By Joe Vardon, Mike Vorkunov, Fabian Ardaya and Andy McCullough
The Buss family has agreed in principle to sell the Los Angeles Lakers, one of the most iconic sporting brands in the world, to financier Mark Walter in a deal valued at a record $10 billion, league sources told The Athletic.
The sale, which is not yet finalized, could reach $12 billion in value, according to one source with knowledge of the negotiations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the sale.
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Even at the lower number, the sale would be the largest for any sports team, and it will affect not only how competitive the Lakers can be in the NBA, but will also impact the other storied Los Angeles sports team for whom Walter is the controlling owner, the Dodgers.
Jeanie Buss, 63, will remain governor after the sale is complete, a league source said. Her father purchased the Lakers in 1979 and the following year the Lakers were NBA champions, the first of 10 titles they would win under his ownership. With stars like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and especially Magic Johnson, the “Showtime” Lakers of the 1980s helped to reinvigorate the league’s popularity and made the franchise one of the most popular in all of sports.
Jeannie Buss has been team governor and controlling owner since 2017, four years after her father died and a legal dispute among his children was settled allowing her to take control.
The pending sale was first reported by ESPN.
Walter, 65, is chief executive of Guggenheim Partners, a global financial services firm with more than $325 billion in assets. He led the group that bought the Dodgers in 2012 for $2 billion. The franchise has won two World Series titles since and operated as one of the best organizations in professional sports.
Walter first took a stake in the Lakers in 2021 when he and Todd Boehly bought a 27 percent share of the franchise, then valued at about $5 billion, and it included a right of first negotiation, according to one source with knowledge of the deal.
Buss bought the Lakers for about $68 million from Jack Kent Cooke, the former owner, in a complex deal that also gave him the Los Angeles Kings and the Forum. The price of the Lakers has gone up drastically since then.
The Lakers have won 17 NBA championships – second only to the Boston Celtics – and have at multiple points in their storied existence employed the “face” of the league, or a player so important professionally and culturally that he transcends any box score. From Wilt, to Kareem, to Magic to Shaq to Kobe to LeBron, the Lakers added to that impressive list by trading for perennial MVP candidate Luka Dončić last February.
This story will be updated.
(Photo: Jevone Moore / Getty Images)
This news was originally published on this post .
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