The Buss family is entering into an agreement to sell majority ownership of the Los Angeles Lakers to Mark Walter for a franchise valuation of approximately $10 billion, sources told ESPN.
It will mark the largest sale of a U.S. professional sports team all-time.
The Buss family will keep a minority share of the team, just over 15%, for a period of time, a source told ESPN.
Also, Jeanie Buss will continue to serve in her role as Lakers governor, according to sources.
Walter, the CEO and chairman of diversified holding company TWG Global, has interests in multiple professional sports organizations, including the Los Angeles Dodgers, Los Angeles Sparks, the Billie Jean Cup, Cadillac Formula 1 team and the Professional Women’s Hockey League.
The Lakers have been owned by the Buss family since 1979, when Jerry Buss purchased the franchise from Jack Kent Cooke in a $67.5 million transaction that also included the Los Angeles Kings and the Los Angeles Forum. Since 1980, the Lakers have won 11 championships, the most by any NBA team during that span.
The Lakers passed to Buss’ children when he died in 2013, and his daughter Jeanie has served as the Lakers’ governor since.
Walter has been a stakeholder in the Lakers since 2021, when he also received a right of first refusal on the majority share of the team.
The impending sale was preceded by two of Jeanie Buss’ closest confidants in the NBA governors community agreeing to sales for their teams in the past two years: Mark Cuban sold a majority stake in the Dallas Mavericks for $3.5 billion, while Wyc Grousbeck sold the Boston Celtics for $6.1 billion
ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne and Dave McMenamin and ESPN Research contributed to this report.