting so hard to maintain that 15% ownership stake. If she believes she’ll remain the governor no matter who owns the team, then her stance makes more sense.

It doesn’t make it any less desperate or annoying to watch as fans on the outside looking in, but at least there’s a little bit of logic to it.

Shams Charania fires back at Jeanie

One of the wilder strays of the letter from Jeanie’s lawyer was directed at Shams Charania of ESPN and his report on Monday morning that the Buss family would be selling their stake.

As you know, this afternoon, Shams Charania of ESPN falsely reported that the six Buss siblings voted to sell the 17.8% ownership stake in the Lakers to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger, and that my client, Jeanie Buss, is “out” as controlling owner. This is just the latest instance of a years-long pattern whereby Joey and Jesse Buss leak false, defamatory and pernicious “information” to Mr. Charania for the malicious purpose of doing harm to the Los Angeles Lakers so long as Dr. Buss’s chosen successor, Jeanie Buss, carries out her father’s wishes.

That felt pretty far out of left field, but clearly there was some pent-up anger from Jeanie in this situation. On Tuesday, Charania appeared on “The Pat McAfee Show” and defended his reporting on the matter.

Look, Shams’ method of reporting deserves criticism and I’m not going to be defending him. But I also think Jeanie throwing shots his way in this situation felt out of place, mean-spirited and just odd.

Mark Walter tried to take loans out against Lakers’ stake

Lastly, we have our daily “What crazy way did Mark Walter try to get money” update, this time being one that feels like it was serious.

On Tuesday, Eric Platt, Sun Yu, Oliver Barnes, James Fontanella-Khan and Lee Harris of the Financial Times reported that Walter attempted to take out a loan against his Lakers’ stake with conversations carrying on all the way to him agreeing to sell the team.

Mark Walter held discussions with private investment giant Apollo Global Management about a multibillion-dollar loan against his Los Angeles Lakers stake, in a sign of the billionaire’s rush to raise cash this year.

The talks took place throughout the summer and continued until former Disney chief executive Bob Iger and venture capitalist Josh Kushner offered to buy Walter’s stake in the Lakers, according to people familiar with the matter.

The more we learn about Walter, the more it feels like the sale, when it came, was one of the better options on the table.

You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude or on Bluesky at @jacobrude.bsky.social.