I hope everyone was buckled up for the long haul with the Buss family.
On Friday, Jeanie Buss filed for a continuance in the petition to stop her siblings’ sale of their stake in the Lakers, pushing the hearing back to Dec. 8. Originally, the court date was scheduled for November.
In the petition, which was originally submitted in August, Jeanie calls her siblings “devious” and calls for co-trustees Joey and Janie to be removed from their positions.
Jeanie’s stance has been based on the 2017 ruling, which essentially said the trustees must do what’s reasonably necessary to keep Jeanie as the controlling owner. The siblings’ argument is that all of them, including Jeanie, agreed to the tag-along clause one year prior to selling and, given that was the more recent decision, it takes precedence.
Her argument is also backed by the team’s other minority owners, who are not selling their stakes in the team. That ultimately likely doesn’t mean a whole lot in the case as their involvement won’t change much.
This also means the sale of Mark Walter’s shares to Bob Iger and Josh Kushner could be official before this is all settled. The span between the report of Walter agreeing to buy the team from the Buss family (June 18) and the sale becoming official (Oct. 30) was four months. A similar timeline for the latest sale to become official would be mid-December.
Nothing about the Buss family drama will impact the sale from Walter to Iger and Kushner. But it does mean that we’re not close to being at the end of all this nonsense.
You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude or on Bluesky at @jacobrude.bsky.social.
