Patrick Soon-Shiong, the owner of the Los Angeles Times, is not selling his stake in the Lakers.
Soon-Shiong bought a 4% stake in the team from Magic Johnson in 2010. His family attorney, Chuck Kenworthy, said that Soon-Shiong has no interest in selling his stake amid a high-stakes ownership transition.
“We love the Lakers,” Kenworthy told The Times. “We believe in the Lakers. We believe in the future of the Lakers and the championship years they are going to have. And we believe they are still undervalued.”
A group led by former Disney chief Bob Iger and venture capitalist Joshua Kushner agreed last week to buy controlling interest in the Lakers from Mark Walter at a $12.5-billion valuation — a record price for an American sports team. The sale is still pending approval by the NBA board of governors. Walter, who owns a majority stake in the Dodgers, is the subject of multiple federal investigations.
Jeanie Buss, whom Walter had agreed could remain as the Lakers’ governor for five years, is challenging her siblings’ decision to sell the family’s 17.8% stake in the team.
Real estate developer Edward P. Roski, one of the Lakers’ other known minority owners, has not disclosed whether he intends to sell his 3% stake in the team. He has owned a stake in the team since 1998. Todd Boehly purchased a minority stake in the Lakers in 2021, but it’s unclear whether all his shares folded into business partner Walter’s majority stake.
The sunset of his NFL playing career came almost 30 years ago.
So what is Bucky Brooks doing before sunrise, unlocking the gate outside the Granada Hills High football field?
He’s getting in touch with his roots the way dozens of former NFL players are from coast to coast, teaching the game he loves to the latest generation.
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Granada Hills football coach Bucky Brooks, a former NFL player, talks about why he coaches high school football and why it attracts many former NFL players. (Sam Farmer / Los Angeles Times)
“There’s nothing like it,” said Brooks, 55, of coaching high school football. “The athletic part of you dies when we retire. There’s nothing that gives you that same feel of being the gladiator in the ring. But this is the closest thing. Even though you’re not playing, you live vicariously through their experiences.”
“I’m where I need to be,” said Palmer, whose son, Fletch, is a quarterback and junior on this season’s team. “I missed so much when I was playing because I was so involved in so much.”
After retiring in 2018, he contemplated going the route of a lot of former players and working NFL games as a color analyst.
“I almost signed a contract doing TV stuff,” said Palmer, whose daughter, Bries, is a freshman at the school. “I wouldn’t be around when my kids come by my office at lunchtime, or when somebody has a stomachache and needs to take a class period to take a nap on my couch. I love that.”
Santa Margarita will open the season Friday by playing host to Jones High of Orlando, Fla. — a team coached by former Atlanta Falcons defensive back Elijah Williams.
“The standard’s been set, the culture’s been built, and now you’ve just got to carry it on,” Palmer said.
“This class that we have right now has done a phenomenal job. We’re running more stuff than we were last year, just because it’s these kids’ second year in the program.” He added the receivers, in particular, are playing with confidence because of their detailed route work — precise depths, footwork, releases that are “NFL routes” as opposed to “seven-on-seven stuff.”
If you’re an up-and-coming quarterback, there has to be an extra layer of pressure and expectation if your father played the position at an elite level. Philip Rivers understands that. His son, Gunner, a four-star quarterback in the class of 2027 who plays for his dad at St. Michael Catholic High in Fairhope, Ala. The younger Rivers will be headed to North Carolina State, following in the sizable footsteps of his father.
Likewise, Philip Rivers followed his own dad, Steve, a legendary Alabama high school coach.
Granada Hills coach Bucky Brooks watches his players run drills during a recent practice.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
“I grew up wanting to be my dad’s quarterback, and now I’m getting to coach my son and relive it all again 30 years later,” said Philip Rivers, who also has a younger son, Pete, on the team. “Everything goes too dang fast. There’s some long days throughout the years, but it all goes too fast. You wish you could slow it all down.”
All of this gives Philip a better understanding of his own father.
“My dad’s in the state Hall of Fame,” he said, “but he never won a state championship. His championship trophies were in his desk drawer, the letters players had written him over the years. We want them to be better men for having been in our football program. That’s the mission.”
Almost three years ago, former NFL quarterback Tim Hasselbeck was hired as varsity football coach at Ensworth High in Nashville. He gave up his job as primary game analyst for “ACC Primetime Football” in part to coach his son, Taylor, now a quarterback at Wyoming.
Granada Hills coach Bucky Brooks huddles with defensive players during a recent practice in preparation for the 2026 high school football season.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
Coaching high school football became a family affair, with parents Don and Mary Beth selling their Boston house of 50 years and moving to Tennessee, and Don — the former NFL tight end who died last year — joining his son’s staff. Matt Hasselbeck, Tim’s brother and a former Super Bowl quarterback, came on board as well as Ensworth’s offensive coordinator.
“We all had coaches who made an incredible impact on our lives,” Matt said. “And we probably had coaches who had a negative impact as well. … I didn’t seek out coaching. I said I’d do a three-day clinic. I just don’t remember stopping.”
By Archie Manning’s count, about 30,000 high school players have been enrolled in the 30 years of the Manning Passing Academy in Thibodeaux, La. The weeklong camp focuses on quarterbacks and receivers, and college players from around the country serve as counselors, as do brothers Peyton, Eli and Cooper Manning.
“I tell Peyton and Eli, ‘Listen, when these kids get home, their granddaddy is going to ask them, ‘Did you meet Peyton and Eli?’” said Archie of his two NFL quarterback sons. “And I want them to say, ‘Yes.’ OK, so get your butt around to everyone. They try to get in front of every kid.
“The kids we deal with are just so eager and excited, and that’s what makes it so fun.”
Back at Granada Hills, where he has coached since 2019, Brooks is looking to instill in his players some of the lessons he learned from the all-star cast of NFL coaches he played for as a defensive back — among them Marv Levy, Mike Holmgren, Tony Dungy, Marty Schottenheimer and Jon Gruden.
“We all feel an obligation to give back,” Brooks said. “Your Pop Warner coach, your high school coach, your college coach. … I want to take those same lessons people gave me and give it to the next people.”
Granada Hills coach Bucky Brooks talks to his players before practice.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
That requires sacrifice. Brooks has worked as a sportswriter for Sports Illustrated and analyst for NFL Network. Now, he’s a commentator for the Jacksonville Jaguars’ TV Network, meaning he finishes a high school game and flies to where the Jaguars are playing.
Sometimes, that means hopping on a plane to London after coaching a Friday night game. His assistant coaches, mostly a group of his former Granada Hills players, have to pick up the slack sometimes with the subsequent practices early in the following week.
“It’s been a great leadership lesson for me,” Brooks said. “I’ve learned to delegate and let other people take over.”
Jerry Buss put together what was then thought to be a wild business deal to purchase the Lakers and related assets for $67.5 million in 1979.
Buss had a degree in chemistry, but his money came from real estate holdings and loans that moved between third parties to help him obtain the Lakers, Kings and the Forum from Jack Kent Cooke, who was going through a costly divorce.
Buss’ vision was to infuse Hollywood glamour into an NBA team few in Los Angeles seemed to care about, win championships and share that glory with his family.
Buss realized his Hollywood dream in more ways than he ever could have imagined, with his death in 2013 from complications from cancer touching off battles among his six children over control of the Lakers.
At least two siblings have tried to oust another from a leadership role. One sibling reportedly said two others never should have been born. And one sibling managed to fire the five others from jobs with the team.
The rifts mirror the HBO hit show “Succession.” Buss’ tenure and the family drama has been direct inspiration for two television shows and was chronicled in a docuseries the Lakers produced.
The latest daggers were delivered this week, with attorneys representing Buss’ daughter, Jeanie, admonishing her five siblings — Janie, Johnny, Jim, Joey and Jesse — for announcing the Buss Family Trust was selling its 17.8% ownership of the Lakers to new buyers Bob Iger and Joshua Kushner.
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Dodgers sweep the Rockies
From Maddie Lee: As Teoscar Hernández popped up from his slide across home plate, Mookie Betts retreated to first applauding.
While the long ball had been the key to the Dodgers’ earlier offensive success Wednesday, keeping it simple unlocked their 10th-inning push. And in the Dodgers’ 6-4 victory Wednesday, it was Betts’ third hit of the night, a low line drive through the middle of the infield, that widened the Dodgers’ lead to two runs.
“It was huge,” Betts said of completing the three-game sweep in Colorado. “Winning every ball game is important, especially now with the playoff race. Every game is important.”
The trip to hitter-friendly Mile High City, and a matchup against the last-place team in the NL West, came at the perfect time for the Dodgers, ending a collective slump. They’d just dropped three of four to the Brewers at Dodger Stadium, in what had already been a rough start to August.
“Obviously, we haven’t played our best baseball lately,” utility player Kiké Hernández said. “And as a good team, as a team that’s leading the division, … the teams at the bottom of the standings, you need to beat those guys.”
Ethan Pecko struck out four in his major-league debut, five Houston relievers pitched shutout ball for five-plus innings and Christian Vázquez homered as the Astros beat the Angels 3-2 on Wednesday night.
Pecko, a 2023 sixth-round selection by Houston, was ranked ninth in the Astros’ system by MLB Pipeline. The 23-year-old right-hander gave up three hits, two runs and two walks in 3 2/3 innings. He was the 17th starter used by the Astros this season, tying a franchise record set in 1965.
Vázquez’s solo homer, his seventh of the year, put the Astros ahead in the third inning.
Denzer Guzman put the Angels ahead in the fourth with what initially appeared to be a three-run homer. But, the call was changed to a two-run double due to fan interference.
Walbert Ureña (8-9) worked five innings for the Angels, giving up three runs and three hits with seven strikeouts.
The 15-year WNBA veteran announced on Wednesday morning that this would be her last WNBA season.
She made the announcement in an interview with Taylor Rooks at Boardroom Talks.
“I feel very fulfilled with the 15 years that I’ve been able to play and compete at such a high level and I am proud to say that I’m retiring from the WNBA,” Ogwumike said.
Drafted first overall in 2012, Ogwumike was the WNBA rookie of the year and went on to have one of the best careers in. league history. She was the league’s MVP in 2016, when she led the Sparks to their most recent WNBA title. She is also a four-time first-team All-Defensive player.
Joseph Paintsil scored a short-handed goal in the 79th minute to lead the Galaxy to a 1-0 victory over the San Jose Earthquakes on Wednesday night.
Paintsil used assists from rookie defender Harbor Miller and Marco Reus to find the net for the fifth time this season. Miller’s helper was his second, while Reus collected his seventh.
The Galaxy (6-8-7) were forced to play a man down from the 45th minute on after midfielder Lucas Sanabria was tagged with a pair of yellow cards in the final nine minutes of the first half.
Nico Hansen finished with one save and had his third consecutive shutout to help the Colorado Rapids beat LAFC 1-0 Wednesday night.
The Rapids (9-10-1) have won three consecutive games, all by shutout, and four of five since the World Cup break.
LAFC (10-7-4) is winless in three straight for the first time this season.
The Rapids took a 1-0 lead in the 22nd minute on an own goal by Jeremy Ebobisse. Youssef Maziz played a free kick from the right side into the area that was redirected by Ebobisse off the back post and into the net.
1921 — Molla Bjurstedt Mallory beats Mary Browne, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2 to win the U.S. women’s national tennis title at the Germantown Cricket Club in Philadelphia.
1931 — Helen Wills Moody beats Eileen Bennett Whitingstall 6-4, 6-1 to capture the women’s title in the U.S. Lawn Tennis Association championship.
1944 — Robert Hamilton upsets Byron Nelson in the final round 1-up to win the PGA Championship.
1960 — Holland’s Hairos II, driven by Willem Geersen, wins the second International Trot at Roosevelt Raceway before a record crowd of 54,861.
1995 — Monica Seles completes a remarkable first week back in tournament tennis, routing Amanda Coetzer 6-0, 6-1 to capture the Canadian Open. Her 74 games sets a tournament record for the fewest played by a champion.
1999 — Seventh Athletics World Championships open at Seville, Spain.
2000 — Tiger Woods wins the PGA Championship in a playoff over Bob May, becoming the first player since Ben Hogan in 1953 to win three majors in one year. He’s the first player to repeat as PGA champion since Denny Shute in 1937.
2003 — The U.S. wins the women’s overall team gold medal at the gymnastics world championships. It is the first gold for the Americans — men or women — at the biggest international event outside the Olympics.
2004 — Michael Phelps matches Mark Spitz’s record of four individual gold medals in Olympic swimming by winning the 100-meter butterfly. He edges teammate Ian Crocker to win his fifth gold medal. Shortly after winning his seventh medal of these Olympics, Phelps gives up his spot in the medley relay to Crocker.
2006 — Tiger Woods wins the PGA Championship for a five-shot victory over Shaun Micheel and his 12th career major. He becomes the first player to win the PGA twice on the same course, having done so at Medinah in 1999.
2008 — Usain Bolt of Jamaica breaks the 200-meter world record, winning in 19.30 seconds at the Beijing Games. He is the first man since Carl Lewis in 1984 to sweep the 100 and 200 at an Olympics.
2012 — Augusta National invites former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and South Carolina financier Darla Moore to become the first female members since the club was founded in 1932.
2016 — Allyson Felix and LaShawn Merritt anchor the 4×400 relay teams, and the U.S. exits the final night of action at Olympic Stadium with 31 medals — its most in a non-boycotted Olympics since 1956. The U.S. women’s basketball team beats Spain 101-72 for a sixth straight title.
2018 — Alabama becomes the second team to be ranked No. 1 in the preseason Associated Press Top 25 poll for three straight seasons. The preseason AP poll started in 1950 and since then only Oklahoma from 1985-87 had started No. 1 in three straight years.
2023 — FIFA Women’s World Cup Final, Stadium Australia, Sydney: Spanish captain Olga Carmona scores the only goal of the game as La Furia Roja score a 1-0 win over England.
Compiled by the Associated Press
This day in baseball history
1912 — Walter Johnson won his American League-record 15th straight game, downing Cleveland 4-2 in the opener of a doubleheader. Washington’s Carl Cashion pitched a six-inning no-hitter to give the Senators a 2-0 victory over the Cleveland Indians in the second game, which was called to allow Cleveland to catch a train to Boston.
1938 — New York’s Lou Gehrig hit his 23rd and the final grand slam of his career and drove in six runs to lead the Yankees to an 11-3 win over the Philadelphia Athletics.
1945 — Tommy Brown, 17 years, 8 months, 14 days, of the Brooklyn Dodgers became the youngest major league player to hit a home run when he connected in Ebbets Field against Preacher Roe of the Pittsburgh Pirates.
1957 — Bob Keegan of the Chicago White Sox pitched a 6-0 no-hit victory over the Washington Senators in the second game of a doubleheader.
1958 — Detroit’s Jim Bunning pitched a no-hitter to lead the Tigers to a 3-0 win over the Boston Red Sox in the opening game of a doubleheader at Fenway Park.
1961 — The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Milwaukee Braves 7-4 in the second game of a doubleheader to end a 23-game losing streak, a modern record.
