title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: When Bonham Carter was five, her mother had a serious nervous breakdown, from which she needed three years to recover. Soon afterwards, her mother's experience in therapy led her to become a psychotherapist, herself. Bonham Carter has since paid her to read her scripts and deliver opinions on the characters' psychological motivations. Five years after her mother's recovery, her father was diagnosed with acoustic neuroma. He suffered complications during an operation to remove the tumour, which led to a stroke leaving him half-paralysed and using a wheelchair. With her brothers at college, Bonham Carter was left to help her mother cope. She later studied her father's movements and mannerisms for her role in "The Theory of Flight". He died in January 2004.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter, who has no formal acting training, entered the field winning a national writing contest (1979) and used the money to pay for her entry into the actors' "Spotlight" directory. She made her professional acting debut at the age of 16 in a television commercial. She also had a minor part in the 1983 TV film "A Pattern of Roses".


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter's first lead film role was as Lady Jane Grey in "Lady Jane" (1986), which was given mixed reviews by critics. Her breakthrough role was as Lucy Honeychurch in "A Room with a View" (1985), an adaptation of E. M. Forster's 1908 novel, which was filmed after "Lady Jane", but released two months earlier. She also appeared in episodes of "Miami Vice" as Don Johnson's love interest during the 1986–87 season, and then in 1987 with Dirk Bogarde in "The Vision", Stewart Granger in "A Hazard of Hearts", and John Gielgud in "Getting It Right". Bonham Carter was originally cast in the role of Bess McNeill in "Breaking the Waves", but backed out during production owing to "the character's painful psychic and physical exposure", according to Roger Ebert. The role went to Emily Watson, who was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Her early films led to her being typecast as a "corset queen" and "English rose", playing pre- and early 20th century characters, particularly in Merchant Ivory films. Uncomfortable with this image, she states: "I looked, as someone said, like a bloated chipmunk". In 1994, Bonham Carter appeared in a dream sequence during the second series of the British sitcom "Absolutely Fabulous", as Edina Monsoon's daughter Saffron, who was normally played by Julia Sawalha. Throughout the series, references were made to Saffron's resemblance to Bonham Carter.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter, who speaks French fluently, starred in a 1996 French film titled "Portraits chinois". That same year, she played Olivia in Trevor Nunn's film version of "Twelfth Night". One of the high points of her early career was her performance as the scheming Kate Croy in the 1997 film adaption of "The Wings of the Dove", which was highly acclaimed internationally and saw her receive her first Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations. Then followed "Fight Club" in 1999, in which she played Marla Singer, a role for which she won the 2000 Empire Award for Best British Actress.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In August 2001, she was featured in "Maxim". She played her second Queen of England when she was cast as Anne Boleyn in the ITV1 miniseries "Henry VIII"; however, her role was restricted, as she was pregnant with her first child at the time of filming. In 2005, she voiced Lady Tottingham, a wealthy aristocratic spinster in the 2005 stop-motion animated comedy "". Starring alongside Ralph Fiennes and Peter Sallis, the film serves as part of the Wallace and Gromit series.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: She was a member of the 2006 Cannes Film Festival jury that unanimously selected "The Wind That Shakes the Barley" as best film. In May 2006, Bonham Carter launched her own fashion line, "The Pantaloonies", with swimwear designer Samantha Sage. Their first collection, called Bloomin' Bloomers, is a Victorian style selection of camisoles, mob caps, and bloomers. The duo worked on Pantaloonies customised jeans, which Bonham Carter describes as "a kind of scrapbook on the bum".


