Jeanie Buss made sure to avoid any controversy in her latest NBA media appearance. In a sit down for Whistle Sports, Jeanie made her pick for the best Lakers championship team and also revealed her adjusted list of All-Time Lakers greats.
Question: “What do you think is the best Lakers championship team?
Jeanie Buss: “I think the team that won the last three-peat in the NBA which was the 2000, 2001, 2002 Lakers with Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. That and Phil Jackson as the coach.”
Jeanie Buss’ father, Jerry, built that championship three-peat team with Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal, and head coach Phil Jackson. That squad is widely regarded as one of the best in NBA history and they are the last to win three straight championships.
Interestingly, neither Kobe nor Shaq was included on Buss’ All-Time Lakers starting five. Instead, she went with Magic Johnson at every position for reasons she later went on to explain.
Question: “Who is your all-time Lakers starting five?”
Jeanie Buss: “I’ve experienced this question before and it ends up causing a lot of controversy… Magic Johnson at starting guard, Magic Johnson as the two guard, Magic Johnson as the three, Magic Johnson at the four, and Magic at the five because you know what, he could play every position.”
To Jeanie’s credit, Magic Johnson is the safest answer and everyone knows he’s a top-five Laker. Throughout his career, he played practically every position, including center during the NBA Finals. So if any player deserves to be on that list five times, it’s Magic because of his amazing versatility.
In reality, Jeanie answered with Magic due to some of her past experiences with the topic. When she revealed her top five most important Lakers, she received heavy criticism online for putting LeBron James over Magic Johnson. She also excluded Shaquille O’Neal, prompting the big fella to speak out publicly against the disrespect.
With so many great Lakers across history, it’s impossible to rank them compared to each other and someone is always going to feel left out. Unfortunately, Jeanie Buss found out the hard way how serious people can be when it comes to defending their sports takes and they clearly gave her a hard time about her ranking.
So when asked to build her All-time Lakers lineup, Jeanie refused to take the bait and say anything that might invoke the wrath of Lakers Nation. She went with Magic Johnson at one through five, shutting down any room for debate or misinterpretation.
Of course, Jeanie Buss still gives credit where it’s due. Like on the subject of her team’s best championship unit, she didn’t hesitate to pick the three-peat Lakers and hail their historical achievement. To this day, they are the last team to win three titles in a row and Jeanie holds that feat in high regard.
For this current Lakers team, Buss has every confidence that LeBron James and Anthony Davis can make a run but they can’t do it alone. Only she has the power to make the changes necessary to bring real improvement and put the team back in a position to win it all. For now, the Lakers can only focus on one game at a time and Jeanie will not let words be a distraction.
Following tonight’s match against the Boston Celtics at the Crypto.com arena, the Lakers will make their way to San Francisco for a showdown against the Golden State Warriors on January 25th at the Chase Center. Then they travel to Charlotte for a game against the Hornets at Spectrum Center on January 27th at 7:00 PM EST.
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