1965 — Milwaukee’s Eddie Mathews hit his 28th home run, and the Braves beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 4-3. With the homer, the duo of Mathews and Hank Aaron passed the Babe Ruth-Lou Gehrig total of 772 home runs to become the top home-run tandem in major league history.
1974 — Nolan Ryan of the Angels struck out 19 Tigers in a 1-0, 11-inning loss to Detroit. It was the third time this season that Ryan struck out 19 batters in a game.
1980 — Pittsburgh’s Omar Moreno stole his 70th base of the season in a 5-1 loss to Houston, to become the first player this century with three consecutive 70-steal seasons. The fleet outfielder swiped 71 in 1978, 77 in 1979.
1989 — New York’s Howard Johnson hit his 30th home run of the season in the Mets’ 5-4 loss to the Dodgers and joined Bobby Bonds and Willie Mays as the only players to achieve 30 home runs and 30 stolen bases in two different seasons.
1995 — Jose Mesa of the Cleveland Indians picked up his 37th save in 37 opportunities to set a major league record, and the Indians beat the Milwaukee Brewers 8-5.
2005 — The Kansas City Royals ended baseball’s longest losing streak in 17 years, defeating the Oakland Athletics 2-1 to end a club-record 19-game skid.
2014 — The San Francisco Giants became the first team since 1986 to win a protest. Rain caused a delay during an Aug. 19 game after the grounds crew couldn’t put the tarp down quickly, and the umpires deemed the field unplayable. The Cubs were declared the winners by a 2-0 score after 4 1/2 innings. MLB ruled to resume the rain-shortened game with the Cubs batting in the bottom of the fifth.
2019 — By defeating the Blue Jays, 16-3, Clayton Kershaw of the Dodgers notches win No. 166 to pass Sandy Koufax for most by a left-hander in franchise history.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at houston.mitchell@latimes.com. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.
Thirteen years ago, on the final Sunday in September, Skip Schumaker struck out. It was the last out in the last game of the regular season.
For the Dodgers, no big deal: They had won the National League West, and the playoffs were four days away.
For Dodgers fans that subscribed to Cox Communications, it turned out to be the start of a bizarre and protracted blackout that cost viewers the final years of Vin Scully and the golden years of three World Series championships.
After 4,560 days, the blackout is over.
On Friday, for the first time in 13 years, Cox subscribers within the Dodgers’ broadcast territory will be able to watch the team on their local television home. Fans can find SportsNet LA on Channel 63 in Orange County, Channel 54 in Palos Verdes, Channel 36 in Santa Barbara and Channel 50 in Las Vegas.
How did this finally come to pass? Those channels no longer belong to Cox.
Charter Communications, the company responsible for getting SportsNet LA on as many cable, satellite and streaming options as possible, on Thursday closed its $34.5-billion purchase of Cox.
For Dodgers fans, the takeaway is this: It no longer matters that Cox did not want to pay Charter for the rights to air SportsNet LA. Charter made the 13 years of that moot by buying Cox.
Charter offers broadcast service under the Spectrum brand.
In 2013, with the team in the final year of its local television agreement with Fox Sports, the Dodgers announced it would launch a team-owned channel the following year.
In exchange for the rights to market and distribute that SportsNet LA channel, Time Warner Cable agreed to pay the Dodgers $8.35 billion over 25 years. It was the last great regional sports network deal, with traditional broadcast audiences about to fragment amid the rise of streaming and cord-cutting.
The guaranteed rights fees are as sure of a revenue stream as anything in baseball, and the Dodgers’ success amid all that cash is one of the triggers for major league owners in their push for a salary cap.
However, the great regional sports network deals relied on cable and satellite subscribers paying for every channel in a bundle, most of which viewers never watched.
With DirecTV leading the resistance, cable and satellite providers balked at signing up for SportsNet LA: a few dimes per month per subscriber for a news or entertainment channel was fine, but they drew the line at $5 per month subscriber for a baseball channel.
No major Los Angeles outlet besides Time Warner Cable carried SportsNet LA until 2016, and then only because Charter bought Time Warner Cable. Even then, less than half the households in the Los Angeles market could get SportsNet LA.
In 2020, DirecTV and AT&T struck a deal with Charter, not so much to liberate Dodgers fans as to help the parties maintain a shrinking base of subscribers amid a proliferation of video options.
“I think I can speak for a lot of people who will say this is, maybe, long overdue,” Dodgers star Justin Turner said then.
Six years later, as a longtime Cox subscriber excited to see SportsNet LA for the first time, your humble correspondent can say this: I think I can speak for a lot of people who will say this is definitely long overdue.
Jerry Buss put together what was then thought to be a wild business deal to purchase the Lakers and related assets for $67.5 million in 1979.
Buss had a degree in chemistry, but his money came from real estate holdings and loans that moved between third parties to help him obtain the Lakers, Kings and the Forum from Jack Kent Cooke, who was going through a costly divorce.
Buss’ vision was to infuse Hollywood glamour into an NBA team few in Los Angeles seemed to care about, win championships and share that glory with his family.
Buss realized his Hollywood dream in more ways than he ever could have imagined, with his death in 2013 from complications from cancer touching off battles among his six children over control of the Lakers.
Lakers owner Jerry Buss, center, with children Janie, from left, Jeanie, Johnny and Jim in 1979.
(Gunther/mptvimages.com)
At least two siblings have tried to oust another from a leadership role. One sibling reportedly said two others never should have been born. And one sibling managed to fire the five others from jobs with the team.
The rifts mirror the HBO hit show “Succession.” Buss’ tenure and the family drama has been direct inspiration for two television shows and was chronicled in a docuseries the Lakers produced.
The latest daggers were delivered this week, with attorneys representing Buss’ daughter, Jeanie, admonishing her five siblings — Janie, Johnny, Jim, Joey and Jesse — for announcing the Buss Family Trust was selling its 17.8% ownership of the Lakers to new buyers Bob Iger and Joshua Kushner.
The sale would yield billions for the trust, with Iger and Kushner set to purchase the franchise at a $12.5-billion evaluation for the majority ownership stake of the team and a tagalong provision extending that price to the minority shareholders.
The Buss children are already billionaires following the sale of their majority stake to previous owner Mark Walter in 2025, but in addition to a big jump in share value, the minority stake sale would remove Jeanie from her coveted role as governor.
Neither side is giving up ground, suggesting lawsuits will soon be filed to resolve the family ownership dispute.
How did we get here?
The roots of the infighting date to the early days of Jerry Buss’ team ownership.
Buss focuses on building a family business
For the first 12 seasons Buss owned the team, the Lakers won NBA championships in 1980 and 1982 against the Philadelphia 76ers, 1985 and 1987 against the hated Boston Celtics, and 1988 against the Detroit Pistons.
Former player and shrewd executive Jerry West helped build the Lakers’ rosters, Pat Riley blossomed into an elite coach, and stars Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar led a collection of elite playmakers during the Showtime era.
Jerry Buss, right, talks with his children Johnny, Jim, Jeanie and Janie in 1979.
(Gunther / mptvimages.com)
The Buss family came along for the ride, with each child working on some aspect of the family business. Jeanie notably helped organize events at the Forum and was eager to take on more challenges while honoring her father’s ambition. Her father put her in charge of the team’s indoor tennis franchise when she was only 19.
As Jerry aged and new stars emerged, including Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal and coach Phil Jackson, it was clear the next ownership chapter for the Lakers would be messy.
For one thing, Jerry had trouble letting go of what he built.
“I just can’t visualize myself walking away, relinquishing control,” Jerry told The Times in 2002. “My relationship with this team is a lifelong marriage.”
A clear successor emerges
By the time they reached their 40s, Jeanie took on a greater role on the business side, while Jim became a basketball executive.
Joey and Jesse, the youngest Buss children, learned about scouting and business operations.
Lakers owner Jerry Buss poses with the NBA championship trophy in 1980.
(NBAE / Getty Images)
Jerry’s health challenges could not be denied and at age 69, he scaled back his involvement.
In 2002, Jeanie emerged as Jerry’s clear successor. At the time, her siblings did not seem interested in the role.
Her biggest challenges seemed to be getting the rest of the NBA to take her seriously after previously partying with her father’s girlfriends and posing nude for Playboy magazine. She told The Times she wished the media hadn’t focused as much on her past and stood by her work moving forward.
Soon after the Lakers hired Jackson in 1999, he asked Jeanie on a date. Their ensuing relationship added challenges to business operations, but The Times reported Jerry didn’t oppose it.
Lakers owner Jerry Buss and his daughter, Jeanie, pose for a photo at the Staples Center.
(Michael Kelley / For the Times)
Jeanie joined her father at NBA board of governors meetings for three years before being the Lakers’ sole representative at the gatherings that featured no other women. She handled an array of business challenges, big and small, and helped supervise the team’s move from the Forum to the Staples Center.
In 2002, all her siblings seemed content with Jeanie emerging as the face of the Lakers’ front office. They either were driven to make a name for themselves in other lines of business or had clearly carved out roles within the Lakers organization.
“My dad likes a system of checks and balances,” Jim told The Times. “Jeanie has more of the administrative part. We all have a good relationship. There’s no jealousy or envy. It’s very smooth.”
Buss family hits troubled waters
The smooth sailing didn’t last forever.
Jeanie helped her father navigate a series of difficult decisions. The Lakers agreed with Jackson to mutually part in 2004 amid a feud between Bryant and O’Neal, the first sign Jeanie was willing to part with someone she loved for the sake of the business. Jackson returned to coach the team in 2005 and held the role until his retirement in 2011, guiding the team to five titles.
In 2013, Jerry died and Bryant ruptured his left Achilles tendon. The Buss children reportedly decided against selling the team immediately after their father’s death, with Jeanie a clear vote against the move.
In 2014, coach Mike D’Antoni’s Lakers won 27 games. In 2015, the team won 21. In 2016, the team hit rock bottom with just 17 wins. Jeanie and Jackson broke up in 2016, ending their four-year engagement. She has since married comedian Jay Mohr.
Lakers star Kobe Bryant and Lakers governor Jeanie Buss stand beside each other on the basketball court.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
In 2017, the Lakers were headed to another losing season when Jeanie fired Jim, the president of basketball operations, and Mitch Kupchak, the team’s general manager. They were replaced by Rob Pelinka, Bryant’s former agent, and Johnson, the former Showtime star turned businessman.
Shortly after the firing, Jim and his brother, Johnny, tried to remove Jeanie from the team’s board of directors, sparking a legal feud that included Jeanie filing a restraining order while she wrestled control of the team.
“It wasn’t like we were trying to get rid of Jeanie as president of the Lakers,” Johnny said during a docuseries the team produced. “We wanted Jeanie to understand that Dad would not have wanted you to just take total control, hire and fire whoever you wanted, without the rest of us being involved.”
Jeanie countered her father created a trust that put her in control.
“They tried to disregard what their father wanted,” Jeanie said in the docuseries. “That’s a betrayal of all the hard work and what he did on our behalf to make this possible. I felt that there was this desire to remove me or stab me in the heart.”
A court ultimately delivered a ruling that Jeanie is still clinging to today as she hopes to retain the family’s minority ownership of the Lakers and her role as governor.
“The co-trustees are bound to vote the Los Angeles Lakers, Inc. shares to ensure that the minimum 15% ownership requirement is maintained in order to ensure that Jeanie Buss may remain controlling owner,” a letter written this week by Jeanie’s attorney reads, citing a 2017 court ruling outlining her role. “Any attempt by the co-trustees to do otherwise and any attempt to aid or abet the co-trustees as such would constitute a breach of trust, breach of fiduciary duty and be in contempt of court.”
The ruling stipulated that co-trustees “would take all actions reasonably available to them, including voting the trust’s shares to ensure that [Jeanie] is elected as the controlling owner of the Lakers on an annual basis during [her] lifetime.”
A title masks more drama
Soon after the ruling, Jeanie included younger brothers Joey and Jesse in the search for a coach to replace Luke Walton. Her siblings continued to hold roles within the team.
With Jeanie’s power firmly defined by the court, the Lakers signed LeBron James in 2018, traded for Anthony Davis in 2019 and won a title during a season shortened by COVID in 2020. It is the sole championship the team has won since Jerry’s death.
LeBron James hugs Lakers governor Jeanie Buss after winning the 2020 NBA championship.
(Douglas P. DeFelice / Getty Images)
The run to the latest title was far from smooth.
ESPN reported that when Jesse called Jeanie to ask a question about a remark Pelinka made during Davis’ introductory news conference in 2019, she told a story of a promise made between her father and mother that Jerry would never have any other children. Jeanie’s mother reportedly was heartbroken when Jerry and his then girlfriend had Joey and Jesse.
The siblings still somehow continued to work in various aspects of the Lakers’ operation.
Jeanie reportedly took intense criticism of the team during the last five years personally and Joey and Jesse wondered whether she might be open to selling the franchise. At the same time, value of NBA teams soared as more billionaires moved into the space. A sale would shift the siblings from millionaires who struggled to invest in growing the Lakers’ operations into billionaires.
A climate opposed to a sale
Jerry created a trust he hoped would prevent his children from feeling pressure to sell the team.
ESPN reported he prepaid inheritance taxes to prevent his children from having to do so upon his death and added provisions to the trust allowing siblings to buy each other out and forcing shares to be redistributed among the siblings when one died rather than passing them on to the next generation of their respective families.
Joey and Jesse began exploring small shares of the team and tried to get other family members on board, ESPN reported. They had not completed their work before Jeanie announced Walter’s offer. Four of the six siblings approved selling 50% of their shares to Walter for a figure that reportedly stunned all of them. Joey and Jesse learned the sale had been approved via a post on X by ESPN’s Shams Charania.
Janie told ESPN the Buss siblings were assured their roles with the team would not change for five years.
Walter’s purchase of the majority stake of the Lakers was approved by four of the six siblings in June 2025, with Jeanie endorsing the deal. She was assured she’d represent the Lakers on the NBA board of governors for at least the next five years.
On Nov. 20, three weeks after the NBA approved the sale to Walter, Jeanie fired Joey, Jesse, Jim, Johnny and Janie, who all worked for the team in various roles.
“I don’t think my dad would be happy with the way things just went down,” Janie told ESPN. “Not at all.”
While she disagreed with the way Jeanie handled the firings, her sister said in an interview with ESPN she didn’t think she meant to hurt her family.
“Jeanie doesn’t have a mean bone in her body, and so she just has to make these tough decisions,” Janie told the network. “And she’s been having to make them … I just wish she would’ve done it differently.”
Firing the last Buss family member
Last week, the family drama flared up again.
When Walter, who is facing multiple investigations into his business practices, reached a deal to sell his majority stake to Iger and Kushner, the family resumed conversations about completely cashing out of the Lakers.
Iger pledged to honor Walter’s agreement with Jeanie to remain as governor for at least five years and spoke highly of the Buss family in multiple interviews and statements released after the deal was announced.
Six days later, five of the siblings voted to approve the sale of their minority stake to Iger and Kushner, effectively firing Jeanie as governor.
