As part-owner of the L.A. Dodgers, Magic Johnson lights up at the mention of the team signing Freddie Freeman to a six-year, $162 million deal. “We always look to win. We care about our fans, & Dodger Stadium is going to be rocking all season long.”
One of the most influential players in the history of professional basketball is ready to walk — make that dribble — down memory lane. On a recent afternoon in Los Angeles,, sometimes on the verge of tears, reminisces about his last conversation with his mentor, L.A. Lakers owner Jerry Buss, in a hospital room hours before his 2013 death. He recalls telling the world that he was HIV positive at a press conference in 1991, and stepping away from his towering career as a Laker.
Moments from Johnson’s glory days are interspersed throughout “They Call Me Magic.” Some of the archival material — such as the coin flip that gave the Lakers the first pick in the 1979 NBA draft ; they chose a 19-year-old college student from Lansing, Mich., named Earvin “Magic” Johnson — he’d never seen before. And he never would have had he not agreed to be interviewed for Michael Jordan’s docuseries “The Last Dance.
“Bear in mind, we did not represent athletes,” says Michael Ovitz, who co-founded CAA and signed Johnson in 1988. “Taking on Earvin was unique to us. To put this in perspective for you, Magic Johnson was probably the single most popular being in Los Angeles.” They devised a strategy for Johnson that went beyond endorsements. “The goal was to get him equity in businesses.” Some of Johnson’s early ventures included buying a controlling interest in PepsiCo.’s Washington, D.C.
“They only had two people in a 30-bed hospice. All these people out here on the streets trying to get beds. Trying to get care. They were sending them through so much. I quit. That day, I quit.” He never spoke to Bush again. “That’s when I started doing my own thing, and hooked up with all these grassroots organizations doing great work.”It’s not hyperbole to say that Johnson’s HIV diagnosis changed the world.
Johnson set out on a roadshow, and he estimates that he visited 300 high schools, colleges and churches to discuss what it was like to live with HIV and how infection could be prevented. Most important, he says, was to reduce the number of cases in “urban America,” the Black and Latino populations that were disproportionately affected by the epidemic. His primary strategy was to reach them through their pastors.
“The Magic Hour” may be best remembered for an interview that wouldn’t fly today. As Johnson launched his program, one of his most vocal haters was Howard Stern, who would trash him daily on his massively popular radio show. So the producers of “The Magic Hour” came up with the bright idea to book Stern for an appearance.
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