{"id":167349,"date":"2025-11-20T15:10:06","date_gmt":"2025-11-20T20:10:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=167349"},"modified":"2025-11-20T22:38:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T03:38:11","slug":"lakers-front-office-shakeup-joey-jesse-buss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/11\/20\/lakers-front-office-shakeup-joey-jesse-buss\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers Carry Out Stunning Front Office Shakeup"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> have fired executives Joey and Jesse Buss in a move to \u201c[reorganize] their basketball operations department,\u201d <\/span>ESPN\u2019s Shams Charania reported Thursday<\/span><\/a>. This comes amid a significant period of change<\/a> for LA. The NBA Board of Governors approved the team\u2019s <\/span>sale to billionaire Mark Walter<\/span><\/a> at the end of October.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lakers Carry Out Stunning Front Office Shakeup<\/b><\/h2>\n

Buss Brothers Release Statement; What\u2019s Next for Them and the Lakers<\/b><\/h3>\n

In a <\/span>statement to ESPN<\/span><\/a>, Joey and Jesse Buss expressed gratitude to fans while reflecting on their two-decade tenure with the team.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe are extremely honored to have been part of this organization for the last 20 seasons. Thank you to Laker Nation for embracing our family every step of the way. We wish things could be different with the way our time ended with the team. At times like this we wish we could ask our Dad what he would think about it all.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The brothers\u2019 termination comes five years after two of the elder Buss siblings, Johnny and Jim, unsuccessfully <\/span>attempted to oust Jeanie as the team\u2019s governor<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jesse Buss<\/a> served as the Lakers\u2019 director of scouting since 2006, while Joey<\/a> was the team\u2019s alternate governor to Jeanie Buss and president of the team\u2019s G League affiliate, the South Bay Lakers. The two recently <\/span>launched a sports investment firm<\/span><\/a>, Buss Sports Capital, in late September. Over the years, they also played key roles in <\/span>drafting successful players<\/span><\/a>, from the former young core featuring <\/span>D\u2019Angelo Russell<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Jordan Clarkson<\/span><\/a>, to current star <\/span>Austin Reaves<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"The
Nov 18, 2025; Los Angeles, California, USA; Los Angeles Lakers guard Austin Reaves (15) is congratulated by forward LeBron James (23) and guard Luka Doncic (77) after a three-point basket in the second quarter at Crypto.com Arena. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In an <\/span>exclusive interview with The Athletic<\/span><\/a>, Jesse Buss mentioned that he felt a growing disconnect from the team since before the 2023 NBA Draft. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c<\/span>I kind of didn\u2019t think much of it, but you know, as time went on and there was a lack of communication between not only my sister and I, but you know, the organization as a whole \u2014 while I was combating various health issues. I kind of felt like the writing was on the wall.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

According to <\/span>Charania<\/span><\/a>, \u201cThe brothers will maintain their minority ownership shares within the Lakers.\u201d Still, it\u2019s clear that the first domino has fallen with Walter in charge of the purple and gold.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a9 Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Los Angeles Lakers have fired executives Joey and Jesse Buss in a move to \u201c[reorganize] their basketball operations department,\u201d ESPN\u2019s Shams Charania reported Thursday. This comes amid a significant period of change for LA. The NBA Board of Governors approved the team\u2019s sale to billionaire Mark Walter at the end of October. Lakers Carry […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4265,"featured_media":167354,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,26,62,3],"tags":[757],"class_list":["post-167349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-lakers","category-nba","category-news","tag-jeanie-buss"],"modified_by":"Jordan Pagkalinawan, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167349"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167349\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":167440,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167349\/revisions\/167440"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/167354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}