Report: Lakers Ownership Issues Are Slowing the Basketball Operations Rebuild

Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers · Sep 1, 2026 · 38m

It'll be a while before we know if the new ownership group led by Josh Kushner and Bob Iger will be a net positive or a net negative for the Lakers. We don't know how they'll spend money, or what they'll prioritize.

But what we did know was that ownership upheaval had a chance to completely undermine a buildout of the basketball operations department that was already going a lot slower than Lakers fans had hoped for when the Buss family sold to Mark Walter a year and a half ago. Dan Woike at The Athletic made it clear in a report on Monday that the Lakers, who have already been turned down…