It began with an innocent and rather hopeless DM via Twitter.



“Jeanie, any chance you’d talk to my Chapman journalism class?”



I sent it to Jeanie Buss roughly 2 1/2 years ago, when I was an adjunct professor at the Orange, Calif.-based university, charged with teaching 13 aspiring journalists the art of an arguably artless art. I knew the Los Angeles Lakers CEO and co-owner a little bit, in that a half decade earlier we’d shared a lovely two-hour lunch while I was researching my book, “Showtime.” But were we friends? No. Buddies? No. Confidants? No. Amig—



“Sure. When do you want me to come?”



Um, really?



“Of course. What day of the week is your class?”



Wednesday evenings.



“I’m there.”



And that’s how, less than a month later, the owner of a franchise worth an estimated $2.6 billion drove 32 miles through the inevitably...