Rob Pelinka, from left, Luka Doncic and Jeanie Buss pose for a photo in Katowice, Poland, on Aug. 27.
(Marcin Golba / Associated Press)
“We have decided as a family to sell the remaining Buss Family Trust shares to the Bob Iger group as part of the ongoing transaction,” the family’s statement to ESPN read. “We love the Lakers, Laker fans and will continue to support Los Angeles; but it is time to use this opportunity to move on and exit gracefully while we still can.”
Jeanie’s attorney has contested the sale, citing the 2017 court ruling. The attorney’s letter calls out two of Jeanie’s siblings for sending false information to ESPN: “This is just the latest instance of a years-long pattern whereby Joey and Jesse Buss leak false, defamatory and pernicious ‘information’ to Mr. Charania for the malicious purpose of doing harm to the Los Angeles Lakers so long as Dr. Buss’s chosen successor, Jeanie Buss, carries out her father’s wishes.”
Charania said he stands by his reporting.
The Buss Family Trust issued the following statement to The Times defending the five siblings’ right to sell the team:
“The Los Angeles Lakers have never been just a basketball team. They have been one of the greatest privileges of our lives. Our focus has always been on what we believe is best for the Lakers, the fans who have supported this franchise for generations and the greater Los Angeles community.
“Johnny, Jimmy, Janie, Joey and Jesse have made the decision to sell the family’s remaining stake, and we remain united in that decision. We intend to move forward thoughtfully, respectfully and through the appropriate process.
“We have tremendous respect for Bob Iger and Josh Kushner and believe they understand what the Lakers represent to Los Angeles and our incredibly loyal fan base. We are confident they will honor everything this franchise stands for while building upon the foundation our father created.”
It appears the Buss family will soon be headed back to court to decide their future as Lakers owners.
Recently released body camera footage shows a deck collapsing during a warrant operation in Huntsville, Missouri, injuring multiple law enforcement officers. The raid involved the Moberly Area SWAT Team, US Marshals, and supporting personnel.
DENVER — Dodgers manager Dave Roberts called right fielder Kyle Tucker into the visiting manager’s office at Chase Field a week and a half ago, just to catch up.
Roberts had run into Tucker’s wife Samantha and their 5-month old baby that morning in Arizona. And he saw it as a good time to check in.
“When you start to struggle and you internalize … you find yourself going dark, and that’s a lonely place,” Roberts said Tuesday, before the Dodgers’ 7-6 win against the Rockies. “So I think that for me, trying to proactively pull conversations out of him, talk about life, talk about baseball, it just kind of opens things up, and I think that it’s freeing.
“He’s a cerebral guy by nature, internalizes a lot. But still, for me, he’s with a new ballclub, he’s scuffling, so I want to get that out of him.”
Scuffling is a mild way of describing Tucker’s struggles this season. He described it as the “first time in [his] life” that he’s had a season with so many offensive false starts. After being named an All-Star in each of his previous four seasons, Tucker is on pace for the worst offensive year since his 2018 debut season with the Astros.
On Tuesday, he finally ended his career-high hitless streak at seven games, with a double up the right-field line in the fourth inning (although he grounded out once and struck out twice in his other plate appearances). He’d gone 26 straight at-bats without a hit.
So much about Tucker’s year has been head-scratching.
Take his plate discipline, for example. Traditionally known for his strike-zone control, Tucker’s chase rate has been up this season. But even when he trimmed it to 21.6% in July (not as low as the last two years but even with his 2023 season), his production at the plate didn’t respond accordingly.
One of the biggest mysteries has been his extreme home/road splits. Entering Tuesday, he had a solid .822 OPS on the road and a paltry .558 OPS at Dodger Stadium.
Asked about the contrast earlier this week, he said he didn’t have a theory.
“If I knew, I’d probably have figured it out by now,” he said. “But that’s just kind of how it’s gone.”
Recently, his woes have followed him into the outfield. The day after he failed to reel in a flyball in the right-field corner at Dodger Stadium, he had a far worse drop Monday at Coors Field.
In the seventh inning of the Dodgers’ 11-5 victory against the Rockies, Tucker seemed to camp right under a shallow fly. But as it fell, he twisted and put one knee down before dropping the ball.
“There’s indecision, and catching a baseball at your ankles kind of speaks to where his head is at right now,” Roberts said. “It’s not from lack of effort, or care. It’s just right now, I think he’s kind of fighting. So we’ve got to keep supporting him.”
Tucker isn’t the only player who’s struggling. Mookie Betts has been hot and cold at the plate. Teoscar Hernández hasn’t been slugging the way he’s accustomed to. And before arriving in Colorado, the team was in a collective slump.
Tucker, however, is in the first year of a four-year, $240-million contract. And so far the Dodgers haven’t seen the version of him that elevated the Cubs’ offense in the first half of last year and was a steady part of the Astros’ lineup during a run of sustained success.
“Whether it’s my first year or 10th year with a team, I think it’d be frustrating regardless,” Tucker said. “But it’s not like I’m frustrated just because I’m playing at home or anything. Whether it’s on the road or at home, it would be frustrating, just not helping the team win games.”
He slid into his most recent slump during the Dodgers’ last homestand, but the Colorado altitude didn’t immediately work its magic when the team went back on the road.
During Monday’s SNLA broadcast, analyst Eric Karros suggested sending Tucker to Arizona for a reset.
The less extreme version would be sitting Tucker for several games in a row.
“I’m not at the point where it’s like a three-day, three-game reset situation, something like that,” Roberts said Tuesday afternoon.
He did, however, give Tucker a day off Saturday, saying he saw Tucker’s frustration as he continued to struggle offensively at Dodger Stadium. And Tuesday, he said he hadn’t decided whether to start Tucker against Rockies left-handed starter Kyle Freeland the next day.
“It’s tough because, I mean, I feel like I’ve tried just about everything,” Tucker said. “And every time I feel like I’m turning a corner, I get hit with a roadblock. But, you can’t stop. You just got to keep going, try and at least pick out the positives, and just try and ride with that. Just keep on moving to the next day and hope for something to build.”
From Thuc Nhi Nguyen: For more than four decades, the Lakers were a family-run business. The sibling rivalries still remain.
Jeanie Buss is fighting back after her siblings reportedly voted to sell the family’s remaining stake in the Lakers on Monday. The team’s governor, Buss sent a letter through her attorney to her brothers’ attorneys stating any votes to sell the family’s remaining 17.8% stake in the team to new majority owners Bob Iger and Joshua Kushner are void because the sale cannot be completed without approval of the other trustees: Jeanie and her younger siblings, Janie and Joey.
ESPN reported Monday that the six Buss family siblings, who took over team ownership after their father, Jerry Buss, died in 2013, are selling their shares of the Lakers to Iger and Kushner following a family vote. Iger, the longtime Disney chief executive, and Kushner, a venture capitalist and entrepreneur, agreed last week to buy Mark Walter’s controlling stake of the Lakers for a record valuation of $12.5 billion.
The transactions still need to be approved by the NBA board of governors. Jeanie Buss, who was to remain the Lakers governor for at least five years after Walter’s purchase of the team was approved last October, no longer would be eligible to serve on the board if the Buss family sells its shares. Governors are required to own at least a 15% stake.
“The co-trustees are bound to vote the Los Angeles Lakers, Inc. shares to ensure that the minimum 15% ownership requirement is maintained in order to ensure that Jeanie Buss may remain controlling owner,” the letter from Buss’ attorney reads, citing a 2017 court ruling outlining Jeanie Buss’ role. “Any attempt by the co-trustees to do otherwise and any attempt to aid or abet the co-trustees as such would constitute a breach of trust, breach of fiduciary duty and be in contempt of court.”
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Ohtani homers twice, Dodgers win
From Maddie Lee: Shohei Ohtani paused to admire the flight of his no-doubt home run as it sailed to right-center field.
Clearly on a home-run trajectory, it was headed toward the visitor’s bullpen. From among the trees, Dodgers reliever Kyle Hurt’s glove shot up and secured the ball.
As Ohtani circled the bases, the bullpen turned into a mosh pit around Hurt.
In what has been a brutal August for the Dodgers, the vibes were undeniably high.
Maybe all the Dodgers needed was a trip to the Mile High City.
En route to an 11-5 win over the Rockies, Ohtani’s two-run blast in the sixth inning — his second homer of the game — widened the Dodgers’ lead to eight runs, a comfortable lead even at hitter-friendly Coors Field.
From Steve Henson: The NBA investigation into whether payments from Clippers team sponsors to star player Kawhi Leonard were a prohibited attempt to circumvent the salary cap has moved to a contentious discussion phase between the team and the league, people with knowledge of the case not authorized to discuss it publicly confirmed to The Times on Monday.
ESPN reported that the probe conducted on behalf of the NBA by high-powered New York law firm Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz has found no evidence establishing that Clippers owner Steve Ballmer funneled money through Aspiration Partners, Daktronics or other team sponsors to pay Leonard millions of dollars in excess of his player contract.
However, the NBA issued a statement that read: “ESPN’s article regarding the LA Clippers investigation — for which the NBA declined to cooperate — contains numerous and significant inaccuracies. The results in this matter will be made clear once the investigation is concluded.”
Major League Baseball’s team owners unanimously have approved the sale of the San Diego Padres to an investor group led by private equity billionaire José E. Feliciano and his wife and business partner, Kwanza Jones.
The league announced the approval Monday after a vote. Feliciano and Jones reached an agreement in May to buy the Padres from the family of late owner Peter Seidler at an MLB-record valuation of $3.9 billion. The deal is still contingent on the official closing of the transaction in the coming weeks.
“José and Kwanza understand the unique place the Padres hold in San Diego and the powerful bond between the club and its fans,” Commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement. “We look forward to their leadership of the Padres and to working with them to build on the club’s strong foundation in a market that is so important to Major League Baseball.”
1923 — Helen Mills, 17, ends Molla Bjurstedt Mallory’s domination of the U.S. Lawn Tennis Assn. championships and starts her own with a 6-2, 6-1 victory.
1958 — Floyd Patterson knocks out Roy Harris in the 13th round at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles to retain his world heavyweight title.
1964 — The International Olympic Committee bans South Africa from competing in the Summer Olympics because of its apartheid policies.
1994 — South Africa is introduced for the first time in 36 years during the opening ceremonies of the 15th Commonwealth Games held in Victoria, British Columbia. South Africa had been banned from the Games since 1958 because of its apartheid policies.
1995 — Thirteen-year-old Dominique Moceanu becomes the youngest to win the National Gymnastics Championships senior women’s all-around title in New Orleans.
2004 — Paul Hamm wins the men’s gymnastics all-around Olympic gold medal by the closest margin ever in the event. Controversy follows after it was discovered a scoring error that may have cost Yang Tae-young of South Korea the men’s all-around title. Yang, who finished with a bronze, is wrongly docked a tenth of a point on his second-to-last routine, the parallel bars. He finishes third, 0.049 points behind Hamm, who becomes the first American man to win gymnastics’ biggest prize.
2008 — A day after winning an Olympic gold medal in Beijing, Rafael Nadal officially unseats Roger Federer to become the world’s No. 1 tennis player when the ATP rankings are released. Federer had been atop the rankings for 235 weeks.
2013 — For the first time in Solheim Cup history, the Europeans leaves America with the trophy. Caroline Hedwall becomes the first player in the 23-year history of the event to win all five matches. She finishes with a 1-up victory over Michelle Wie and gives Europe the 14 points it needed to retain the cup.
2013 — Usain Bolt is perfect again with three gold medals. The Jamaican great becomes the most successful athlete in the 30-year history of the world championships. The 4×100-meter relay gold erases the memories of the 100 title he missed out on in South Korea two years ago because of a false start. Bolt, who already won the 100 and 200 meters, gets his second such sprint triple at the world championships, matching the two he achieved at the Olympics.
2016 — Jamaica’s Usain Bolt completes an unprecedented third consecutive sweep of the 100 and 200-meter sprints, elevating his status as the most decorated male sprinter in Olympic history. He wins the 200-meter race with a time of 19.78 seconds to defeat Andre de Grasse of Canada. American Ashton Eaton defends his Olympic decathlon title, equaling the games record with a surge on the last lap of the 1,500 meters — the last event in the two-day competition. Helen Maroulis defeats Japan’s Saori Yoshida 4-1 in the 53-kilogram freestyle final to win the first-ever gold medal for a United States women’s wrestler.
2018 — Accelerate cruises to a record 12 1/2-length victory in the $1 million Pacific Classic at Del Mar, becoming just the third horse to sweep all three of Southern California’s major races for older horses in the same year.
Compiled by the Associated Press
This day in baseball history
1915 — Boston opened Braves Field with a 3-1 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals.
1931 — New York’s Lou Gehrig played in his 1,000th consecutive game. Gehrig went hitless in the 5-4 loss to Detroit.
1948 — Brooklyn’s Rex Barney pitched a one-hitter for a 1-0 win over Robin Roberts and the Philadelphia Phillies at Shibe Park.
1956 — The Cincinnati Reds hit eight home runs and the Milwaukee Braves added two to set a National League record for home runs by two clubs in a nine-inning night game. Bob Thurman’s three homers and double led the Reds in the 13-4 rout.
1960 — Lew Burdette of the Milwaukee Braves pitched a no-hitter, beating the Philadelphia Phillies 1-0. Burdette faced the minimum 27 batters.
1965 — Hank Aaron of Milwaukee hit Curt Simmons’ pitch on top of the pavilion roof at Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis for an apparent home run. However, umpire Chris Pelekoudas called him out for being out of the batter’s box when he connected. Nevertheless, the Braves won the game 5-3.
1967 — Jack Hamilton of the Angels hit Tony Conigliaro on his left cheekbone with a fastball in the fourth inning of a 3-2 loss to Boston. Conigliaro was carried unconscious from the field and missed the remainder of the 1967 season and the entire 1968 season. The 22-year-old already had more than 100 home runs in his career.
1977 — Don Sutton of the Dodgers pitched his fifth one-hitter to tie the National League record. Sutton gave up a two-out single in the eighth inning to San Francisco’s Marc Hill. The Dodgers won 7-0.
1995 — Tom Henke became the seventh pitcher to reach 300 saves, surviving a rally by the Atlanta Braves in the ninth inning of the St. Louis Cardinals’ 4-3 victory.
2000 — Darin Erstad of the Angels made a spectacular, game-saving catch in the 10th inning and followed it with a homer in the 11th as the Angels defeated the New York Yankees 9-8.
2006 — Alfonso Soriano became the third player in major league history to have at least four seasons of 30 homers and 30 stolen bases, and the Washington Nationals beat the Philadelphia Phillies 6-4.
2007 — Micah Owings went 4-for-5, including a pair of mammoth homers, drove in six runs and scored four times while pitching three-hit ball through seven innings as the Arizona Diamondbacks beat the Atlanta Braves 12-6.
2011 — Mike Jacobs became the first player suspended by Major League Baseball for a positive HGH test under the sport’s minor league drug testing procedures. The 30-year-old minor league first baseman, who was in the big leagues from 2005-10, received a 50-game suspension for taking the banned performance-enhancing substance and was subsequently released by the Colorado Rockies.
