“And that’s dangerous, man. That is dangerous.” When Draymond Green said that on his podcast this week, he wasn’t talking about some new offensive scheme or a rising star. He was talking about the Los Angeles Lakers. But it wasn’t a player that had him spooked. It was a number: $10 billion. That’s the record-shattering price the Buss family just got for a controlling stake in the team, a sale that sent a shockwave through the entire league. And for Draymond, a guy who has built a career battling the Purple and Gold, this isn’t just a business deal. It’s a warning shot. It’s not the price tag itself that has Green so concerned. It’s the man behind the money, Mark Walter, and what his arrival means for the twilight of LeBron James’ career.
For years, the Lakers have been an iconic brand, but they’ve operated under a specific set of financial constraints. As Draymond laid out on his show with Baron Davis, the Buss family, for all their success, were—by NBA owner standards—one of the league’s “least wealthiest families.”
“They had the big asset, in which they just sold,” Green explained, “but that was… that’s kinda the source of their income. And so when that is the source of your income, you gon’ run it a little differently. You’re gon’ be more mindful.” He even pointed to the Lakers’ massive regional TV deal with Spectrum—a 20-year, $4 billion behemoth—as the financial lifeline that kept them profitable when other teams were losing money during the COVID era. It was a huge asset, but it was also a crutch.
Well, Draymond fears now that mindfulness is officially over. The new owner, Mark Walter, is a different kind of animal. He’s the CEO of a firm managing over $300 billion, and he’s the guy who turned the Los Angeles Dodgers into a financial juggernaut, signing off on record-shattering contracts for superstars like Shohei Ohtani without blinking. As Lakers insiders Andy and Brian Kamenetzky have noted, this isn’t just a change in bank accounts, it’s a change in philosophy. The Lakers are no longer a family business. They are now a corporate powerhouse, and a front office shake-up is imminent.
And that’s the reality that has Draymond so wary about LeBron’s future. “Now you got an owner with the deep pockets, he gon’ say — well no, I don’t need that money. Take all of that money and put it back into the team, and go get me this guy, and go get me that guy,” Green said. “We’ll pay the tax… it makes the Lakers so dangerous.” This is the crux of it.
Just as LeBron is finally showing signs of his basketball mortality, admitting “you think about when the end is,” and just as his body is starting to “run out of gas” in the playoffs, the Lakers have been handed a blank check.
(This is a developing story…)
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