Magic Johnson now has an advisory position with the Los Angeles Lakers, and it definitely feels like he intends to use that position as a foothold to climb to greater heights within the organization. Bill Reiter of CBS Sports reports that Magic will “ease out” part-owner and vice-president Jim Buss:
“Talking to sources in that organization – they’re doing this – you have to ease Jim Buss out of the role that he’s had for the last two years. That’s why Magic Johnson is there. Don’t get it twisted; Jim Buss will not, according to my sources, be in that job in three or four months.
General manager Mitch Kupchak is also unlikely to stick around, says Reiter. When asked: “What about Mitch Kupchak?” Reiter repliedx:
“I like Mitch, and Mitch has actually done a really nice job drafting lower in the draft. I think Jordan Clarkson from my alma mater, the University of Missouri, I’m going to give him a shoutout, is a heck of a pick where he got him. But Mitch is probably a guy – frankly if I had to put money on it – I don’t know that Mitch survives, because there is, to quote Game of Thrones, there’s a battle for that throne going on in that organization. Jeanie’s gonna win, Jim’s gonna lose, and sometimes good people on the wrong side of that battle go away too.”