2017 — Manny Machado capped a three-homer night with a grand slam in the bottom of the ninth inning, and the Baltimore Orioles rallied past the Angels 9-7 in a game that featured 10 home runs.
2018 — New York Mets ace Jacob deGrom pitched his first complete game of the season and lowered his major league-leading ERA to 1.71 with a 3-1 win over the Philadelphia Phillies.
2019 — Zack Grenke records the 200th win of his career as the Astros defeat the Athletics 4-1.
2021 — Shohei Ohtani continues to do it all by himself on the field. Today, he becomes the first hitter in the majors to reach 40 homers this season, and also improves his record on the mound to 8-1 as he pitches eight innings for the first time of his career. The Angels defeat the Tigers, 3-1.
2021 — Atlanta Braves first baseman Freddie Freeman hit for the cycle for the second time in his career as they beat the Miami Marlins 11-9.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at houston.mitchell@latimes.com. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.
Born in Senegal’s capital Dakar, Vieira will now manage the country of his birth, having moved to France aged eight before later winning over 100 caps for Les Bleus and lifting the World Cup in 1998 and the European Championship in 2000.
Senegal’s football federation (FSF) said the appointment reflects its “desire to strengthen its high-level technical staff” and is “perfectly aligned” with the nation’s sporting ambitions.
Details of Vieria’s contract and his starting date in the role are still being discussed.
His first matches in charge of the Teranga Lions are expected to come next month in qualifiers for the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon).
He won eight and drew nine of his 26 games during the 2024-25 season to guide the Italian club to safety and a 13th-place finish.
However, he left the club after managing just two wins in 25-26, with both of those victories coming in the Coppa Italia.
During his playing career, midfielder Vieira won three Premier League titles and four FA Cups at Arsenal, as well as silverware with AC Milan, Inter Milan and Manchester City.
He retired in 2011 and became the manager of New York City in 2016 before returning to Europe with Nice and leading them to seventh in Ligue 1 in his first season.
Vieira was sacked in December 2020 and became Crystal Palace manager the following year, guiding the Eagles to 12th in the Premier League and the FA Cup semi-finals in 2021-22.
He was dismissed in March 2023 after a 12-game winless run, before joining RC Strasbourg as their first appointment following a takeover by BlueCo, the company which owns Chelsea. He left Strasbourg by mutual consent in July 2024.
His predecessor Thiaw was at the centre of controversy in January when he ushered his Senegal team off the field when Morocco were awarded a stoppage-time penalty in the 2025 Afcon final.
The players eventually returned after a delay of about 17 minutes before Brahim Diaz’s penalty was saved and Pape Gueye scored an extra-time winner.
However, Morocco were declared the winners of the tournament in March when the a Confederation of African Football appeals board overturned the result of the final following Senegal’s walk-off.
Welcome back to this week’s Lakers newsletter, where we’ve apparently never heard of an offseason.
During an allegedly sleepy period on the NBA schedule, the Lakers shook everyone awake with a blaring alarm. Twice.
Mark Walter, 14 months after agreeing to buy the NBA’s premier franchise, is selling his controlling stake in the Lakers to Joshua Kushner and Bob Iger at a staggering $12.5 billion valuation that would be the highest in sports history. When Kushner and Iger seemed poised to cash in even more after a reported Buss family vote to sell remaining shares of the team, team governor Jeanie Buss said emphatically, “Not today.”
Buss is contesting her family’s reported plan to sell its remaining 17.8% of the team to Iger and Kushner. Her lawyers issued a scathing letter saying her younger brothers are “doing harm to the Los Angeles Lakers,” and that she should remain the controlling governor of the Lakers, as described in the family trust.
One 47-year reign in the NBA hangs in the balance this week. Quietly, another 18-year run has already concluded.
All things Lakers, all the time.
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‘Just a kid from inner city L.A.’
Russell Westbrook with the Clippers in 2023.
(Matt York / Associated Press)
Reggie Morris Jr. won’t just remember the way Russell Westbrook changed basketball. Even after Westbrook’s retirement, his former high school coach chooses to see the way the former Lawndale Leuzinger star is changing the city that raised him. That’s even more important than the NBA record 209 triple-doubles.
“I believe that his impact on this community,” Morris said, “is far greater than his basketball impact.”
Westbrook was once just a short kid with size 14 shoes and an even bigger chip on his shoulder. He grew into an electrifying guard at UCLA, where he went to two Final Fours. He blossomed into one of the most productive, yet polarizing, players in NBA history. Through it all, he remained dedicated to the community that would later fail to fully embrace his no-holds-barred playing style.
The L.A. native was named NBA most valuable player in 2017. The same season, when Morris was coaching at Loyola Marymount, Westbrook reached out about starting an Elite Youth Basketball League team for young players.
Westbrook set the NBA record for triple-doubles and averaged a season-long triple-double four times. Between the stat-stuffing performances, he launched Why Not Premier, an EYBL girls team with the same resources and investment as the boys.
The 2012 Olympic gold medalist was named to the NBA’s 75th anniversary team in 2021 after snarling, dunking and driving with full force every play, every night. On the way, he regularly returned to his hometown.
“Before he was a walking headline,” actor Michael B. Jordan said in a video Westbrook posted on social media last Wednesday for his retirement announcement, “he was just a kid from inner city L.A. who could jump higher than anybody had a right to.”
The video shows Westbrook walking through a museum of his basketball career then into an unfinished wing that represents “the mentorship, the foundation, the kids who are going to grow up wanting to move just like he did … [that] hasn’t been built yet either.”
Tributes to Westbrook flooded in. Fifteen-year-old highlight reels showing baggy shorts, jaw-dropping athleticism and a crossover that nearly shook defenders out of their shoes popped up on social media again. Even his own high school coach had forgotten just how dynamic Westbrook was in his prime.
“He didn’t back down from anybody,” said Morris, now the director of Westbrook’s Team Why Not EYBL team and the boys’ basketball head coach at Redondo Union. “He was fearless. He was relentless. There’s never really been a player quite like him. I would say he kind of has, like, a Charles Barkley, a young Charles Barkley spirit, where he was just passionate and fiery. He wasn’t PC. He wore his emotions on his sleeves, and he didn’t really apologize to anyone for how he felt or what he was there to do.”
Westbrook’s unapologetic attitude became a defining characteristic of his game. He was defiant. He was dynamic. He was exciting and explosive, but exhausting.
After 11 seasons with the Oklahoma City Thunder, where the Thunder went to the playoffs nine times with one NBA Finals appearance, Westbrook was traded to the Houston Rockets. When he got to the Lakers in 2021, it was his fourth team in as many seasons.
Russell Westbrook brings the ball upcourt for the Lakers.
(Michael Conroy / Associated Press)
Westbrook’s two-year run with the Lakers was “bittersweet” for Westbrook, Morris said. Returning to the community that raised him was expected to be a triumphant homecoming. But the team struggled, his efficiency waned and fans turned on him. He became a punch line and a negative example of LeBron James’ potential influence after the superstar lobbied for the trade that brought Westbrook to L.A. He sparred with reporters.
The public feuds started to overshadow what those close to Westbrook know him to be in private: a maniacal hard worker with a competitive streak that demands respect.
“A lot of people looked at the emotions on the court and thought Russ was loud,” Durant wrote in a poignant note on X. “Nah to me, he was quiet and methodical. He [led] by example and once the lights were bright, he let everything out and experienced pure freedom. It was inspiring as his teammate and everywhere I went, I seen it inspire people from all walks of life.”
Westbrook will now inspire away from the court. When Nike reached out to Westbrook about starting an EYBL team, he knew where to go with the idea. He hadn’t been part of the regular travel ball circuit growing up and instead stuck closely with his local coaches, including Morris. He wanted that same loyal experience for his youth team.
Westbrook’s Team Why Not expanded to include a girls program Why Not Premier in 2022. His wife, Nina, also played basketball at UCLA, and the couple has been a strong supporter of the UCLA women’s basketball program.
Westbrook, who often trained at UCLA’s basketball facility that the men’s and women’s programs share, would readily share knowledge with UCLA’s women’s players, UCLA women’s basketball coach Cori Close said. He welcomed them in workouts, showed them what food he had packed in Tupperware containers to stay on a healthy diet and encouraged them to train for long, productive careers.
“There’s so much bad press about, ‘Oh, college athletes or pro athletes are just a bunch of takers, they all are about money first,” Close said, “and the Westbrooks, and specifically Russ and Nina, they’re about giving back and they’re about making a difference.”
Even during the season, Westbrook made himself available to players on his EYBL teams as often as possible, visiting between playoff runs or at least supporting them through social media.
“They feel his presence when he’s there, and he’s hands-on in the situation,” Morris said. “He’s not just giving money; he’s trying to help the kids, give them a different aspect or a different take on what he knows and give it back to them.”
Jared McCain is one of Team Why Not’s most prominent alumni. The 22-year-old Oklahoma City guard posted a picture from his EYBL days to his Instagram story last week showing Westbrook with his arm wrapped around McCain’s waist.
“Legend!!” wrote McCain, who graduated from Corona Centennial. “Thank you for everything.”
Morris and Westbrook had talked about the end more often lately. They knew if not this year, it would have probably been next year. Morris could never have envisioned the career was going to be this decorated, but the longtime coach knew it was going to be successful. If he hadn’t become a future Hall of Famer, Westbrook would have easily become a president of a successful company, Morris said.
Don’t rule it out for his second act.
“When you have a work ethic like his, it’s just part of who he is,” Morris said. “It’s not gonna go anywhere.”
Best thing I ate this week
Signature beef udon at Azuki in Seattle.
(Thuc Nhi Nguyen / Los Angeles Times)
This technically isn’t the best thing from this week, but I needed to share this extra food gem from my hometown. Azuki’s unassuming storefront in Seattle’s Capital Hill neighborhood is easy to miss but the homemade udon noodles should not be overlooked. The signature beef udon noodles had a simple, light broth that leaves the perfect amount of salty coating on your tongue. The thin slices of beef are perfect with the chewy udon noodles. The only way the meal would have been better was if it was on a cold winter day.
For more than four decades, the Lakers were a family-run business. The sibling rivalries still remain.
Jeanie Buss is fighting back after her siblings reportedly voted to sell the family’s remaining stake in the Lakers on Monday. The team’s governor, Buss sent a letter through her attorney to her brothers’ attorneys stating any votes to sell the family’s remaining 17.8% stake in the team to new majority owners Bob Iger and Joshua Kushner are void because the sale cannot be completed without approval of the other trustees: Jeanie and her younger siblings, Janie and Joey.
ESPN reported Monday that the six Buss family siblings, who took over team ownership after their father, Jerry Buss, died in 2013, are selling their shares of the Lakers to Iger and Kushner following a family vote. Iger, the longtime Disney chief executive, and Kushner, a venture capitalist and entrepreneur, agreed last week to buy Mark Walter’s controlling stake of the Lakers for a record valuation of $12.5 billion.
The transactions still need to be approved by the NBA board of governors. Jeanie Buss, who was to remain the Lakers governor for at least five years after Walter’s purchase of the team was approved last October, no longer would be eligible to serve on the board if the Buss family sells its shares. Governors are required to own at least a 15% stake.
“The co-trustees are bound to vote the Los Angeles Lakers, Inc. shares to ensure that the minimum 15% ownership requirement is maintained in order to ensure that Jeanie Buss may remain controlling owner,” the letter from Buss’ attorney reads, citing a 2017 court ruling outlining Jeanie Buss’ role. “Any attempt by the co-trustees to do otherwise and any attempt to aid or abet the co-trustees as such would constitute a breach of trust, breach of fiduciary duty and be in contempt of court.”
The trust was revised in 2017 after a series of legal battles between Jeanie and her older brothers, Johnny and Jim. It stipulated that co-trustees “would take all actions reasonably available to them, including voting the trust’s shares to ensure that [Jeanie Buss] is elected as the controlling owner of the Lakers on an annual basis during [her] lifetime.”
The statement to ESPN attributed to the Buss family regarding the sale read: “We have decided as a family to sell the remaining Buss Family Trust shares to the Bob Iger group as part of the ongoing transaction. We love the Lakers, Laker fans and will continue to support Los Angeles; but it is time to use this opportunity to move on and exit gracefully while we still can.” ESPN didn’t report a price for the shares.
The Buss family has owned the team since 1979, when Jerry Buss bought the franchise, the Forum and the Los Angeles Kings for $67.5 million. The family patriarch leveraged Hollywood glamour with entertainment spectacle to elevate the Lakers into an internationally recognized brand. The NBA’s biggest stars shone brightest in L.A.; Jerry West, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant helped pile up 10 championships under Buss. The Laker Girls became a harbinger of sports dance teams to come. Celebrities flocked to the courtside seats. Books and TV shows told the team’s Hollywood story.
Each of Buss’ six children — Jeanie, Jim, Johnny, Janie, Joey and Jesse — held titles in the organization. Jeanie was her father’s hand-picked successor. She fought to maintain her position against Johnny and Jim, who tried to reorganize the board of directors to push Jeanie out in 2017. She eventually ousted them from team operations. Joey and Jessie, the two youngest, were fired by the new owners last November. Joey was the team’s alternate governor and vice president of research and development, and Jesse was the assistant general manager. Janie held an administrative role directing the team’s charitable services.
The booming sports business quickly caught up to the team that once held the attention of the city with the league’s biggest stars, iconic “Showtime” style and old Hollywood feel. The Lakers slogged through a six-year playoff drought from 2013-19. The team started falling behind in resources and revenue compared to other organizations that controlled their own arenas and could maximize alternative revenue streams. The Buss family voted to relinquish a majority ownership of the team last year, bringing in Walter, who also owns the Dodgers.
Walter then shockingly flipped the NBA’s crown jewel franchise for a profit of $2.5 billion last week. The investment mogul who is under federal investigation for unpaid loans agreed to sell his stake in the Lakers to Kushner and Iger. Kushner is a co-founder of Thrive Capital, which started a permanent holdings company, Thrive Eternal, this year to invest in sports and cultural brands. Iger is the longtime Disney CEO who already owns Southland soccer club Angel City FC and previously flirted with NFL ownership by trying to build a stadium in Carson before the project ultimately went to the Stan Kroenke-led group that built SoFi Stadium in Inglewood.
Before including the Buss shares, the deal for the Lakers’ majority stake already was the largest sum paid for any professional sports franchise, surpassed only by Walter’s $10-billion purchase of the team. It still sits below Sportico’s estimate for the most valuable franchise, with the outlet listing the Dallas Cowboys’ valuation at $15.5 billion.
Minority stakeholders Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, who also owns the Los Angeles Times Media Group; real estate billionaire Ed Roski; and Walter business partner Todd Boehly own about 14% of the Lakers, according to Sportico.
How Iger and Kushner will finance the Lakers deal is unclear.
When the duo agreed to buy Walter’s share last week, Kushner and Iger released a statement that in part praised the Buss family’s work with the Lakers.
“We have immense respect for the leadership and vision of Jerry and Jeanie Buss,” the statement read. “Our long-term commitment is to build on that foundation, compete at the highest level, and serve this extraordinary team, its fans, and the city of Los Angeles.”