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter played the evil witch Bellatrix Lestrange in the final four "Harry Potter" films (2007–2011). While filming "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", she accidentally perforated the eardrum of Matthew Lewis (playing Neville Longbottom) when she stuck her wand into his ear canal. Bonham Carter received positive reviews as Bellatrix, described as a "shining but underused talent". She played Mrs. Lovett, Sweeney Todd's (Johnny Depp) amorous accomplice, in the film adaptation of Stephen Sondheim's Broadway musical, "", directed by Burton.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter received a nomination for the Golden Globe for Best Actress for her performance. She won the Best Actress award in the 2007 Evening Standard British Film Awards for her performances in "Sweeney Todd" and "Conversations With Other Women", along with another Best Actress award at the 2009 Empire Awards. Bonham Carter also appeared in the fourth "Terminator" film, entitled "Terminator Salvation", playing a small but pivotal role as a personification of Skynet.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In 2009, Bonham Carter was the mother squirrel narrator in the 30-minute animated film adaptation of the best-selling children's book "The Gruffalo", which was broadcast on BBC One on 25 December 2009. Bonham Carter joined the cast of Tim Burton's 2010 film, "Alice in Wonderland", as the Red Queen.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: She appears alongside Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Mia Wasikowska, Crispin Glover, and Harry Potter co-star Alan Rickman. Her role was an amalgamation of the Queen of Hearts and the Red Queen.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In early 2009, Bonham Carter was named one of "The Times"s top-10 British Actresses of all time, along with fellow actresses Judi Dench, Helen Mirren, Maggie Smith, Julie Andrews, and Audrey Hepburn.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In 2010, Bonham Carter played Queen Elizabeth in the film "The King's Speech." , she had received numerous plaudits and praise for her performance, including nominations for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She won her first BAFTA Award, but lost the Academy Award to Melissa Leo for "The Fighter".


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter signed to play author Enid Blyton in the BBC Four television biopic, "Enid". It was the first depiction of Blyton's life on the screen; she starred with Matthew Macfadyen and Denis Lawson. She received her first Television BAFTA Nomination for Best Actress, for "Enid". In 2010, she starred with Freddie Highmore in the Nigel Slater biopic "Toast", which was filmed in the West Midlands and received a gala at the 2011 Berlin International Film Festival. She received the Britannia Award for British Artist of the Year from BAFTA LA in 2011.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In 2012, she appeared as the eccentric, jilted bride Miss Havisham—one of the most potent figures in Victorian gothic fiction—in Mike Newell's adaptation of the Charles Dickens novel "Great Expectations". In April 2012, she appeared in Rufus Wainwright's music video for his single "Out of the Game", featured on the album of the same name. She co-starred in a film adaptation of the musical "Les Misérables", released in 2012. She played the role of Madame Thénardier.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: On 17 May 2012, Bonham Carter was announced to be appearing in the 2013 adaptation (entitled "The Young and Prodigious T.S. Spivet") of Reif Larsen's book "The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet". Her casting was announced alongside that of Kathy Bates, Kyle Catlett and Callum Keith Rennie, with Jean-Pierre Jeunet directing. She also appeared in a short film directed by Roman Polanski for the clothing brand Prada. The short was entitled "A Therapy" and she appeared as a patient of Ben Kingsley's therapist.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In 2013, she played Red Harrington, a peg-legged brothel madam, who assists Reid and Tonto in locating Cavendish, in the movie "The Lone Ranger". Also that year, Bonham Carter narrated poetry for "The Love Book App", an interactive anthology of love literature developed by Allie Byrne Esiri. Also in 2013, Bonham Carter appeared as Elizabeth Taylor, alongside Dominic West as Richard Burton, in BBC4's "Burton & Taylor", which premiered at the 2013 Hamptons International Film Festival. She played the Fairy Godmother in the 2015 live-action re-imagining of Walt Disney's "Cinderella".


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In 2016, Bonham Carter reprised her role of the Red Queen in "Alice Through the Looking Glass". In June 2018, she starred in a spin-off of the "Ocean's Eleven" trilogy, titled "Ocean's 8", alongside Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, Anne Hathaway, and Sarah Paulson. She plays an older Princess Margaret—whom Bonham Carter knew in person through her uncle Mark—for the Netflix series "The Crown", replacing Vanessa Kirby, who played a younger version for the first two seasons. In 2020, Bonham Carter starred as Eudoria Holmes in the Netflix film "Enola Holmes", which is based on the Sherlock Holmes adaptation, "The Enola Holmes Mysteries".


