In The Courts and on The Court: What's Going on With The Lakers?

In court documents reported over the weekend by LA Times Nathan Fenno, Lakers president Jeanie Buss stated that her brother, Jim Buss, was "completely unfit" to run the team and that she feared her brothers would not allow Earvin "Magic" Johnson to do his job, which is to effectively replace Jim Buss as head of the basketball side of the Lakers' organization.

Suffice it to say, Jeanie Buss firing Jim Buss has been about as ugly a saga as one would expect from two siblings going through a professional divorce in public.

Jim Buss gets a bit of a raw deal considering the Lakers did win a couple titles under his watch, and his biggest crime seemingly was that he continued to put his faith in former Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak.

With Kupchak, the Lakers did a great deal in terms of laying the foundation for a team that can compete in the future by drafting well and not pulling the trigger on a trade that would jeopardize the growing stockpile of talent. Rather than rushing to improve in a hurry, the Lakers have protected their assets. Also, hiring what appears to be the right coach, finally, to make sense of the rubble left over from three torrid seasons was a positive move by nearly all accounts.

Saying Jim Buss is "unfit" to run the basketball organization is a bit of a stretch, though that doesn't mean both Jim Buss and Kupchak did not deserved to lose their jobs in recent years.

They absolutely did.

The Lakers sank to their three worst seasons since the team moved from Minnesota in three successive seasons, and that happened on Jim Buss' watch, with Kupchak pulling the strings and even netting a contract extension. While Julius Randle, D'Angelo Russell and Brandon Ingram arrived in exchange for those three painfully forgettable seasons, the fact that the Lakers fell to those depths should have probably cost both men their jobs earlier.

Now, the Lakers appear to be in contention for a fourth straight NBA lottery, suggesting that Jeanie Buss made the correct decision to sack the front office and start fresh.

Also, signing Luol Deng and Timofey Mozgov to four-year contracts is unforgivable. For three more years, the Lakers are saddled with two big contracts that look much worse after the arrival of the new Collective Bargaining Agreement. Everything considered, those two hefty, unmovable contracts deserved to get both Kupchak and Jim Buss canned.

In truth, Jeanie Buss probably said it best on the day she fired her brother and hired Johnson to run the basketball side of the business. With Johnson sitting next to her at the Spectrum Sportsnet studios, the President of the Lakers told television cameras, "This was a very difficult decision. It was probably so hard for me to make that I probably waited too long. And for that, I apologize to Lakers fans."

Jim Buss was gone, and Jeanie Buss had taken full control.

All the Buss family drama seemed sorted and all was Kosher until Friday's reports of an attempt to remove Jeanie Buss as head of the Lakers, seemingly orchestrated by her brothers Jim and Johnny. Quickly, lawyers got involved, and seemingly, Jeanie won the battle as the two siblings retreated and swore they meant no harm.

Jeanie Buss' lawyer suggested that the war had only begun after Jim Buss and Johnny Buss had seemingly intended to remove Jeanie from the board of directors, which would also disqualify her from being the controlling owner of the Lakers.

If there is a conflict and a fight, one imagines that Jeanie Buss' lawyers pushing for and setting a trial date means she's confident that she'll emerge victorious.

For now, Johnson is calling the shots, and both the previous and current administrations agree that Luke Walton is the right man to coach the team.

On the courts most regularly associated with the Lakers, the purple and gold lost their seventh straight game on Sunday night at Staples Center. Since Johnson took over, the Lakers have lost all five games. On a related note, the Lakers traded away their best player and top scorer of the season for a draft pick and Corey Brewer at the trade deadline, and so, the decline in wins is expected.

If the Lakers are in such a hurry to fall to the bottom, do they still even need to taste wins?

"Absolutely," Walton said in the wake of his team's 105-97 defeat to the New Orleans Pelicans. "The work that these guys are putting in, and we are working them. We're working them like it's early in the season right now because we know how important this time is and this opportunity is in building the right momentum into the off season."

Walton added, "I don't know if I'll say we 'need' it. I might need it, but I put that aside for what's going on. It would be really nice to have that feeling of winning after some of these games just to reinforce what we're working for because we're going to continue to push it every day."

The Lakers only have 19 games remaining in the season, and LA is currently two full games clear of the Phoenix Suns at the bottom of the Western Conference. At this point, every loss is a welcomed sight for fans in the streets and the front office crossing its fingers and toes in the hopes to land a top-three draft pick in the lottery.

If the Lakers don't land in the top three, their pick goes to Philadelphia as part of the Steve Nash trade that continues to torment the franchise.

While the Lakers will never admit to tanking and players play to win and coaches coach to win, the moment Johnson pulled the trigger to give up the team's leading scorer for a future late first round draft pick, the team entered full development mode, i.e. "Tanking."

Since it needs to be stated more clearly, the Lakers are tanking. Mozgov and Deng, who are their two highest paid players, are no longer starters. Both rarely expect to play for the remainder of the season.

Prior to trading Lou Williams, the Lakers won at a rate of approximately one win per three games. Without Williams, the Lakers have lost five in a row, and the purple and gold would be fortunate to win even once every six games.

With only 19 games remaining on the schedule, one win per six games for the remainder of the season would add up to three wins and a 22-60 record. To put that win total in context, the Lakers under Byron Scott in 2014-15, when Nash retired mid-season and Kobe Bryant only played 35 games, won 21 games and finished as the first 60-loss team in franchise history.

Only finishing one win better than the team that started Carlos Boozer and Ronnie Price for a large chunk of the season would not be worth boasting about.

And so, the Lakers may not exactly be sitting at rock bottom anymore, but they're still closer to the bottom than they are to the mountain top.