Major League Baseball’s team owners unanimously have approved the sale of the San Diego Padres to an investor group led by private equity billionaire José E. Feliciano and his wife and business partner, Kwanza Jones.
The league announced the approval Monday after a vote. Feliciano and Jones reached an agreement in May to buy the Padres from the family of late owner Peter Seidler at an MLB-record valuation of $3.9 billion. The deal is still contingent on the official closing of the transaction in the coming weeks.
“José and Kwanza understand the unique place the Padres hold in San Diego and the powerful bond between the club and its fans,” Commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement. “We look forward to their leadership of the Padres and to working with them to build on the club’s strong foundation in a market that is so important to Major League Baseball.”
Seidler’s family announced its intention to explore a sale of the Padres last November, two years after his death. The 53-year-old Feliciano, a co-founder of Santa Monica-based private equity firm Clearlake Capital, emerged from the competition as the Seidler family’s top choice.
Padres Chief Executive Erik Greupner and general manager A.J. Preller will remain in charge of day-to-day operations, according to MLB’s announcement.
“We are a family first, and becoming owners of the San Diego Padres means joining an even larger one,” Jones and Feliciano said in a statement. “We are grateful to the Seidler family, and especially to Peter, for raising the expectations of what this franchise can achieve. … Our ambition is clear: to bring a World Series championship to San Diego and build an enduring organization capable of competing for championships year after year. We intend to be engaged owners, bringing our energy, experience and perspective while working alongside the talented team already in place and investing ambitiously and thoughtfully in the Padres’ future.
“We are all in and committed to winning.”
Peter Seidler assumed majority control of the Padres in 2020 after first joining their ownership group in 2012, but he became beloved in San Diego for his aggressive financial pursuit of winning and his eagerness to engage with the team’s fan base. He died at age 63 in November 2023.
The Padres dramatically increased their payroll under Seidler, allowing Preller to build the foundation for the current team, which has made four playoff appearances in the past six years and won at least 89 games in three of the last four seasons during the most successful stretch in franchise history. San Diego is currently in the playoff race again, winning 17 of its last 22 games entering Monday to surge into an NL wild-card position at 67-58.
“As far as the day-to-day operations, nothing changes for us,” Padres manager Craig Stammen said in New York before San Diego’s series opener against the Mets. “We’ve got to go out here and play the games, just like we have all season long. The ownership sale has kind of been something that’s been going on throughout the entire year. It doesn’t really affect the play on the field, but we’re excited to have José and Kwanza a part of the Padres and can’t wait to welcome them.”
The minority partners in the Padres’ new ownership group include Joey and Jesse Buss, two sons of former Lakers owner Jerry Buss. Coincidentally, the six Buss siblings decided earlier Monday to sell their remaining minority ownership stake in the Lakers to incoming majority owners Joshua Kushner and Bob Iger. Jeanie Buss is contesting the sale of the family’s shares.
When Feliciano and Jones reached their agreement to purchase the Padres earlier this year, they praised the team as “a unifying force in San Diego, rooted in community, connection and belonging.” They’ve since been spotted at Padres games in San Diego and in Mexico City.
“It’s good to see people that care working with us, you know?” Padres outfielder Jackson Merrill said. “I mean, the Seidlers cared a lot. It’ll be fun to see how these people take it, mold it into their own, you know? Trust in them, as they trust in us on the field. So, full confidence in them. Excited to meet them.”
The Padres have never won a World Series, but they were a valuable commodity for potential owners as the only team in the four biggest North American sports leagues in a metropolitan area with roughly 3.3 million people. Downtown Petco Park has become one of the liveliest ballparks in the sport, and the Padres ranked second in the majors in attendance last season.
Feliciano, who was born in Puerto Rico, becomes the second Latino principal owner in baseball, along with the Angels’ Arte Moreno. Latino and Hispanic players comprise roughly 30% of major league rosters.
Feliciano and Jones will hold an introductory news conference at Petco Park on Aug. 24.
Wimbledon semi-finalist Arthur Fery has been included in Great Britain’s Davis Cup team to face Ecuador in September.
Former world number four Jack Draper is not included but a fifth player will be added closer to the time.
British number one Cameron Norrie, Henry Patten and Lloyd Glasspool make up the team to play at London’s Copper Box Arena.
“I am really proud to be able to represent GB again,” Fery said. “It is going to be a bit of a different scenario this time, at home, in the World Group and trying to qualify for the final eight.
“There might be some extra pressure, but I’m ready for it.”
Fery, 24, jumped to a career-high world ranking of 36 following his shock Wimbledon success, when he was a wildcard into his home Grand Slam.
Ranked 114th in the world before the start of the tournament, Fery went on to become the lowest-ranked player to make Wimbledon’s last four since Goran Ivanisevic in 2001.
This will be Fery’s first outing in England since Wimbledon.
A persistent arm injury has kept him sidelined and caused his world ranking to plummet from fourth to as low as 160th over a 12-month period.
The best-of-five tie takes place over two days on 19 and 20 September, with two singles matches on day one.
Day two features a doubles match followed by two singles encounters.
Fery was unable to celebrate his Davis Cup inclusion as he suffered a 7-5 7-6 (7-3) defeat on Monday to world number eight Alex de Minaur in the third round of the Cincinnati Masters.
Rain delayed the start of play, before later forcing the players off with fifth seed De Minaur leading 7-5 5-1.
Fery fought back after a 30-minute delay to take the second set to a tie-break, but his Australian opponent was able to wrestle back control and see out victory.
When the Oakland Athletics released Max Muncy before the 2017 season, the then-26-year-old didn’t know if a baseball career was for him anymore, let alone a future at third base.
“Man, there’s a lot with that,” Muncy told The Times. “It’s just a lot.”
Then, the Dodgers came calling, signing Muncy to a minor-league contract in late April 2017.
And now — nine seasons, three All-Star nods and three World Series championships later — Muncy just eclipsed 10 years of service time on Sunday against the Brewers, eight days before his 36th birthday.
“It’s special. It’s a rare accomplishment in baseball,” Muncy said of the feat that fewer than 10% of all MLB players reach. “It’s something that I’m extremely proud of. There’s not many things that I take personal pride in when it comes to, you know, personal accomplishments. For me, it’s always about winning rings and doing things as a team.
“But this is one of the few that I’m really, really proud of, and I’ll definitely cherish.”
No one could’ve foreseen the unobtrusively great career that Muncy has carved out for himself, specifically over the last nine seasons in Los Angeles since getting called up in 2018.
Entering this week’s three-game series in Colorado against the Rockies, Muncy is the Dodgers’ all-time playoff home run leader with 16 and is fifth on the franchise’s all-time home runs list with 233. He has slashed .234/.357/.486 over 1,039 regular-season games with the club, anchoring lineups alongside countless big-name teammates while evolving into a trustworthy defender.
Even someone who’s seen Muncy’s journey up close like Dodgers reliever Brock Stewart, who was also vying for a big-league opportunity in Triple-A Oklahoma City during that forever-ago 2017 season, is still moved by his ascent.
“He’s always been a good teammate [and] always been a good human,” Stewart said. “I don’t know if he always believed in himself, and I can relate to that, because I didn’t believe in myself all the time … But to see him and how he persevered through that feeling [or] that self-doubt and became what he is now [is] super special.
“And, man, to know that he’s now the Dodger [Stadium] all-time home run leader? Whatever it is … after being an older guy in Triple-A with me and then getting called up … special.”
In retrospect, though, this was always Muncy’s destiny.
He’s long been a manager’s dream, a status that is timeless and priceless.
“I remember a guy that just got DFA’d that was sort of kicked to the curb by an organization that didn’t believe in him,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of Muncy. “He was close to being out of baseball … He’s one of the leaders on our ballclub, the longest-tenured Dodger currently. So I just have nothing but praise.
“The ability to kind of adapt, start, come off the bench and still [do] whatever it takes to help the team win — he’s all in. … He does everything you want as a manager — everything. He’s cut from the same Freddie Freeman cloth.”
Muncy is as team-first as it gets.
Although some stats might occasionally catch his eye, Muncy doesn’t put much thought into individual accomplishments. Recently passing Eric Karros, for example, for first in career homers at Dodger Stadium — Muncy currently has 132 to Karros’ 130 — doesn’t light up Muncy as one might think.
“There’s not much when it comes to me, personally, that I care about,” Muncy said. “But three rings is definitely what I [cherish] most.”
That selfless approach is what MLB’s premier organization and latest dynasty loves most about Muncy.
“He’s a guy that is always going to show up for the team and do whatever it takes to put the team in a good position,” said Miguel Rojas, Dodgers infielder and veteran leader. “That’s what I believe is a sign of a leader without talking much. … Every time he goes out there and he breaks a record, you feel good for the guy because he’s been working really hard toward the things he has right now in his power.
“I’m so happy and proud that I can say I was a teammate with him because he was one of the first guys that kind of opened his arms to me when I got back here in 2023. … He’s a guy you always can root for, especially in this organization full of stars. He always gets [overlooked] a little bit, but I feel like he’s one of the leaders of this club, and he will be until he retires.”
L.A. has borne witness to nothing but stars over the years.
Since Muncy has called L.A. home, he’s suited up alongside several future Hall of Famers, from Clayton Kershaw to Shohei Ohtani, mainly at the hot corner, where the bar is high after the trails blazed by Justin Turner, Ron Cey and others.
But if Muncy’s 10 years of service represent anything, it’s that he has become a Dodgers great, too — even if he hasn’t fully embraced the label yet.
“Surreal. It’s crazy. I definitely don’t see myself as that,” Muncy said of his growing place in Dodgers history. “But maybe one day, when I’m done, I’ll be able to sit back and kind of reflect on that. But for me, it’s just all surreal.”
NEW YORK — Ohio State and Oregon were 1-2 in The Associated Press Top 25 released Monday, giving the Big Ten Conference the top two teams in the preseason rankings for the first time in 65 years and just the second time ever.
The Buckeyes received 40 first-place votes and Oregon received 14 in voting by 69 media members who cover college football.
Ohio State will go into a season No. 1 for the ninth time, and first since 2015. The Buckeyes are now tied with Alabama for second-most preseason No. 1 rankings behind Oklahoma’s 10.
Oregon has its highest preseason ranking in program history after having opened No. 3 four times.
Georgia, Notre Dame and Texas round out the top five. Defending national champion Indiana starts at No. 6 and is followed by Miami, Texas A&M, Mississippi and Oklahoma.
Notre Dame received six first-place votes, Indiana got eight and Miami one.
This is the first year a conference has held down the top two spots in the preseason poll since Oklahoma and Nebraska of the Big Eight were 1-2 in 1987.
The last time the Big Ten had the Nos. 1 and 2 teams in the preseason was 1961, when Iowa and Ohio State topped the poll. The Hawkeyes lost four of their last five games after a 4-0 start and finished that season unranked. The Buckeyes went 8-0-1 and ended the season No. 2 behind unbeaten Alabama.
The Big Ten has won three straight College Football Playoff championships (Michigan, Ohio State, Indiana) and will be going for an unprecedented fourth straight national title. This is the fourth consecutive year the Big Ten has had two of the top three teams in the preseason rankings.
The Southeastern Conference leads all conferences with nine teams in the preseason Top 25, marking the third straight year it has had at least that many. Five of the top 10 teams are from the SEC for the first time since 2013.
Four Big 12 teams are ranked, with conference champion Texas Tech the highest at No. 12. The Atlantic Coast Conference has three ranked teams, with the Hurricanes joined by No. 19 SMU and No. 24 Louisville. There are no Group of Six schools in the Top 25.
Top-ranked Buckeyes
The offense is loaded. Heisman Trophy finalist Julian Sayin was the most accurate passer in the nation by a wide margin last season, Jeremiah Smith leads the nation in receiving yards and receiving touchdowns over the last two years and Bo Jackson is coming off a 1,000-yard rushing season as a freshman.
There is little concern about the defense even though eight starters must be replaced for a second straight year. At least six transfers are projected to start or play major roles.
Ohio State will get tested early and often. The Buckeyes visit Texas on Sept. 12 and five of their nine conference games are against preseason ranked teams, including at Indiana and against Oregon at home.
The Buckeyes have ended a season No. 1 in the AP poll six times (1942, 1954, 1968, 2002, 2014, 2024).
Bulldogs best of the SEC
The beat goes on for Kirby Smart’s Georgia Bulldogs. They’re in the preseason top five for the ninth straight year. The two-time defending SEC champion Bulldogs are favored to play in a sixth straight conference title game and appear in the CFP for the sixth time in 10 years.
Texas, the preseason No. 1 last year, opens in the top five for the third straight year. No. 8 Texas A&M is in the preseason top 10 for the first time since it was No. 6 in 2022, the year that marked the beginning of the end for coach Jimbo Fisher.
Pete Golding’s first full season as Mississippi head coach starts with the No. 9 Rebels in the preseason top 10 for the second time in three years and third time since 1970. No. 10 Oklahoma is in the preseason top 10 for the first time since 2022, when it was in the Big 12.
What about the Hoosiers?
Indiana is the seventh returning national champion in 40 years, and second in three years, to be ranked outside the top five in the preseason (Michigan went into the 2024 season ranked No. 9 after winning the national title).
The Hoosiers became the first team in the modern era to go 16-0, and they return lots of talent and signed a top-10 transfer class. The move from Heisman Trophy winner and No. 1 NFL draft pick Fernando Mendoza to TCU transfer Josh Hoover at quarterback apparently put doubts in the minds of voters.
Poll nuggets
—USC, which landed the nation’s top recruiting class during the offseason, is ranked No. 15 in the preason poll.
— Ohio State will try to become the 12th team to start and finish No. 1 since the AP preseason poll debuted in 1950. The last team to do it was Alabama in 2017.
— Notre Dame has its highest preseason ranking since it was No. 2 in 2006. The Fighting Irish, who have a Heisman candidate in quarterback CJ Carr, bring a 10-game winning streak into the season and are still smarting from being left out of the playoff.
— Lane Kiffin’s first LSU team is No. 11 after finishing 7-6 and unranked under Brian Kelly and Frank Wilson.
— Ten of the 12 CFP teams last season are ranked. The two that aren’t are James Madison and Tulane from the Group of Six.
— No. 23 Houston has its first preseason ranking in four years and third since 1991.
Hi, and welcome to another edition of Prep Rally. I’m Eric Sondheimer. The high school football season begins this weekend with zero week games. Let’s review some of the top openers.
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Big opening games
Thursday
Corona Centennial vs. Servite at Orange Coast College: It’s a challenging debut for first-year Servite coach Rick Garretson going against a Matt Logan offense that should be one of his best with quarterback Jaden Jefferson, running back Malaki Davis and receiver Quentin Hale. Servite has lots of speed and a trio of outstanding linebackers, plus new quarterback Gino Wang, so let’s see if the Friars can stay close. The pick: Corona Centennial.
Murrieta Valley at Rancho Cucamonga: These two top 25 teams exude toughness. Murrieta Valley is known for daring anyone to stop their running game. Rancho Cucamonga has had a year to get quarterback Trey Towns comfortable with the offense. The pick: Murrieta Valley.
