The executives that Mark Walter and his Guggenheim Baseball Management trusted to turn around the Dodgers and make them World Series winners, Farhan Zaidi and Andrew Friedman, now have been enlisted to take on advisory roles with the Lakers, people not authorized to speak publicly confirmed to The Times on Friday.
Walter, the controlling owner of the Dodgers, purchased majority ownership of the Lakers for a $10-billion evaluation and has started the transition from the Buss family ownership by having Zaidi and Friedman become more involved. Friedman is the Dodgers’ president of baseball operations and has overseen a team that won three World Series titles in the last six years. Zaidi was the Dodgers’ general manager under Friedman from 2014 to 2018 before becoming president of baseball operations with the San Francisco Giants. He returned this year as an advisor with Guggenheim and also has been consulting with the Sparks, another team Walter now owns.
Both executives are known in the baseball world for relying on analytics. The Lakers have been known to have a weak analytics department, so Zaidi and Friedman will play a role in improving that. Friedman already has been talking with Rob Pelinka, the Lakers’ president of basketball operations, according to people with knowledge of the situation.
The Lakers began making changes in their front office Thursday when they fired Joey and Jesse Buss as well as some scouts. Joey Buss was an alternate governor and vice president of research and development, while Jesse was the assistant general manager and head of the scouting department.
Fresh off winning a World Series with the Dodgers, Walter, who had been a minority owner of the Lakers since he bought 27% of the franchise with Todd Boehly in 2021, promptly sat courtside for the next Lakers home game on Nov. 2. He looked on when the Lakers honored the Dodgers at a home game on Nov. 5.
Walter was part of the group that purchased the Dodgers for $2 billion in 2012. Since then the team has won three World Series titles in five appearances with 13 consecutive playoff berths.