Jeanie Buss attends “Running Point” from Netflix to Los Angeles at the Hollywood of the Egyptian theater on February 13, 2025 in Los Angeles, California.
Charley Gallay / Getty Images for Netflix / Getty Images North America
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Charley Gallay / Getty Images for Netflix / Getty Images North America
Sometimes life can become so bizarre that it almost looks like a comedy. This exact thought came about Jeanie Buss while her own brothers tried to make her turn.
Buss is the president of Los Angeles Lakers, and his life is parodied in the new Netflix comedy Racing pointWith Kate Hudson.
Before her death in 2013, Jeanie’s father, Jerry Buss, had the Lakers.
“I was 17, 18, I do everything my father asked me,” said Jeanie Buss Morning edition Host a Martínez. “I was fascinated by the company, and I shaded him. Wherever he needed an appearance, if he could not go, he would send me like his substitute. And he saw that I liked it, so he just started to prepare for this age to be in the position in which I am now.”
Jerry was responsible for the commercial side of things – and her brother, Jim, in charge of players’ staff.
Then the team started to lose – a lot.
The story of the way Jeanie Buss has rejected a coup by her own brothers and has taken control of the team is the basis of Racing point.
Kate Hudson like Isla Gordon in episode 101 of Running Point.
Kat Marcinowski / Kat Marcinowski / Netflix 2024 / 101_240513 _km_02673
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Kat Marcinowski / Kat Marcinowski / Netflix 2024 / 101_240513 _km_02673
This interview has been modified for duration and clarity.
After being appointed vice-president of basketball operations in 1999-with his brother, Jim, becoming vice-president of players’ staff in 2005
Jeanie Buss: When you are on the commercial side of a team, you have obligations to your partners, which means your banks, your sponsors, your fans. You must be held responsible for the product to which you have sold them, which you must deliver. What was going on with my brother and the managing director was that they had made the decision – once Kobe (Bryant) was withdrawn – they were going to let the team fall to the bottom and collect draft choices.
Well, (our father) never managed the team in this way. He didn’t want to reconstruct. What I saw is that our fans base was starting to erode, losing faith.
My brother and I made my head. I kept saying: “I cannot increase the prices of tickets if we do not win. And we just went season after the season. And I’m like, I lost patience with that. I had to make the decision very difficult to let my brother go.
My father explained to me very well: he finally put me in charge. And he said to me: “Jeanie, you have the hammer and I expect you to use it.” This means that if things are not doing well with the team, I expect you to intervene.
During a season, we attracted the largest free agent, LeBron James, to come and play for Lakers in 2018.
A Martínez: Your father died in 2013, and that’s when you became president. And in 2017, this is when you dismissed your brother (Jim). Then he and your older brother, Johnny, tried to withdraw you. You retaliated and obtained an operational control for life from the Lakers.
Since you said that your father said, here is the hammer – I always wondered what (your father) Dr. Buss would have thought of all this.
Jeanie Buss: He put me in charge and he knew what I would do. He asked me to do something, which was to protect the Lakers. And I did it.
I am on good terms now with my older brothers, but they did what they thought well. If they had won and could withdraw from my position, it would have put the Lakers in chaos. We would probably have been forced to sell the team because we would have been completely dysfunctional without having a controlling voice in all property issues.
I knew it was not that it was going to justice gave me power; I have always had power. It’s just that they didn’t understand. I think they were surprised. I think my father did not explain them well because they would have complained to him and made the last years of his miserable life.
Be one of the only women to lead an NBA team
Jeanie Buss: The pressure is enormous to become a role model and pierce. It was never my intention to do the work I do, but I felt enormous pressure so as not to fail. And, you know, feeling that there were probably a lot of people who wanted to see me fail, just because I am a woman in this business.
I think that in some ways, it was easier to be a woman. I never intimidated anyone, so people did not have guard when I was there. So I think people have probably told me more things than they should.
