Latest Buss family drama is like a real-life episode of ‘Succession’

Monday afternoon played out like a real-life episode of the television show “Succession,” a satirical drama about a family fighting for control over a national media conglomerate.

At the eye of the storm? 

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The Buss family. And the Los Angeles Lakers. 

Jim Buss and his sister Jeanie Buss attend a news conference where Dwight Howard was introduced as the newest member of the team at the Toyota Sports Center on August 10, 2012, in El Segundo.

Five days after Mark Walter agreed to sell the Lakers to Bob Iger and Josh Kushner for $12.5 billion, ESPN’s Shams Charania reported Monday morning that the Buss family has decided to sell its 17.8% ownership stake in the franchise. 

It was the end of an era. 

It meant Jeanie Buss would no longer be the Lakers’ governor since NBA guidelines require governors to own at least 15% of a franchise. It meant the Buss’s 47-year tenure with the franchise had come to an end. 

This was monumental.  

Buss with her brother Jim in El Segundo. Christopher Patey/Contour by Getty Images

Two-time Laker champion Mychal Thompson told The California Post that it was “a sad day for us Laker faithful.” Laker great Magic Johnson took to X to write a lengthy post about what the Buss family meant to him. 

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But Thompson’s words quickly morphed in meaning. And Johnson deleted his post. 

Their eulogies were interrupted. 

Why, you may ask?

The drama began to unspool like yarn. The jaw-dropping in-fighting that has hung over the Buss family like a dark cloud since Jerry Buss died in 2013 raged into yet another war. 

Jeremy Strong, Sarah Snook and Kieran Culkin in Season 4 of “Succession.” AP

Jeanie Buss did not vote to sell the team — and she’s contesting her five siblings’ votes, arguing that they can’t legally execute a sale without her approval.   

In a letter obtained by The California Post, Jeanie Buss’s lawyer, Adam Streisand, called this 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,…

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Publish date : 2026-08-18 01:52:00

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