If you thought it was hard for Jeanie Buss to fire brother Jim Buss and longtime general manager Mitch Kupchak, you’re right. But the decision, though gutting, was made easier by the fact that Buss and Kupchak were basically ignoring Magic Johnson, who, at the time, was a special consultant to the Los Angeles Lakers.
ESPN.com’s Ramona Shelburne penned a fantastically enlightening feature on the mess in Laker Land right. The entire thing demands a read, but this excerpt on Jim’s and Mitch’s treatment of Magic is beyond telling:
Three weeks before, Buss had installed Magic Johnson, a Lakers legend and one of her oldest friends, as a special adviser — an act she had hoped would be a wake-up call to everyone in the front office. Now, she found out, he wasn’t being integrated or even informed of what Kupchak and Jim Buss were planning.
One day, she found out the team had worked out center Larry Sanders and hadn’t bothered to invite Johnson to watch. Then there were the trade calls Johnson had to inquire about; he was never informed of the prospects — let alone asked his opinion.
So much for working together.
To Mitch’s and Jim’s credit, it was probably annoying, borderline demeaning, working alongside someone, in Magic, who was all but publicly campaigning for their jobs upon arrival. But that’s not a viable excuse.
If anything, Johnson’s hiring should have been the wake-up call Jeanie intended it to be. Mitch and Jim should have been working to keep their jobs, to perhaps erase the writing on the wall. Accepting and embracing Johnson would have been the best way to do that.
There are other things at play here. Deeper things. Family things. Maybe Jim’s fate specifically was always doomed, because of a poor relationship with his sister. Nevertheless, it’s tough to come up with an adequate defense of either Mitch or Jim when they so blatantly froze out one of the people Jeanie, effectively their boss, trusted most.
