Lakers brass officially breaks silence on franchise’s historic sale

For the second consecutive preseason media availability, Rob Pelinka was limited with what he could say about a pending Lakers’ ownership change.

Last year, it was the $10 billion sale of the Lakers from the Buss family to Dodgers controlling owner Mark Walter. 

This summer, it was the historic $12.5 billion sale from Walter to businessman Josh Kushner and ex-Disney executive Bob Iger.

With the sale not official yet, the Lakers president of basketball operations and general manager didn’t say too much about the sale, citing league rules.

But he’s been encouraged by the initial impressions of Kushner and Iger. 

“We have had introductory meetings with Bob and Josh, and those have been excellent,” Pelinka said Thursday during his preseason media availability alongside coach JJ Redick. “With a pending transaction, we’re not at liberty to talk more about that under league rules. But we’ve had preliminary discussions with them that have been really, really positive.” 

Even with the sale pending, and the Buss family drama surrounding their potential sale still looming, Pelinka noted nothing has tangibly changed in terms of the franchise’s day-to-day operations. 

“We’re operating with Lakers excellence,” Pelinka said. “We’re continuing to build out a world-class front office. Proud of the people we’ve added, incredibly proud of the energy we’ve had upstairs. We’re super excited about the people upstairs, the coaching staff, the support staff, the roster. Nothing’s changed day-to-day.”

Among the people the Lakers added to their front office were two assistant general managers: Eric Amsler (player personnel) and Rohan Ramadas (cap, analytics and data).

The additions of Amsler and Ramadas were among the 15-plus front office hires the Lakers made over the last few months, Pelinka added. 

“Super appreciative of the support from Jeanie [Buss] and ownership to build out,” Pelinka said. “Really built out our strategy and analytics department, have hired two assistant general managers. Have more to do, and we’re actually continuing to do that. And then in terms of player services, as JJ said, we’ve really rebuilt our player experience and player development arm. With that comes new equipment, new recovery and modalities. We’ve worked with our training department to do that.”

When asked what other additions the Lakers were looking to make, Pelinka mentioned wanting to make more hires to support Amsler’s side of the front office.

Amsler will focus on the “player draft and evaluation processes,” which will include pro scouting, draft scouting and player development. 

He spent 22 years in the Heat organization, most recently serving as the vice president of player personnel before the Lakers hired him.

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“You guys saw we hired Eric Amsler, who was with two decades with the Heat to kind of see over our player personnel, our draft scouting, our G League scouting and NBA scouting – we’re gonna be adding more scouts in those departments,” Pelinka said. “That’s just one example of a sort of a vertical that we’ll continue to build. And there are others, too. But it’s been a really robust last two months. The players are already seeing the differences. And we’ll continue, like I said, to set the gold standard with the people we have upstairs.”

It’s clear there’s a lot more to come when it comes to building out the Lakers’ infrastructure.

What isn’t clear amidst the ownership change is how involved the Dodgers will be in those changes to come. 

Dodgers executives Andrew Friedman and Farhan Zaidi took on special advisory roles with the Lakers last fall following Walter’s purchase of the franchise.

Their influence included being involved in the assistant general manager hiring process.

But with Walter’s ownership tenure coming to an end soon, it isn’t clear what roles Friedman and Zaidi will have with the Lakers future.

“We can’t really talk in this interim period,” Pelinka said. “There’s just a transaction that’s going on. I will say this, I’m super grateful for the opportunity to learn from incredible leaders like Andrew Friedman. And the reps and time and conversations we’ve had have been enriching for me. He does an incredible job. Good luck to the Dodgers in three-peating. So, we’ll see.”