Magic Johnson once broke down in tears while stepping down as Lakers President, claiming he wasn’t happy with the job at hand
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Magic Johnson and the Los Angeles Lakers go hand-in-hand with one another. The purple and gold are considered to be North American Sporting royalty and they wouldn’t have reached that level without the 6’9 point guard manning the offense in the 1980s.
Magic made was chosen 1st overall in the 1979 NBA Draft, the same year that Jerry Buss had purchased the Lakers. A perfect analogy for the relationship Jerry had with him is the one Patriots owner, Robert Kraft has with Tom Brady, the man who brought him 6 NFL rings.
Alongside the way, as Jerry’s daughter, Jeanie, grew older, Magic and her got close as well. Soon enough, the Michigan State alum, Jerry Buss, and Jeanie Buss become an inseparable duo.
Fast-forward to 2017 and Jeanie utilized her close relationship with Magic to convince him to take the Lakers Presidency job. He obliged.
Magic Johnson would get extremely emotional while stepping down as the Lakers President in 2019.
Magic Johnson, after merely 2 years as the President of Basketball Operations for the Los Angeles Lakers, stepped down from his position prior to a Blazers-Lakers game in the 2018-19 season. “It is a difficult decision, I cried before I came here,” Johnson told the media.
He would then go on to reiterate just how much love he was for the organization and the people within it, especially Jeanie Buss. “I want to go back to having fun,” said the 5x NBA champion.
It’s clear that Magic didn’t fully understand what he was getting himself into and took the job out of pure love and affection for the franchise and of course, Jeanie. Things like being vary of tampering is something he wasn’t all privy to when getting into the front office fold.
Magic missed being able to interact with the players in the league without the higher ups fining him for merely speaking with them.
A few of Magic’s most popular moves as the President of Basketball Operations
Without a shadow of a doubt, the greatest thing Magic Johnson did as a member of the Los Angeles Lakers front office was recruiting LeBron James in the summer of 2018. He reportedly waited outside of his house for an hour before speaking with him so as to avoid a pesky tampering fine.
He would also go on to trade D’Angelo Russell upon drafting Lonzo Ball, claiming the former wasn’t exactly a leader in comparison to the UCLA product. Along with vouching hard for Luke Walton to keep his job, Magic was fairly quiet in those 2 years he was the President of Basketball Ops.
