Jeanie Buss has a reported agreement with Mark Walter that would let her remain the Lakers’ alternate governor beyond the original five-year period, but only if she keeps at least a five-percent ownership stake in the franchise.
That detail matters because the ownership picture around the Lakers is no longer just about a future sale. It is now tied to whether Buss can keep the stake required to stay in her role while five of her siblings have formally filed a case against her over the sale of Lakers shares.
Buss had already secured a side agreement with Walter that arranged for her to remain director and controlling owner for five years, subject to NBA approval. The newer reported arrangement extends that framework beyond the original term, again with the ownership threshold attached.
The problem is that the family dispute has moved into court.
Jeanie Buss challenged the legality of her siblings’ vote to sell the family’s remaining shares of the franchise, while the five other Buss siblings filed a formal claim against her for refusing to sell her shares. In their filing, the siblings said Jeanie Buss’s petition is “legally and factually baseless.”
The dispute is centered on the family’s remaining 17.82% ownership stake. That stake is expected to be sold after an NBA board of governors vote in November, with the trust projected to generate $2.2 billion through the tag-along provision by selling to the group involving Josh Kushner and Bob Iger.
A court hearing was originally scheduled for Nov. 5 and later postponed to Dec. 8.
The tension in the case is straightforward: the reported governance agreement gives Buss a path to stay in place, but only if she retains enough ownership, while the siblings’ filing pushes the opposite direction by backing the sale that could alter that status. As one confirmed quote in the case put it, “Jeanie’s ability to continue to operate as the Lakers’ governor has been a major point of discussion in the midst of Walter selling the team to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger.”
If the family’s remaining shares are sold and Buss no longer has the required stake, the reported agreement would not preserve her role. That is the unresolved issue now hanging over the Lakers’ ownership structure.