Magic Johnson: Sports Needs More Black Team Owners

As the NBA restart gets underway, players are displaying racial justice messages on their jerseys and playing on a court that features the phrase “Black Lives Matter” — but they’re playing for team owners who are nearly all white.

The lack of diversity among owners needs to change, Hall of Fame player Magic Johnson told Yahoo Finance in a recent interview.

Johnson, a former Los Angeles Lakers star and part-owner of three sports franchises, said professional sports should have “more Black owners,” adding that increased diversity needs to start with current owners helping former players move up the industry’s leadership ranks.

“We play on the field, we play in the arenas, but we haven't been able to go up to the ownership box,” Johnson says. “So I'm hoping that that changes.”

“It has to change with the other owners first,” he adds. “If they say, ‘hey, it's a good idea to have Black ownership,’ that would definitely happen.”

“So the change has to be with them first, and then it would trickle down to us as Black athletes that could move from the field to the ownership box,” Johnson, who recently announced a partnership with CBD company Uncle Bud’s Hemp & CBD, said in an interview with Yahoo Finance Editor-in-Chief Andy Serwer.

Read the rest of this Yahoo story here: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/magic-johnson-more-black-owners-sports-re...