The Los Angeles Lakers front office underwent a big makeover this past season, as owner Jeanie Buss decided to part ways with her own brother Jim and general manager Mitch Kupchak, replacing them with Lakers legend Magic Johnson and Kobe Bryant’s former agent Rob Pelinka.
Johnson has a lot of pressure on him to turn around the great franchise he loves so much, and to begin doing that he drafted UCLA point guard Lonzo Ball with the second overall pick in the recent NBA draft.
Many people believe that Ball’s style of play resembled Johnson’s, so it seems to be a match made in heaven.
In a recent interview with TMZ, former Laker great James Worthy, a teammate and good friend of Johnson’s, even went as far to say that the franchise has not seen a talent like Ball since Johnson was leading the Showtime Lakers to five championships in the 1980s:
“He enhances everybody on the court. We haven’t had someone with that type of talent really since Magic.”
Worthy was not taking a shot at Kobe Bryant or any of the other great Lakers of the past couple decades, he was just simply stating that the Lakers have not had a true pass-first point guard that elevates the game of everybody around him since Johnson.
Ball’s skill set was on display at the Las Vegas Summer League, as he took home MVP honors after recording the only two triple-doubles in the history of the league, and led the Lakers to their first ever summer league championship, although he missed the championship game with a calf injury.
Despite not yet playing a single NBA game, it’s evident that expectations for Ball are already sky high as he is pegged as the point guard to turn around the historic franchise that has struggled in the recent years. If there’s anyone that seems to be up for that challenge it’s the quiet but confident Ball though.