Paraclete vs. St. Bonaventure at Ventura College: Former NFL defensive back Troy Hill, in his second year as head coach, had his first off season and the results should be good. The offense will be explosive behind improving junior quarterback Jaxson Carper and a group of speedy receivers. Angelus League favorite Paraclete has St. Francis transfer Shawn Sanders.
Friday
St. John Bosco at Las Vegas Bishop Gorman: This is a real national championship game. Whomever wins can finish unbeaten by season end. St. John Bosco’s experience on defense should be beneficial, but priority No. 1 is stopping running back Terrance Grant Jr., who has a huge offensive line to support him. Junior quarterback Koa Malau’ulu is in his third season as a starter. The receiving corp was hit hard by graduation but the offensive line should be much improved with the addition of Servite transfer Elisha Mueller. The pick: St. John Bosco.
Crenshaw at Palisades: Robert Garrett has left Crenshaw after 300 career victories. Interim coach Terrence Whitehead and his group of Garrett-trained assistants have worked hard to increase the roster level. There’s lots of athleticism at quarterback with Ethan Grant, a transfer from Los Angeles, and returnee Danniel Flowers. This is the first campus football game at Palisades since the Palisades Fire in January of 2025, so emotions will be high. The pick: Crenshaw.
Chaparral at Mission Viejo: Get ready for an entertaining TV opener in which both teams have a terrific group of receivers, so it will come down to who can protect their quarterback best. That’s where Mission Viejo has an advantage with probably the best offensive line since coach Chad Johnson arrived. The pick: Mission Viejo.
Loyola at Crean Lutheran: The Cubs go on the road to face a veteran team that has added lots of transfers, and the only question is how many will be eligible come game time. There are five Crean Lutheran players committed to Arizona. The pick: Crean Lutheran.
Gardena Serra vs. Palos Verdes at El Camino College: Get ready for Serra to pound the ball with its five returning offensive linemen and new running back AJ McBean. Palos Verdes has four-year starter Ryan Rakowski at quarterback to work his magic. Look for Serra’s speed advantage to be tough to stop. The pick: Serra.
Tustin at San Clemente: The Tritons won their game in Hawaii. Their defense faces a challenge from a Tustin team that has standout receiver Hayden Koo among a number of college prospect. But with Jaxson Rex leading the way, San Clemente figures to get some turnovers. The pick: San Clemente.
All-City linebacker De’Andre Kirkpatrick of Crenshaw has grown to 6 feet 3, 220 pounds entering his senior season.
(Eric Sondheimer / Los Angeles Times)
The Times’ nine-part series previewing some of Southern California’s best football players continues on Monday with a profile of Crenshaw linebacker De’Andre Kirkpatrick, who had to overcome the loss of his mother and father within weeks of each other. Here’s the profile.
Southern California teams traveled to Hawaii last week and came away 9-0. Chaminade, Villa Park, San Juan Hills, Viewpoint, Edison, Beaumont, San Clemente, Newport Harbor and Capistrano Valley all won their openers.
San Juan Hills beat Castle 67-0. Nikos Ioja rushed for 93 yards.
Bellflower showed off two promising freshmen receivers in a scrimmage: Ke’Ondre Smith and Ryan Clark. They could help with Austin Miller out with an injury.
JSerra quarterback Kate Meier reaches across the goal line for the winning touchdown an instant before her flag is pulled.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
Defending Southern Section Division 1 champion JSerra showed Saturday that it remains the team to beat in 2026 by winning the Chargers tournament Gold Division championship over Newport Harbor.
Sophomore quarterback Kate Meier and a terrific defense sparked the Lions to victory. JSerra defeated Orange Lutheran in the semifinals in a rematch of last year’s Division 1 final.
Right before its opening game of the season and its first game in school history, Sierra Canyon was able to get eligible quarterback Makena Cook, who transferred from Orange Lutheran. The Trailblazers played in the Chargers tournament and should be much stronger when the transfer sit-out period ends for those who did not change residences.
Two flag football standouts, Ayden Klaiber (transfer from Florida) and Ava Irwin (JSerra) have to sit out the first half of Sierra Canyon’s season.
Coach Morgan Wijay of Harvard-Westlake has her team playing well to start the girls volleyball season.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
In a season-opening matchup between reigning state champions, Harvard-Westlake pushed Mater Dei to five sets before senior outside hitter Westley Matavao took control in the Monarchs’ 26-28, 25-18, 25-19, 17-25, 15-8 victory in Studio City. The UCLA commit had 16 kills, 19 digs and six aces while Cal-bound middle blocker Emma Kingston had 13 kills for Mater Dei, which has won the CIF Open Division state championship twice in the last three years.
Brooke Cotter and Ruby Sampson had 12 kills apiece and Princeton commit Sophia Cotter added 11 kills for Harvard-Westlake, which won the Division 1 state title last fall under first-year coach Morgan Wijay, who had spent the previous 10 seasons at Alemany and guided that program to section titles in 2021 and 2022. The Wolverines finished third in the Mission League last year after being swept twice by Sierra Canyon and Marymount and are projected to be third again.
Mater Dei is the heavy favorite to repeat as Trinity League champion having added five transfers — two of those from its own league.
Sierra Canyon won the prestigious Ann Kang tournament in Hawaii, beating one top team after another.
Former Marina first baseman Jake Bauers has 21 home runs for the Milwaukee Brewers.
(Eric Sondheimer / Los Angeles Times)
From not making the varsity at Marina High until his junior year to hitting 21 home runs this season for the Milwaukee Brewers to marrying the girl he met in 10th grade, Jake Bauers’ journey has been quite rewarding. He went four for four on Sunday at Dodger Stadium against the Dodgers.
CIF media rights contract with PlayOn Sports and the NFHS Network.
(Los Angeles Times)
The CIF has reached agreement with PlayOn Sports, the owner of MaxPreps, the NFHS Network and GoFan, on a 10-year, $11.1 million broadcast rights deal.
El Camino Real players celebrate winning a 10th City Section baseball title at Dodger Stadium.
(Craig Weston)
As if replacing its executive director and assistant principal in charge of athletics wasn’t enough summer drama for El Camino Real, now the school has put on leave multiple coaches and launched an investigation over a dispute about first-aid cards and why they couldn’t be found in the Red Cross database.
Multiple El Camino Real coaches have been placed on administrative leave because of a school investigation. The school has been in turmoil since the summer when the executive director and assistant principal in charge of athletics were both ousted. Here’s the report.…
Former Crespi pitcher Tim Leveque is the interim pitching coach for the Angels….
La Mirada Junior Little League won the World Series championship, beating Taipei 6-3 on a 10th-inning three-run home run from Jaylen Valdez, who is one of seven players on the team already enrolled as freshmen at La Mirada High….
Infielder Ian Nunez from La Mirada has committed to Cal State Northridge….
St. Bernard will be getting a new all-weather turf field in 2027….
Linebacker Ezekiel Su’a of Mater Dei has committed to Dartmouth….
Catcher Maddie Schepp from Torrance has committed to Fresno State softball….
Jaylee Moore of Etiwanda has committed to Hawaii for women’s basketball….
Arcadia will not use its longtime nickname Apaches this school year as it transitions to a different mascot after a new state law. It will use only Arcadia this year.
From the archives: Cody Fajardo
Former Servite quarterback Cody Fajardo has found a home in the Canadian Football League. He was MVP of the Grey Cup in 2023 in leading the Montreal Alouettes to the championship. He’s with the Edmonton Elks, his fifth team. This season, he’s completing 70% of his passes.
The 34-year-old helped Servite win the 2009 Southern Section Division 1 championship, then became starting quarterback at Nevada. He’s always been known for his ability to pass and run while showing toughness.
From MLB.com, a story on former Thousand Oaks shortstop Jacob Wilson setting a major league record with 111 consecutive games without making an error.
Tweets you might have missed
High school basketball players have been playing games nonstop since the “season” ended in March. Now it’s August. School is about to begin. Practices are about to start. Is there any time to rest the bones and the mind? A week? A day?
Friends of Golf, which has donated millions to help junior golfers, high schools and colleges, will honor Rickie Fowler and Kay Cockerill at its Charity Golf Tournament in October. https://t.co/PofOgg3XVP
Where did I find new Servite baseball coach Eric Borba? Working to clean mats and the clubhouse. Life as a high school baseball coach. Field maintenance. pic.twitter.com/TliUl4gESQ
Have a question, comment or something you’d like to see in a future Prep Rally newsletter? Email me at eric.sondheimer@latimes.com, and follow me on Twitter at @latsondheimer.
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It’s right there in the medical books, along with Belsey fundoplication, Heineke-Mikulicz pyloroplasty and Keller’s excision arthroplasty: Tommy John surgery.
Purists might refer to it as ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction, but the rest of the world knows it as the career-saving surgery named for a sore-armed left-handed Dodgers pitcher.
Tommy John was facing the bleak reality that his career was likely over when he ruptured a ligament in his left elbow on a summer night in 1974, an injury that had sent so many pitchers into an early retirement. But a then-radical surgery not only saved but revived his career, as well as the careers of hundreds of baseball players ranging from Tom Candiotti to John Smoltz to Shohei Ohtani in the 50 years since.
Always more famous for the surgical procedure than his career stats, John died Saturday, the Dodgers announced. He was 83.
“We are saddened to hear the news of Tommy John’s passing,” Dodgers president and CEO Stan Kasten said in a statement. “… Tommy was an exceptional pitcher throughout his career in Major League Baseball and his courageous role in becoming the first to have surgery that would go on to bear his name can’t be overstated. His impact both on and off the field has been felt by ballplayers of all ages and will be for generations to come.”
A good pitcher before the surgery with 124 wins in 12 seasons with three teams, he won 164 more afterward — only one fewer than Sandy Koufax during his entire career, he liked to point out — in 14 more seasons with four teams, finally retiring at 46 with a 288-231 record and a 3.34 earned-run average.
“Dr. Jobe made it so I could throw a baseball again,” John told The Times’ Sam Farmer in 2023 from his home in Sarasota, Fla. “After surgery, I never missed a start, and I even pitched out of the bullpen every once in a while.”
He pitched for the Dodgers and the Angels and had two successful stints with the New York Yankees but it was with the Dodgers that he had his greatest success, an 87-42 record and a 2.97 ERA, helping them to consecutive World Series appearances.
It was also as a Dodger that he had his history-making operation.
He came to the Dodgers in a trade from the Chicago White Sox in December 1971 with an 84-91 record, a good curveball and a less than intimidating fastball. Pitching coach Red Adams convinced him that precision location and ball movement were more effective than raw speed and John went 11-5 the following season. He also became well acquainted with orthopedist Frank Jobe, the team physician.
Late in the season, he jammed his left elbow sliding into home plate, jarring loose some bone chips. Jobe cleaned things up for John during the offseason.
Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda congratulates Tommy John after John shut out the Phillies during 1978 National League Championship Series.
(Associated Press)
Then in July 1974, by which time John had become a mainstay in the pitching rotation, he threw a pitch to Hal Breeden of the Montreal Expos that changed his life, and ultimately the lives of many others.
“Right at the point where I put force on the pitch, the point where my arm is back and bent, something happened,” he told Sports Illustrated. “It felt as if I had left my arm somewhere else. It was as if my body continued to go forward and my left arm had just flown out to right field, independent of the rest of me.
“I heard this thudding sound in my elbow, then I felt a sharp pain.”
John had ruptured the medial ulnar collateral ligament in his left elbow, although he didn’t know that then. The pitch, of course, was nowhere near the strike zone and, despite the pain and in an effort to see if that was a fluke, he tried to throw another. It bounced off the plate, ending his outing and, for all anyone knew, his pitching career.
Jobe recommended total rest but after a month, with no sign of healing, he came up with an outside-the-box suggestion. Earlier, Jobe had grafted a tendon to a recovered polio patient’s ankle to provide stabilization. He thought maybe a tendon could be grafted to a pitcher’s elbow as well.
He gave John a grim choice: Do nothing and never pitch again, or try the surgery at 100-1 odds against success.
“I told Dr. [Frank] Jobe if you do your job I will do more than mine,” John told The Times last year. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time with the right doctor and team.”
So, on Sept. 25, 1974, Jobe took a tendon from John’s right arm, threaded it through holes he had drilled in John’s left elbow and hoped it all would work.
Nerve damage necessitated a second surgery several months later and the prospects were not promising. John’s left arm had atrophied, his hand now basically a claw, and two of his fingers were numb.
Even so, he began rehab, knowing he would miss the entire 1975 season. He taped the unfeeling fingers to the functioning ones so that he could grip a baseball, then, resembling “a little boy throwing against the steps of his back porch,” threw against a wall. He squeezed Silly Putty and strictly adhered to a physical therapy regimen.
By June 1975 he had regained the use of his entire hand and in late September pitched three innings in an exhibition game. He continued his routine through the offseason and into spring training, once joking, “When they operated on my arm, I asked them to put in a Koufax fastball. They did but it turned out to be Mrs. Koufax.”
Surprising many, who considered it at least a minor miracle, he was back in the rotation at the start of the 1976 season and went five innings in his first start, giving up five hits and three runs in a loss to the Braves in Atlanta. He finished the season at 10-10 with a 3.09 ERA, and if anyone was still wondering about his comeback, he put doubts to rest in 1977.
In one of his best seasons, he won 20 games, had a 2.78 ERA and finished second in National League Cy Young award voting for the pennant-winning Dodgers. In a 4-1 win over the Philadelphia Phillies in the clinching Game 4 of the NL Championship Series — then a best-of-five format — John pitched a complete game, striking out eight in a 130-pitch effort.
Dodgers pitcher Tommy John celebrates after the final out in a 4-1 victory over the Phillies in Game 4 of the 1977 NLCS that clinched the pennant for the Dodgers.
(Associated Press)
He came back with a 17-victory season in ’78 and the Dodgers won the pennant again but again lost to the Yankees in the World Series, with John winning a game in both the NLCS and World Series. After the season, he signed with New York as a free agent.
He was an immediate hit with the Yankees, winning 21 games in 1979 and finishing second in the American League Cy Young voting, then won 22 in ’80. In 1981, the Yankees reached the World Series, once again facing the Dodgers — and John was at the center of the most controversial decision in the series that ultimately sealed New York’s fate.
John was the starter in Game 6 at Yankee Stadium with the Dodgers leading the series, 3-2. The left-hander had won Game 2, giving up three hits over seven innings in a 3-0 victory, and had completed four innings of one-run ball when Yankees manager Bob Lemon elected to pinch-hit for John with two runners on in a 1-1 game. ABC, which broadcast the World Series that year, showed John looking visibly upset and surprised as he paced the dugout.
Bobby Murcer flied out to right to end the inning, and the Dodgers would score eight runs over the next four innings against an ineffective Yankees bullpen to secure a 9-2 victory and win the franchise’s first World Series since 1965.
