Magic Johnson

Earvin Johnson Sr. never missed a day on the General Motors line and worked a used-car lot and a trash route besides. Christine Johnson was a school janitor. Earvin Jr. rode the garbage route with his father and got called Garbage Man for it. He wanted Sexton High, five blocks away and mostly Black. He was bused to Everett instead, where rocks had been thrown at the buses carrying his sister and brother and his brother had been put off the team. His new teammates would not pass him the ball, and he nearly fought one before the coach stepped in. At 15 he put up 36 points, 18 rebounds and 16 assists in a game, and a Lansing State Journal writer named Fred Stabley Jr. called him Magic.

He chose Michigan State because the coach promised him the point. In March 1979 the Spartans beat Larry Bird's Indiana State 75-64 for the title. The Lakers took him first. In Game 6 of the 1980 Finals he was 20 and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was out with a sprained ankle, so Johnson started at center: 42 points, 15 rebounds, seven assists, three steals, the only Finals MVP a rookie has won. Five championships, three league MVPs, three Finals MVPs, and 11.2 assists a game for a career, still the highest average on record. Showtime meant no-look passes and alley-oops from half court. In 1981 he signed for 25 years and 25 million dollars, the largest in sports at the time. When he complained about Paul Westhead and Jerry Buss fired the coach, arenas booed him for a season, Los Angeles included.

A preseason physical came back positive, and on November 7, 1991 he retired at 32, saying his wife Cookie and their unborn child had tested negative and that he meant to fight the disease. He said heterosexuals needed to know they were at risk, and later said plainly it came from the number of women he had slept with. Fans voted him onto the 1992 All-Star team anyway, and Karl Malone and others argued publicly that an open wound could infect them. He won the game's MVP, and both benches ran out after his last three-pointer. He tried a comeback that autumn and quit again over the same objections, saying he did not want to hurt the game. He joined the National Commission on AIDS in 1992 and quit after eight months, saying the White House had utterly ignored it.

He has taken a daily antiretroviral combination ever since, and researchers credit the announcement with a measurable jump in AIDS diagnoses among heterosexual men, which for some meant treatment they would not have sought. Then the businesses — theaters and Starbucks franchises in neighborhoods that had neither, a Sodexo food-service venture, a controlling stake in EquiTrust. He bought into the Dodgers in 2012, the Sparks in 2014, Los Angeles FC in 2018, the Commanders for 240 million dollars in 2023 and the Spirit in 2024. Forbes called him a billionaire in 2023 and put him at 1.6 billion in 2026. Joe Biden gave him the Presidential Medal of Freedom on January 4, 2025, and he led the Rose Parade in 2026.

Magic Johnson's life against the full span of the corpus — the fading end marks a life still in progress.

• Magic Johnson Foundation company
  Created weeks after the diagnosis, later broadened past HIV work 1991
• My Life book
  His autobiography, including the account of being bused to Everett 1992
• Urban Coffee Opportunities company
  The Starbucks partnership that opened stores in Harlem, Detroit and Crenshaw 1998
• SodexoMAGIC company
  A contract food-service venture with Sodexo USA 2006
• Guggenheim Baseball Management company
  The group that bought the Los Angeles Dodgers for 2 billion dollars 2012
• EquiTrust Life Insurance Company company
  A controlling interest in an annuities and life insurer 2015

• 1977 aged ~18 Wins the Michigan state championship at Everett High School He dedicated it to his friend Reggie Chastine, killed in a car crash the summer before.
• March 26, 1979 aged 19 Michigan State beats Larry Bird's Indiana State 75-64 for the NCAA title
• 1979 aged ~20 Taken first overall in the NBA draft by the Los Angeles Lakers
• May 16, 1980 aged 20 Plays center in Game 6 of the Finals at 20 and scores 42 Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was hurt. Johnson is the only rookie ever named Finals MVP.
• 1981 aged ~22 Signs a 25-year contract worth 25 million dollars The largest contract in sports at the time.
• November 7, 1991 aged 32 Announces he is HIV-positive and retires the same day
• 1992 aged ~33 Wins Olympic gold in Barcelona with the Dream Team He had already taken the All-Star Game MVP over other players' public objections.
• March 2012 aged 52 His group wins the bidding for the Los Angeles Dodgers The price was 2 billion dollars.
• January 4, 2025 aged 65 Receives the Presidential Medal of Freedom

• Larry Bird b. 1956
  Celtics forward whose rivalry with Magic Johnson defined the NBA's golden age of the 1980s. rival from 1979, then friend
• Kareem Abdul-Jabbar b. 1947
  NBA's all-time leading scorer and six-time champion known for his skyhook and social activism. teammate he replaced at center in 1980
• Ryan White 1971–1990
  Teenager with HIV/AIDS whose fight against discrimination changed public perception of the epidemic. the other public face of HIV in America
• Michael Jordan b. 1963
  Widely regarded as the greatest basketball player of all time, who became a global marketing phenomenon. Dream Team co-captain
• Joe Biden b. 1942
  46th president who enacted major infrastructure and climate legislation after decades in the Senate and vice presidency. gave him the Medal of Freedom