After Magic Johnson officially rejoined the Lakers last week, the team was quick to downplay any potential tension it might cause in the front office, stressing that the Hall-of-Famer would be serving in an advisory role on basketball operations and business matters. However, Johnson revealed in a conversation with Josh Peter of USA Today that he may have larger aspirations.
“Working to call the shots, because it only works that way,” Johnson said when asked what he hopes his role with the team will be. “Right now I’m advising. I get that. But at the end of the day, then we all got to come together and somebody’s got to say, ‘I’m making the final call,’ all right? And who’s that going to be? … So, we’ll see what happens.”
Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak and executive VP of basketball operations Jim Buss have made the personnel decisions in Los Angeles for the last several years. However, at least one recent report has been critical of the job Kupchak has done in free agency, and Buss vowed during the 2013/14 season that he’d step down in three or four years if the Lakers hadn’t developed into a title contender by that point.
With Johnson now entering that mix, it remains to be seen whether all three men will still be involved in basketball decisions during the coming offseason, and which of them will have the final say on roster moves. In comments to Peter, Johnson suggested that the decision on his role rests with owner Jeanie Buss, adding that he expects that decision to be made by the end of the season. In the meantime, the former Lakers star is hitting the books to brush up on the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement and salary cap.
“I’m going to school, for sure,” Johnson said. “Because I know talent. This part (evaluating players) comes easy, watching people play and seeing how they play, whose game hopefully can translate to the next level, those type of things. You’ll find out more as you get to interview them later on, the draft and workouts we have pre-draft. Then you’ll find out a lot more.
“The main part for me is really learning the other part that I didn’t know, and that is to understand the CBA, the salary cap, where we are in terms of the salary cap and who’s a free-agent-to-be. You’ve got a lot of young players so you’ve got to learn when are their contracts coming up, if you can give them the max deal, give them an extension, all those types of things you’ve got to learn. It’s a lot of things, but I’m excited.”
Phil Jackson 2.0
Magic Has been a very successful businessman so I would think he would be better than Phil, but how hard would that be really.
I’d probably be better than Phil at this point…
It’s pretty hard to be a bad businessman when you’ve made billions of dollars from peddling HIV meds.
Lakers have enough problems, whats next coach? Major train wreck coming
Magic Johnson Wants To ‘Call The Shots’ For Lakers
Well, he did such a good job with the Dodgers
Los Angeles Dodgers will end the season with a $298.3 million player payroll, by far the highest of all-time and makes them biggest spenders in MLB for the second straight season, besting the New York Yankees by a considerable sum
All, that money just to field a baseball team and now he wants to share that success with the Lakers.
Marvelous!!!
He doesn’t do anything for the Dodgers. He’s just someone attached with minority’s stakes.
Meanwhile, the dodgers have hired an amazing assortment of front office guys in a bunch of different aspects, done a great job adding amateur talent through the draft, and out spent everyone on the international market to add more talent to the system, allowing them to make upgrades when necessary, and they’re a perennial contender. They haven’t broken through for a WS, but they’ve also had a lot of injuries in the last couple of seasons, and still put themselves in position
Still can’t buy a second baseman soo
Lefty, I usually like your posts, but as a poster already said, he doesn’t call the shots for the Dodgers. He’s just a minority owner. That’s not the same as running an actual team.
Magic had some moves on the court, but we’ll have to see about how he is with running a team. As we’ve seen before, sometimes the best players aren’t the best judge of talents (Wayne Gretzky, Michael Jordan are a few that come to mind)
This is to everyone.
I said what I said about Magic because of this:
“We understand that you have to spend money to be good in this league, and we understood that before we bought the team,” Johnson said.
I remember chuckling to myself about it back in 2012 when they made a big trade with the Red Sox.
Anyway, the Lakers should give him a chance to do something, but to immediately make him GM (which is kind of inferred in the article by Magic), I am not certain that is a good idea, even if that is what he wants.