“At the time my reaction was, ‘why is he doing this?’ I was pitching fine and you don’t pull someone out in the fourth inning just because you need a hit at the time,” John said last year. “I was not happy, but that was so long ago in retrospect could we have won? I think so. Does it matter now? No.”
In John’s two stints with the Yankees — he had four seasons with the Angels in between — he was 91-60 with a 3.59 ERA.
And it was with the Yankees that he made the record book, in a way no player would ever want. He committed three errors in an inning, all on the same play during a game July 27, 1988.
With the Yankees leading the Milwaukee Brewers 4-0 and Jim Gantner on first for the Brewers, John charged a slow roller by Jeffrey Leonard to the first-base side of the mound. First, he bobbled the ball. Then, he sailed it past first baseman Don Mattingly, bouncing it off the right-field ballboy. Dave Winfield made a nice play on the ball and fired a strong throw home. It was on line and probably would have nailed the hustling Gantner but John cut it off, then threw wildly past catcher Don Slaught and into the Brewers’ dugout as Gantner scored.
John’s summation, according to Newsday? “I must have had a metal cup on. It glitched the ions in the air.”
After his playing days, John did some broadcasting, some minor league managing and became a strong advocate for suicide prevention after one of his sons took his own life. And after seeing many young pitchers, some still in their teens, undergo the surgery named for him, he spoke out against arm overuse, recommending less than year-round pitching by young arms.
But regardless of the context, John is forever linked to the operation that continues to be performed by orthopedic surgeons such as Dr. Neal ElAttrache, who began learning how to perform the procedure when he was a fellow at the Kerlan-Jobe Orthopedic Clinic in 1990 from Jobe himself. The two would operate together twice a week throughout the 1990s and were close friends until Jobe’s death in 2014.
“It should have been called the Frank Jobe operation,” ElAttrache told The Times in 2023. “But with Frank being the man he was, it was all about the person he was treating. It wasn’t about him.”
By ElAttrache’s estimation, he has performed the operation between 50 and 75 times per year over his career — including the two he has done on Ohtani, one in 2018 and one in 2023. And although ElAttrache has put his own signatures on the surgery — including a second graft to further fortify Ohtani’s elbow — the operation has remained largely the same since Jobe first performed it in 1974.
John is survived by his wife, Cheryl, and his children, Tommy, Travis and Tamara. A private celebration of his life will be held in Florida.
Doc Rivers needed some time to write the speech that he’ll give when formally inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame on Saturday.
The storytelling, that part was easy. He’s a natural at that.
But what Rivers wound up learning during the trial-and-error process of speechwriting was that the words he’ll say from a stage in Springfield, Mass., aren’t going to be about him. They’re going to be about everyone else who played a role in him getting to that moment.
“You go through this journey of writing it and you realize it has nothing to do with you in a very good way,” Rivers said. “People are happy for you, and I am happy for them because they got me there. You hear all your life, ‘You don’t do anything alone.’ When you get in the Hall of Fame, you really understand that you don’t do anything alone. It’s all the coaches in your life, your parents, the players. It’s a thankful journey and that’s what the Hall of Fame should be about.”
Numbers prove he’s among best
A winner of 1,194 regular-season games as an NBA coach — and that’ll be all, he insists, saying his retirement is a real one — Rivers ranks sixth in league history. The only others ahead of him: Gregg Popovich, Don Nelson, Lenny Wilkens, Jerry Sloan and Pat Riley, all of whom are Hall of Famers, so it was obviously a lock that Rivers would be joining them.
He won a championship with Boston in 2008, won 114 playoff games as a coach, played 13 seasons, was an All-Star once, has been a broadcaster and — if he goes back to work, and his family currently has a pool that he will — he’ll be a broadcaster again.
But there’s more to life now. The Illinois native and Marquette legend has seven grandchildren, a house on the water and can’t play enough golf. He’ll still be involved in the game, somehow. It just won’t be as a coach. It’ll be as a Hall of Famer.
“Doc is a proven, extraordinary leader and communicator during his renowned NBA coaching career,” Milwaukee general manager Jon Horst said when the Bucks hired Rivers in 2024. “As a championship coach, he’s widely respected as an established innovator, and the right coach to lead our experienced and talented team.”
He was, until he wasn’t.
Injuries derailed every chance the Bucks had at being a winner last season, and when the season came to its dismal close Rivers was fairly certain it was the end for him as well — after 27 seasons on the sideline, and whole lot of missed moments along the way.
“The one thing that people have no idea about is the toll it takes on you and the family component,” Rivers said. “It is rough. You’re never home. You make sacrifices and your family has to make them as well.”
That won’t be an issue now.
A hit from the beginning
Rivers won coach of the year in his first season, taking a team he called “the 301s” in Orlando and leading it to a 41-41 record. On the surface, there’s nothing special about going .500. But the Magic were supposed to be bottom dwellers that season and Rivers used a preseason ranking of the league’s top 300 players as inspiration — since none of those top 300 were playing for the Magic.
“That season gave me great confidence,” Rivers said.
He has some regrets, of course. Critics have long pointed to the 10 losses that Rivers-coached teams had in Game 7s, by far the most of any coach in NBA history. And his fans will retort by pointing to his 114 playoff wins, fourth-most in NBA history. But the biggest do-over, if Rivers had such an option, would be changing his mind about leaving the Celtics for the Clippers in 2013.
Rivers got to the Clippers not long before the end of Donald Sterling’s ownership of the team; Sterling made racist comments and was banned by NBA commissioner Adam Silver.
“I underestimated what a great situation I was in, and I took that for granted, like you can just go anywhere and create that,” Rivers said. “I messed that one up. But then when I go to the Clippers, the team is pretty damn good. The organization, it was the worst organization in sports with the ownership problem. Within a week there, I remember telling my assistant, ‘We’ve got a lot to do here.’ ”
The championship with the Celtics in 2008 — Ray Allen, Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett, the stars of that team, will be together again to present their former coach for his Hall enshrinement — was an obvious high point for Rivers’ career. There were other moments he’s particularly proud of as well, such as delivering on a promise that he made to someone who barely played for him.
Tyronn Lue succeeded Rivers as coach of the Clippers. Lue played 11 games for Rivers in Orlando during the 2003-04 season; that was all the time it took for Rivers to be convinced that Lue would one day be a coach. He told Lue to call him if he ever wanted a job and Lue took him up on it. Rivers wound up going to the Hall of Fame, and few within the game would be surprised if Lue joins him there one day.
“It’s the stories like that that you think about,” Rivers said. “Rajon Rondo played for me in Boston. We had a very tumultuous relationship when I coached him and now, I probably talk to Rondo more than probably than any player that I coached.”
It’s what the game does, Rivers said. The lucky ones get guided along the way. He played that role with players like Rondo — who coached with Rivers — and Lue, and in Rivers’ own case, it was Riley who gave him the push he needed.
Riley and Rivers clashed at times during their player-coach relationship, and their biggest fights came when Riley was telling Rivers that he belonged in coaching.
Riley was right.
“When I was doing TV, he kept writing and sending me these freaking messages about getting into the fray,” Rivers said. “He knew it. And here I am, going into the Hall of Fame.”
From Maddie Lee: The second pitch Dodgers closer Edwin Díaz threw on Thursday night sailed above the strike zone, at about eye-height on Brewers hitter William Contreras. It was an early sign that Díaz was in for a brutal ninth inning.
By the end of his third blown save in four appearances, even Díaz wasn’t sure what his role would be going forward.
“Now I’ve just got to see what they want to do,” he said after the Dodgers’ 5-4 loss to the Brewers on Thursday. “I want to do the best thing for the team. At the end of the day, if they give me the ball in the ninth I will try to do my job. If they give me the ball in another inning, I will try to do my job. Got to get better, be consistent.”
Manager Dave Roberts, however, as he looked at the state of his bullpen as a whole, wasn’t ready to take the closer title from Díaz.
“Give me another option,” Roberts said. “…To be quite honest, none of those guys really are throwing the baseball great. So that’s just kind of the way it is.”
The series opener Thursday between the Dodgers and Brewers, two of the top teams in the National League, saw Dodgers starter Roki Sasaki battle command issues to salvage a two-run, six-inning start. It included a record-setting go-ahead home run from Max Muncy, No. 131 at Dodger Stadium, breaking a tie with Eric Karros for the most all-time.
Then Díaz, who has been working through an evolving set of issues since returning from the IL (arthroscopic elbow surgery) a couple weeks ago, took over with a two-run lead. And the game went sideways.
The Dodgers (73-49) fell to two games back of the Brewers (75-47) and half a game behind the Braves (73-48).
“A loss is a loss, but there’s certain losses that are more costly,” Roberts said. “And when you use five relievers and you lose a game, that’s costly.”
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Angels defeat the Rangers
Walbert Ureña gave up two hits in six innings, Mike Trout and Denzer Guzman led a 15-hit outburst with three singles and an RBI apiece, and the Angels beat the Texas Rangers 7-0 on Thursday night.
Josh Lowe added two hits and two RBIs, and Adam Frazier had two hits and an RBI for the Angels, who extended their win streak to three and had at least 10 hits in a game for the first time since July 8.
Ureña (8-8) struck out five and walked two while lowering his ERA to 2.67. The rookie right-hander has a 2.43 ERA in 18 games since May 1 and has given up no more than one run in 13 of those starts. José Fermin, Tayler Saucedo and Sammy Peralta each threw a scoreless inning to complete the five-hitter.
From Bill Shaikin: The Steinbrenner family has owned the New York Yankees for 53 years. Jerry Jones has owned the Dallas Cowboys for 37 years. The Buss family owned the Lakers for 46 years.
These trophy assets are few and far between. Walter had agreed to sell the Lakers after less than one year of ownership — and not through a comprehensive bidding process, but to an inquiring caller during the weekend?
“This has more red flags than a May Day parade,” an industry insider said, speaking on condition of anonymity so as not to jeopardize his professional relationships.
The deal, which valued the Lakers at $12.5 billion, was motivated by the spiraling price for an NBA expansion team in Las Vegas, according to ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne. After all, if Iger and Kushner might have to pay $10 billion for a startup team, why not call and see if Walter might accept a bit more for one of the marquee franchises in American sports?
“You don’t get the most opportunities at practice, so you’ve got to maximize the opportunities that you do get,” said Johnson, who had two touchdowns and a successful conversion run Thursday in a 27-7 victory over the Houston Texans in a preseason opener.
“Every game you kind of hit the reset button like, yeah, I did something this week, but the next game is a new week.”
Jim Harbaugh said the urgency is palpable, especially for players looking to secure one of the last few roster spots.
“That’s why you play like your football life is at stake,” the Chargers coach said. “Because it kind of is.”
Johnson had a seven-yard touchdown run in the first half, then turned a short reception into a 55-yard gain in the second. He was tackled a yard short of the end zone. He smiled when asked about that, knowing he likely was going to take a ribbing from teammates.
“I had to punch it in one more time,” he said. And he did punch it in, scoring from the one on the following play.
Sabrina Ionescu scored 20 points and the New York Liberty avoided one of the biggest collapses in WNBA history, holding off the Sparks 85-81 on Thursday night.
New York (21-14) led 69-41 early in the fourth quarter and looked poised to cruise to an easy victory when the Sparks scored 21 straight points to get within striking distance.
The Sparks (12-21) only trailed 82-79 with 26.6 seconds left and were in position to match the Chicago Sky for the biggest comeback in league history. The Sky rallied from 28-down to beat Las Vegas in 2022. Rae Burrell got the Sparks within one on a reverse layup with 22 seconds left. Ionescu hit two free throws with 14.8 remaining to restore the three-point advantage.
The Sparks also lost Cameron Brink earlier in the fourth quarter. She helped key the game-changing run, drawing an offensive foul on Breanna Stewart. Brink was down on the floor for a few minutes before being helped to the locker room with a towel over her head. She took a shot to the stomach area from Stewart to get the offensive foul called. A few minutes earlier Brink and Burrell banged heads.
Sparks coach Lynne Roberts said Brink was being evaluated by doctors after a “brutal hit to the ribs”, but didn’t have an update other than that.
1903 — Jim Jeffries knocks out Jim Corbett in the 10th round to retain his world heavyweight title in San Francisco.
1936 — In Berlin, the U.S. wins the first Olympic basketball gold medal with a 19-8 win over Canada. The game is played outdoors on a dirt court in a driving rain. Joe Fortenberry leads the U.S. with seven points. James Naismith, the inventor of the game, presents the medals.
1959 — The formation of the American Football League is announced in Chicago. Play will begin in 1960 with franchises in six cities with the probability of adding two more teams.
1977 — Lanny Wadkins beats Gene Littler on the third hole of sudden death to take the PGA Championship.
1977 — The Cosmos, led by Pele, play before a Meadowlands crowd of 77,961 in East Rutherford, N.J., the most to see a soccer game in the U.S. The Cosmos beat the Fort Lauderdale Strikers 8-3 in an NASL quarterfinal playoff game.
1994 — Nick Price wins the PGA Championship, finishing at 11-under 269 for 72 holes, six strokes ahead of Corey Pavin. It is the lowest stroke total in an American major championship.
2005 — The U.S. 4×400 relay team, anchored by Jeremy Wariner, races to a record 14th gold medal for the United States at the field world championships.
2011 — Keegan Bradley wins the PGA Championship after trailing by five shots with three holes and then defeating Jason Dufner in a three-hole playoff. Bradley becomes the third player in at least 100 years to win a major championship in his first try.
2016 — South Africa’s Wayde van Niekerk breaks Michael Johnson’s 17-year-old world record in the 400-meter final in Rio de Janeiro. Usain Bolt becomes the first to capture three straight 100-meter titles at the Olympics. He finishes in 9.81 — 0.08 seconds ahead of Justin Gatlin.
2019 — French woman Stephanie Frappart is the first woman to referee a major match in a European men’s tournament. UEFA Super Cup, Chelsea vs. Liverpool in Istanbul.
Compiled by the Associated Press
This day in baseball history
1919 — Chicago’s Happy Felsch tied the major-league record with four outfield assists in a game. The White Sox still lost to the Boston Red Sox 15-6.
1932 — Brooklyn’s John Quinn, 49, became the oldest pitcher to win a major league game. Quinn pitched the last two innings of a 2-1, 10-inning win over the New York Giants.
1933 — Jimmie Foxx of the Philadelphia Athletics hit for the cycle and drove in nine runs in an 11-5 win over the Cleveland Indians. The nine RBIs set an American League record for one game, breaking the 22-year-old mark set by Topsy Hartzell of the New York Highlanders.
1958 — Vic Power of the Cleveland Indians stole home twice, in the eighth and 10th innings, in a 10-9 win over Detroit. He had only three steals all year.
1960 — Bill White of the St. Louis Cardinals hit for the cycle in a 9-4 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates in the opening game of a doubleheader.
1971 — Bob Gibson of St. Louis pitched a no-hitter, blanking the Pittsburgh Pirates 11-0.
1987 — Oakland’s Mark McGwire set a major league rookie record with his 39th homer of the season to help the A’s to a 7-6, 12-inning victory over the Angels.
1998 — Baltimore’s Chris Hoiles became the ninth major leaguer and first catcher to hit two grand slams in one game.