But, you know, once we have won a championship, I think this kind came out through the window. Now I am from competition.
Through difficult times
Jeanie Buss: I had this good time in my life when I was with Phil Jackson, the legendary coach of the NBA.
And there was a period when my brother always headed basketball that they might be brought back to Phil for the third time because Kobe was frustrated. And instead, they called Phil at midnight, woke us up and said they had hired Mike d’Antoni as the coach, which was really difficult to hear because it was just the most cruel thing they could do, you know?
So I encouraged Phil to seek another job, and he ended up taking the post of New York Knicks. And literally the NBA made Phil and I sign a letter that said that we are not talking about basketball because people felt in our positions that it was a conflict of interest. I don’t think they make brothers who direct two different teams to sign a letter like that.
A Martínez: Because (at the time, it happened), you and Phil Jackson are a couple. You work in basketball; He works in basketball. So when you’re going to dine, what are you supposed to talk about?
Jeanie Buss: Well, it made a corner in our relationship. I had depended on Phil’s lawyer. Now I can’t talk to Phil. So I drew a lot on Kobe. Kobe was someone who was still there for me. Phil said, “When I’m going to New York, you can always speak to magic, but Kobe will always be there for you, Jeanie. He believes in you.
By quietly carrying out the job of the year – Acquire Luka Dončić Dallas Mavericks for Anthony Davis
Jeanie Buss: You know, I learned from my father – and I point when the Lakers exchanged against Pau Gasol – people had not heard of it. Gregg Popovich in San Antonio and Mark Cuban in Dallas launched an adjustment that we ended up with Pau. They never had the opportunity to submit to him or probably speak of Memphis to exchange him towards us.
You realize in our company that many rumors are planted by people from the industry who are trying to arouse the favor of the media. There is in a way this “writing good things about me as managing director and I will feed my interior information for you. Then we both win.
In this particular case, I felt that if someone had heard of trade by a rumor that many parties are trying to undermine it. When Pau Gasol came from Memphis to Los Angeles, we won two championships because of this.
And then there was the famous trade of Chris Paul who was opposed to the Commissioner, that people somehow feel that the Lakers have an unfair advantage. But that is not true.
We have abandoned a lot for Luka Dončić. We are happy that we have it. We have lost the last three consecutive years against the Denver Nuggets in the playoffs, and we really had nothing that was going to be different in the playoffs. Anthony Davis complained about where he was played and he was not happy. So I think it was a positive for both teams. They got what they were looking for; We got what we were looking for. And I did not know that it would be international news as it was, but it is the power of the Laker brand and its ability to draw big names that want to write their own chapter in the history of Lakers.
On Kate Hudson playing a character based on her
Jeanie Buss: She is a star as large as possible, but at the time there was a point in the 90s when I was president of the Great Western Forum; I learned to manage the location for five years before being transferred to the Laker post. And Kate came with her parents to the Los Angeles hockey games.
A Martínez: Her parents are Goldie Hawn and (she considers her father) Kurt Russell.
Jeanie Buss: RIGHT. And Kate is like 16, 17 years old. She would stay with me and she holds me. I would take him to the box office. I showed him the ropes behind the scenes. She was a very intelligent, curious girl. She liked to be around the heart rate of entertainment.
And so the idea that she is now playing a character (based on me), I knew she would nail him because she understood what it looks like, madness behind the scenes. I think people will really enjoy their performance.
A Martínez: It is almost as if she was about to play the role of Jeanie Buss all her life.
Jeanie Buss: Exactly.
A Martínez: How does it feel? To have these representations of you?
Jeanie Buss: I mean, it’s not me. But it is more “me” than what people see every day about me – humor in it, the crazy things that occur.
It is very relatable. The majority of companies in this country are family businesses. And everyone has a family. If you are in business with them, this is the kind of thing that happens.
But in the end, what brings you together is the team or the business, and you want to create something successful. It’s just about knowing how not to walk on each other and try to coexist. And laugh. You have to laugh.
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