Nobody saw this coming.
When the Buss family sold their majority stake in the Lakers 14 months ago — ending 46 years of being a family-run business — it didn’t come out of nowhere. There had been speculation for years that as the deep pockets needed to run a competitive major American sports franchise grew, the Buss family had no choice but to consider this option, and Dodger owner Mark Walter already owned 27% of the team (and had first right of refusal on any sale).
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Now, just 14 months later, Walter is flipping the Lakers and selling them to Joshua Kushner and Bob Iger at a valuation of $12.5 billion. The suddenness of the sale caught the league off guard and leads to a lot of questions. Here’s what we know so far.
How did sale come together?
Fast.
NBC Sports had been told that Kushner and Iger were seriously involved in the bidding for a potential expansion team in Las Vegas (though not necessarily the frontrunner). That massive expense — an expansion fee expected to be at least $7 billion but likely higher — to get in the door and then start a new team may have given the partners pause.
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Kushner reached out to Walter on Friday and the deal quickly came together during the weekend, all of it coming together in three days, Iger told The California Post.
Why sell the team now?
That is the $12.5 billion question. It also is at least part of the answer. Walter purchased the team 14 months ago at a valuation of $10 billion, so turning a tidy $2.5 billion profit in just more than a year is good work if you can get it.
However, it also may be that Walter needed cash. Walter is the CEO and invested deeply in Guggenheim Partners (which owned the Lakers as well as the Los Angeles Dodgers), and is also the founder and leads TWG Global, a holding company. Investigators at both the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan and the SEC are looking into alleged failure to properly disclose billions of dollars in related-party private credit loans tied to Walter’s companies.
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Bloomberg reports that Walter is trying to raise cash to pay down debt in the face of that investigation. A quick sale of the Lakers might help with that.
Because Joshua Kushner is the brother and business partner of Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of President Donald Trump, there has been online speculation that the White House had a hand in forcing the sale. A White House spokesperson reportedly told Front Office Sports the sale had nothing to do with Trump or the administration.
Will the Buss family still be involved?
Yes. Walter is selling his majority stake in the franchise, and the Buss family will maintain its 15% share.
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Under the agreement with Walter, Jeanie Buss stayed on as the official governor of the Lakers and was going to be in that role for at least five years. The new owners plan to honor that agreement, Iger told The California Post.
“We have enormous respect and appreciation for Jeanie, her father and what they’ve contributed to this franchise, and we have every intention to honor the agreement that was made between Mark and Jeanie. If things change, they’ll change, but we’re going into this with enormous respect and appreciation for who she is and what she represents in the organization.”
Does this sale impact the Dodgers?
No. Walter and Guggenheim will maintain ownership of the two-time defending World Series Champions, and this sale does not involve the WNBA’s Los Angeles Sparks.
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How will this impact the front office? The roster?
In the short term, nothing changes. The Lakers’ retooled roster is largely set for this season — even though they have discussed trying to land wing Jonathan Kuminga in a sign-and-trade, if they can do it on their terms. At this point, there would be no bold moves to really make, even if ownership wanted to.
Also, Luka Doncic made it clear he remains committed to the Lakers.
Long-term it remains to be seen what this means. Walter had come in and started the “Dodgerification” of the Lakers organization, adding to the team’s scouting and analytics staff and, like the Dodgers, pushing the franchise in a more analytically driven direction. Walter also made major changes on the business side of the organization, bringing in Lon Rosen as the team’s new president of business operations, a role he had with the Dodgers.
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We don’t know what an Iger/Kushner ownership style looks like. Neither do they, Iger told the California Post.
“It’s just premature to speculate at all about what we plan to do, because frankly, we haven’t made any plans yet. Again, we go into this with an appreciation of who the Lakers are. And we just want to build value from today on…
“This is very new.”
Who are Kushner and Iger?
Kushner founded Thrive Capital, a venture capital firm that invests largely in young tech companies such as Instagram and OpenAI, among many others. Kushner is worth an estimated $5.2 billion, according to Forbes.
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Maybe more famously, Kushner is the younger brother of Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law. However, Joshua does not have a role in the White House, reportedly has differing political views from his brother, and is a much more private person. Kushner also has invested in NBA teams before and is currently a minority owner of the Miami Heat (shares he will have to sell to complete this deal).
Iger is well known to many Southern California for his many years — across two stints — as the CEO of The Walt Disney Company, the second of which ended earlier this year. He is a consultant with Thive.
Kushner may be most of the money behind the sale, with Iger likely being the face of the new ownership group.
What are the next steps?
The details of the sale itself need to be formally put together in the coming months, then that will be presented to the league, which will do its due diligence. Ultimately, two-thirds of the Board of Governors need to vote to approve the sale.
That likely is all a formality. This sale is going to happen.