2002 — Trevor Hoffman became the first reliever in major league history to have 30 or more saves in eight straight seasons in San Diego’s 6-2 win over the New York Mets.
2007 — Atlanta manager Bobby Cox was ejected after the fifth inning for arguing a called third strike in the Braves’ 5-4 victory over San Francisco. It was his 132nd ejection, breaking the mark set by Hall of Famer John McGraw.
2009 — Felix Pie became the fourth player in Orioles history to hit for the cycle, and Baltimore tied club records for extra-base hits and doubles in a 16-6 rout of the Angels.
2011 — Albert Pujols hit the longest home run at 6-year-old Busch Stadium in the St. Louis Cardinals’ 6-2 win over Colorado. Pujols’ two-run drive in the first inning was estimated at 465 feet.
2013 — Alfonso Soriano homered twice for the second straight night and drove in a career-high seven runs, giving him 13 RBIs in two games while powering the New York Yankees to an 11-3 victory over the Angels.
2015 — Matt Kemp hit a triple in the ninth for the first cycle in the history of the San Diego Padres, who beat the Colorado Rockies 9-5.
2018 — Atlanta’s Ronald Acuna Jr., 20, became the youngest major leaguer to homer in five straight games.
2021 — Arizona Diamondbacks Tyler Gilbert became the fourth pitcher and first in 68 years to throw a no-hitter in his initial big league start, leading Arizona over the San Diego Padres 7-0 with the record-tying eighth no-hitter of the season.
2024 — With a long ball off Chad Kuhl in the 8th inning, Aaron Judge reaches 300 home runs, doing so in fewer games (955) and at-bats (3,431) than anyone before him. The homer follows a rare intentional walk issued to Juan Soto and is part of an emphatic 10-2 win by the Yankees over the White Sox.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at houston.mitchell@latimes.com. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.
Bradley Beal is returning to the Clippers after missing most of last season because of a left hip injury.
The 33-year-old guard signed a new deal, the team said Thursday. No terms were announced. ESPN’s Shams Charania reported it’s two years for $13.2 million.
In his first season with the Clippers, Beal averaged 8.2 points, 1.7 assists and 20.2 minutes in six starts before sustaining the season-ending injury on Nov. 8.
The three-time All-Star has averaged 21.4 points, 4.3 assists and 4.0 rebounds during his 14-year NBA career, including stints with Washington and Phoenix.
Jaylen Brown and Giannis Antetokounmpo will play homecoming games a week apart in January.
The 2026-27 NBA schedule was released Thursday, setting the dates for the two former NBA Finals MVPs to return to face the teams that traded them this summer.
The schedules for opening night and Christmas already were unveiled this week, so those two games were among the most intriguing matchups not yet known. Brown, who was dealt from the Celtics to the rival Philadelphia 76ers in a stunning move, will play his first game back in Boston on Jan. 21.
Antetokounmpo was expected to be traded by Milwaukee this offseason — at one point speculation was that he might be swapped for Brown — and eventually was dealt to Miami. The Heat will travel to face the Bucks for the first time on Jan. 28.
Both of those games, which will be on Thursday nights, will stream on Prime Video.
Other details about the schedule:
From start to finish
The season will open Oct. 20 with a tripleheader, highlighted by LeBron James, Brown and the 76ers visiting the New York Knicks, who will receive their rings after winning the franchise’s first championship since 1973.
The regular season ends April 11. All-Star weekend is set for Feb. 19-21 in Phoenix.
Busy nights and nights off
Every team will play on Monday, Nov. 2, and there will then be no games the following night, which is election day in the U.S. The league is leaving that first Tuesday in November as an open day in hopes that fans and members of the NBA community will participate in the voting process.
No teams will play on Saturday, April 10, the second-to-last day of the regular season. Every team is then in action on the final day, with all the games matching Eastern Conference teams and the one interconference matchup scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. EDT. The games involving West teams are set for 8:30 p.m.
Where to watch the games
There will be 90 regular-season games televised nationally on ABC or NBC, up from 79 last season. Every team will be scheduled to appear on national TV at least twice.
Throughout the season, games will stream on Peacock on Monday nights, be shown on NBC and Peacock on Tuesdays, be televised by ESPN on Wednesdays, and stream on Prime Video on Fridays.
Saturday night primetime games on ABC begin Dec. 12 with the Knicks visiting the Heat, while NBC’s “Sunday Night Basketball” returns Jan. 24 with Oklahoma City visiting Golden State.
Prime Video will begin streaming Thursday night doubleheaders in January and some Saturday afternoon games starting Feb. 6 with Portland at Memphis, when Ja Morant returns to face the Grizzlies for the first time.
A lot of TV time
The NBA champion Knicks have the most appearances on ABC with six, while the Lakers, 76ers, San Antonio Spurs and Minnesota Timberwolves all are featured on ESPN eight times.
The Knicks, Spurs, 76ers, Thunder, Warriors, Lakers, Denver Nuggets and Houston Rockets all get the maximum 11 appearances on NBC.
Back-to-backs and schedule breaks
Teams will average 14.2 sets of back-to-back games, the lowest total since the NBA Cup was added to the schedule, and no team will have more than 16. No team will play eight games in 12 nights, or 18 in 30.
There are 59 back-to-back games involving at least 750 miles of travel, down from 74 last season.
No team will be scheduled to play the night before games in the NBA Cup, or if they are in nationally televised games on Christmas Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Presidents Day, Sunday nights on NBC or Saturday nights on ABC.
Milestone moments
If Kevin Durant averages 26 points, as he did in his first season in Houston, he could move past Kobe Bryant into fourth place on the career scoring list sometime around Jan. 16, when the Rockets would be at the midpoint of their schedule.
Indiana’s Rick Carlisle is set to become the eighth man to coach 2,000 NBA games on March 8.
The Lakers are being sold … by the Dodgers owner who was supposed to save them?
The Lakers are being sold … to one guy who owns an underachieving women’s professional soccer team and another guy who owns a piece of the hated San Francisco Giants?
Los Angeles sports fans awoke Wednesday to the news that one of their two crown jewels was being sold for the second time in a year, a transaction valued at $12.5 billion and accompanied by at least that many worries.
This doesn’t feel good. This doesn’t feel right. Something stinks here, and it might just be the future of a franchise that once seemed in such good hands.
On Wednesday it was stunningly and ingloriously fumbled, and for what?
There are two main unknowns here, and both should send shivers through a Laker fan base that could be watching their team become the Portland Trail Blazers.
First, why did Mark Walter sell just 10 months after buying? Yes, he made a $2.5 billion profit, but 10 months? Who owns a major sports franchise for just 10 months?
Second, what sort of owners will Bob Iger and Josh Kushner be? Iger is known for running Disney, and Kushner is known for running with President Trump’s son-in-law, who happens to be Kushner’s brother, Jared.
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Dodgers sweep the Royals
From Maddie Lee: Dodgers left-hander Eric Lauer adjusted his cap and glanced into the stands as he walked off the field to a standing ovation.
In the Dodgers’ 4-2 win against the Kansas City Royals, completing a sweep at Dodger Stadium, Lauer held the Royals to two runs (one earned) in 6 ⅓ innings.
“It was really nice,” Lauer said, noting how much more enjoyable it was to pitch well at Dodger Stadium for the home team, instead of the opposition. “It always makes you feel good walking off the mound and having people appreciate what you did out there.”
The Dodgers (73-48) got home runs from Mookie Betts, Shohei Ohtani and Hunter Feduccia.
The Dodgers, with a short bullpen after playing extra innings twice in four games, needed Lauer to pitch deep into the game.
That plan seemed to be in jeopardy as he labored through the first three innings, his pitch count climbing to 64. But the next three, he only gave up just one walk.
“Wasn’t getting a ton of swing out of zone,” Lauer said. “So mentally I just had to lock in a little bit more in-zone, make sure I was throwing quality pitches in zone, and not try to be so fine. Give myself more plate to work with and try to get some quick soft contact.”
From Maddie Lee: Dodgers first baseman Freddie Freeman tracked Royals hitter Isaac Collins’ fly ball through foul territory to just outside the visiting dugout at Dodger Stadium.
He had a plan. With one out in the top of the eighth inning, Freeman was going to lean over the rail to make the catch.
He shuffled, shifted his weight, and the ground disappeared out from under him.
“Obviously there was no rail,” a sore but apparently not seriously injured Freeman said after the Dodgers’ 4-2 win against the Royals.
Mike Trout had three hits and two RBIs, Jose Siri keyed a three-run sixth inning with a pinch-hit RBI double, and George Klassen earned his first major league win in the Angels’ 5-2 comeback victory over the Texas Rangers on Wednesday night.
Klassen (1-1) gave up two runs and five hits over six innings, striking out five and walking one in his fourth career start. Angels reliever Blake Weiman threw a scoreless seventh before giving up two hits and striking out one in the eighth.
Ryan Watson replaced Weiman and escaped the two-on, one-out jam. Ben Joyce, who missed most of the past two seasons because of shoulder injuries, retired the side in order in the ninth for his fifth career save and first since Sept. 1, 2024.
From Sam Farmer: His NFL playing career is over, but Derek Carr is far from done with football.
UCLA announced this week that it has hired Carr as a special advisor to football coach Bob Chesney, and that the four-time Pro Bowl quarterback will assist with the Bruins’ offensive staff in game-planning strategy.
“Coach Chesney is a leader of men,” said Carr, who was at Dodger Stadium on Monday evening and was on the field before the game. “So many guys get hired just based on scheme. This is a guy who stands up in front of the room and leads.”
“You can feel his presence,” Carr said of Chesney, hired in December after his rise to coaching prominence at Holy Cross then James Madison. “You can feel the team respond to him. … It wasn’t so much what he said, it was how he said it. He was so demanding of the team, yet so encouraging.
“He can demand, demand, demand, but also love them at the same time, to the point where they’re like, `OK, coach, whatever you want.’”
1919 — Upset scores a win against Man o’ War in the Sanford Memorial Stakes at Saratoga. The defeat is Big Red’s only loss in 21 starts.
1933 — Gene Sarazen wins the PGA Championship by defeating Willie Goggin 5 and 4 in the final round.
1935 — The first roller derby begins in Chicago by promoter Leo Seltzer.
1987 — Jackie Joyner-Kersee equals the world record in the women’s long jump — 24 feet, 5½ inches — in the Pan American Games at Indianapolis. She matches the mark set in 1986 by Heike Dreschler of East Germany.
1995 — Cuba’s Ana Quirot, severely burned in a 1993 kitchen accident, wins the 800 meters at the world championships at Gothenburg, Sweden.
1995 — Steve Elkington shoots a final-round 64 and birdies the first playoff hole to beat Colin Montgomerie and win the PGA Championship. The 64 is the lowest final round by a PGA Championship winner.
1997 — Wilson Kipketer topples Sebastian Coe’s 16-year-old record in the 800 meters, finishing in 1 minute, 41.24 seconds in Zurich, Switzerland. Haile Gebrselassie also shatters his own 5,000 record with a time of 12 minutes, 41.86 seconds.
2002 — Natalie Coughlin breaks the 100-meter backstroke world record, timed in 59.58 seconds at the U.S. national championships. She is the first American to hold the world record since Catherine Ferguson in 1966.
2008 — Michael Phelps swims into history as the winningest Olympic athlete with his 10th and 11th career gold medals and five world records in five events at the Beijing Games. He wins the 200-meter butterfly and swims leadoff for the U.S. 800 freestyle relay team.
2016 — The U.S. women’s 4×100-meter medley relay team of Kathleen Baker, Lilly King, Dana Vollmer and Simone Manuel — winners at the Rio Games — delivers the nation’s 1,000th gold medal in Summer Olympics history. Michael Phelps closes the Rio Olympics with a gold medal in the butterfly leg of the 4×100 medley relay. Phelps finishes his career with 28 medals, having won five golds and a silver at these games.
Compiled by the Associated Press
This day in baseball history
1910 — The Brooklyn Dodgers and the Pittsburgh Pirates played to an 8-8 tie. Each team had 38 at-bats, 13 hits, 12 assists, two errors, five strikeouts, three walks, one hit batsman and one passed ball.
1921 — George Sisler of the St. Louis Browns became the first batter in American League history to hit for the cycle twice. Sisler went 5-for-5 and drove in three runs in a 7-5, 10-inning win over the Detroit Tigers.
1921 — John “Mule” Watson of the Boston Braves pitched two complete-game victories over the Philadelphia Phillies.
1931 — Tony Cuccinello of the Cincinnati Reds had six hits in six at-bats in the first game of a doubleheader at Boston. Cuccinello had a triple, two doubles and three singles to knock in five runs as the Reds won 17-3. Cuccinello hit a three-run homer in the eighth of the nightcap to give the Reds a 4-2 win.
1939 — The New York Yankees beat the Philadelphia Athletics 21-0 to equal the major-league record for lopsided shutouts. Every batter in the Yankees lineup hit safely. Joe DiMaggio and Babe Dahlgren had two home runs apiece, each hitting an inside-the-parker. Pitcher Red Ruffing had four hits and drove in three runs.
1948 — Satchel Paige, 42, pitched his first major league complete game against the Chicago White Sox. Paige gave up five hits en route to 5-0 Cleveland victory.
1957 — Milwaukee pitcher Lew Burdette hit his first two home runs to lead the Braves to a 12-4 win over the Cincinnati Reds.
1969 — Jim Palmer of the Orioles, plagued by arm trouble the year before, threw an 8-0 no-hitter against the Oakland A’s in Baltimore.
1979 — St. Louis’ Lou Brock reached 3,000 hits with an infield hit off Chicago Cubs pitcher Dennis Lamp. St. Louis won 3-2.
2004 — Kansas City rookies Abraham Nunez and John Buck hit grand slams to lead the Royals past the Oakland Athletics 10-3.
2005 — New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera blew his first save since April 6 in a 7-5 win over Texas. Rivera had converted a career-best 31 consecutive saves before allowing Kevin Mench’s two-run tying single in the ninth.
2013 — Paul Goldschmidt hit the first pitch of the 11th inning for a game-ending home run after leading off the ninth with a tying homer, to help Arizona beat Baltimore 4-3 with a winning blast for the second straight night.
2015 — The Toronto Blue Jays won their 11th straight game, beating the Oakland Athletics 4-2. The AL East leaders also won 11 in a row in June, becoming the first team with winning streaks of at least 11 since Cleveland in 1954.
2016 — Tyler Austin and Aaron Judge became the first teammates to hit home runs in the first at-bats of their major league debuts in the same game, sparking the New York Yankees to an 8-4 win over Tampa Bay.
2018 — Ronald Acuna Jr. hit leadoff homers in both games of a doubleheader for the Atlanta Braves.
2020 — Mookie Betts hits three home runs (the 6th of his career) in an 11-2 win over the Padres. the three home run game ties Betts with Johnny Mize and Sammy Sosa for the most all-time although Betts reached the total in 813 games while Mize needed 1,884 and Sosa 2,364.
Compiled by the Associated Press
Until next time…
That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at houston.mitchell@latimes.com. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.