All the Red Sox got in that deal was salary relief. The Dodgers still have Adrian Gonzalez in the middle of their lineup
And the Red Sox have a CHAMPIONSHIP to show for that trade. Dodgers have Adrian Gonzalez
True. Cheriton used the salary relief to sign short term deals that workednout, thereby winning the WS. As a Red Sox fan, there’s no excuse for that slipping my mind lol, although I haven’t slept much this week…still, the idea was that it was a god awful deal for the dodgers, which it wasnt. That’s the main thing I was refuting there
*sogh* Cherington
Wow…I just noticed this. I really, really hate autocorrect. Would be nice if we had an edit function lol
Come on lefty
The dodgers have the players in place but they need a manager. Very solid organization. Top to bottom. Im here in cincinnati. You wanna switch?
This is going to be a train wreck for the Lakers, and as a non Lakers fan I can’t wait to watch it unfold!
Can’t be any worse than it is now, right?
The Heat are living proof that you don’t need this mega super team to win rings. Not saying Miami is all of a sudden a title contender but they were one of the league 3 weeks ago and have put together an insane streak and not far from the 8th seed.
they’re able to continue to add young talent, even without using draft picks, b/c their scouting does a good enough job to identify players, get them in their system, and then eventually call them up from the D-leagu. Heat coaching staff also does a great job of developing players, even guys that have been in the league for a while.
To be honest, they weren’t that terrible when they had the 2nd worst record a few weeks ago. They had lost 17 close games, and probably a few more that barely didn’t qualify as that. They were in every game. Also, the Heat are a terrible free throw shooting team (worst in the league), and that seemed to hurt them almost every night. They also had all the injuries, but more importantly, they had a black hole at the 4 spot with Derrick Williams and Luke Babbit. Now they have James Johnson and Okaro White, which is a significant upgrade. They’ve won their last 7 or 8 close games
Miami is on a nice little run, but realistically, while they may have a shot at a lower playoff seed, they won’t make much noise in the playoffs if they make it. Great coaching job by Spoelstra though, they were left for dead a month ago.
i like it
Usually a thing called a business degree in college would help. He even admits he doesn’t understand the business side with different contracts, cap space limits and CBA…..uuummm that’s what it takes to call the shots!!!!!!!!!
Completely agree. Most people don’t realize he made all that money from being a spokesman (THE face) of HIV. It isn’t from being a “successful businessman.” Kind of hard to fail when you’ve been handed billions of dollars for being the sleazy snake oil salesman that he is.
let’s see if magic can convince players to come to LA. whatever makes us not suck anymore I’m all for it. I’m tired of tanking for picks, I hope this is the last year we tank like the 76ers have done for like a decade Hahahaha
1 – college degree might be over-valued. Working experience in business the last 20 years puts Magic ahead of just about every graduating senior in any business college in the USA.
2 – Easier to convince talent to come to LA now that Kome is gone. What a talented headache!
3 – I like the Heat’s chances in first round of playoffs versus any team not from Cleveland. (Does Riley have a business degree?)
Even Toronto and Boston?
Yep, might have had Toronto last year (missing Bosh and Whiteside got injured – Toronto’s big man got injured in that series as well).
I like the Heat’s depth, with the Brother’s Johnson STOMPing off the bench, Josh Richardson to return soon, and Wayne Ellington shooting lights out. Heck, Big Willie Reed is even ballin’.
Not saying Heat hands down over Raptors or C’s (I respect them), but I like the matchups against both of those teams.
To be honest, if they make it, I’m hoping for a 1st round matchup against Toronto, assuming health
You’re high
Not saying they’d wn. I just think that’s their best matchup, and it’d be nice to at least have a shot at a clapback
The Heat have ZERO chance against the Celtics. They would get swept for sure. Especially with how well Boston is playing without their best defensive guard Avery Bradley (minus the fluke loss to the kings the other night, let’s not forget that the Kings beat the Warriors too)
Ya I wouldn’t want to face the Celtics, personally.
I can’t help but think about when he started coaching the Lakers mid season and basically decided to quit when the team started losing.
Calling it now…..Isaiah Thomas — Knicks front office — 2.0. Get your popcorn ready.
The Lakers had no bad moves in the last couple of years they drafted niceley and the Mozgov and Deng contracts are ok not crippling they had a loot of extra money .There is not much to do right now but wait.Free agents rarely leave teams now the old way is dead forget it.
Bruh mosgov and deng were terrible moves tf you mean they literally have no trade value and prevent us from getting better free agents