Magic Johnson attends the Elizabeth Taylor Ball to End AIDS on Thursday, Sept. 21, 2023, at The Beverly Hills Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP)
Magic Johnson’s love for his Los Angeles Lakers has kept him from considering ownership of any other NBA team.
The New York Knicks would be the one franchise that could make him have second thoughts.
“I think it would be intriguing,” Johnson said Tuesday. “The only team I would actually probably think about is the New York Knicks.”
Johnson arrived in New York for a speaking engagement at a YMCA from Washington, where the member of the Commanders’ new ownership group watched his NFL team lose to the Buffalo Bills on Sunday.
Once back in Los Angeles, he will gear up for his Dodgers to begin play in baseball’s postseason. But the basketball Hall of Famer repeatedly has passed on opportunities for ownership in the sport he knows best.
Johnson named the Golden State Warriors, Detroit Pistons and Atlanta Hawks as teams he turned down, rather than find himself in competition with the Lakers. The Knicks, though, offer something different.
“I think because of the way fans love basketball you might have to think about that one, because I love coming to New York and going to the Garden and watching the Knicks play,” Johnson said in an interview with The Associated Press. “I love being with fans who are so passionate about their team and the Knick fans are, and they’re smart. They’re smart basketball fans and so that one I would have to think about. I think that other than that, I would probably never think about ever being a part of another franchise.”
Johnson said he hasn’t spoken with Madison Square Garden Executive Chairman James Dolan about the idea and isn’t looking for an opportunity, content to watch the Lakers as a fan after serving as their president of basketball operations for two seasons before resigning in 2019.
But if the conversation did…
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