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In August 2008, four of Bonham Carter's relatives were killed in a safari bus crash in South Africa, and she was given indefinite leave from filming "Terminator Salvation", returning later to complete filming.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In early October 2008, Bonham Carter reportedly had become a patron of the charity Action Duchenne, the national charity established to support parents and sufferers of Duchenne muscular dystrophy.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In August 2014, Bonham Carter was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to a letter to "The Guardian" opposing Scottish independence in the run-up to September's referendum on that issue. In 2016, Bonham Carter said she was keen on the UK remaining in the European Union in regard to the referendum on that issue.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In 1994, Bonham Carter and Kenneth Branagh met while filming "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein". They began an affair while Branagh was still married to Emma Thompson, whom he had met in 1987 while filming the BBC Series "Fortunes of War" and married in 1989. At the time, Thompson's career was soaring, while Branagh was struggling to make a success of his first big-budget film ("Mary Shelley's Frankenstein"). Following the affair, Branagh and Thompson divorced in 1995. In 1999, after five years together, Bonham Carter and Branagh separated.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Thompson has said she has "no hard feelings" towards Bonham Carter, calling her affair with Branagh "blood under the bridge". She explained, "You can't hold on to anything like that. It's pointless. I haven't got the energy for it. Helena and I made our peace years and years ago. She's a wonderful woman." Thompson, Branagh, and Bonham Carter all later went on to appear in the "Harry Potter" series; Thompson and Bonham Carter both appeared in "Order of the Phoenix".


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In 2001, Bonham Carter began a relationship with American director Tim Burton, whom she met while filming "Planet of the Apes". Burton cast her in his other films, including "Big Fish", "Corpse Bride", "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", "", "Alice in Wonderland", and "Dark Shadows". After their separation, Bonham Carter said, "It might be easier to work together without being together anymore. He always only cast me with great embarrassment."


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter and Burton lived in adjoining houses in Belsize Park, London. She owned one of the houses; Burton later bought the other, and they connected the two. In 2006, they bought the Mill House in Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire. It was previously leased by her grandmother, Violet Bonham Carter, and owned by her great-grandfather H. H. Asquith.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter and Burton have two children together: son Billy Raymond Burton (born 4 October 2003) and daughter Nell Burton (born 15 December 2007). Bonham Carter has stated that Nell is named after all the "Helens" in her family. She told "The Daily Telegraph" of her struggles with infertility and the difficulties she had during her pregnancies. She said that before the conception of her daughter, she and Burton had been trying for a baby for two years and, although they conceived naturally, they were considering in vitro fertilisation.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: On 23 December 2014, the two announced that they had "separated amicably" earlier that year. Of the separation, Bonham Carter told "Harper's Bazaar": "Everyone always says you have to be strong and have a stiff upper lip, but it's okay to be fragile... You've got to take very small steps, and sometimes you won't know where to go next because you've lost yourself". She added: "With divorce, you go through massive grief—it is a death of a relationship, so it's utterly bewildering. Your identity, everything, changes."


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Since 2018, Bonham Carter has been in a relationship with art historian Rye Dag Holmboe. Holmboe is 21 years her junior. Regarding their age gap, Bonham Carter told "The Times" in 2019: "Everybody ages at a different rate. My boyfriend is unbelievably mature. He's an old soul in a young body, what more could I want? People are slightly frightened of older women, but he isn't. Women can be very powerful when they're older."


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter is known for her unconventional and eccentric sense of fashion. "British Vogue" described her dark style in clothing and acting as "quirky and irreverent". "Vanity Fair" named her on its 2010 Best-Dressed List and she was selected by Marc Jacobs to be the face of his Autumn/Winter 2011 advertising campaign. She has cited Vivienne Westwood and Marie Antoinette as her main style influences.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: In May 2021, Bonham Carter featured in a commercial for British furniture retailer Sofology, taking viewers through the quirks and stylistic flourishes of her home. In 2021, she wrote an article for "Harper's Bazaar" on the influence of Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" on her life since she first read the book as a child: "As far back as I can remember, I’ve been a wannabe Alice", adding, "everywhere I look at home, every view has some reference to "Alice": frog footman candlesticks, teacup constructions, a teapot lamp, a chessboard teapot, an oversized pocket watch, undersized doors, bunnies, internal windows that look like mirrors, and mirrors that look like windows".


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter's paternal grandparents were British Liberal politicians Sir Maurice Bonham-Carter and Lady Violet Bonham Carter. Helena is descended on her father's side from John Bonham Carter, Member of Parliament for Portsmouth. Helena's paternal great-grandfather was H. H. Asquith, 1st Earl of Oxford and Asquith and Prime Minister of Britain 1908–1916. She is the great-niece of Asquith's son, Anthony Asquith, English director of such films as "Carrington V.C." and "The Importance of Being Earnest", and a first cousin of the economist Adam Ridley and of politician Jane Bonham Carter.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter is a distant cousin of actor Crispin Bonham-Carter. Her other prominent distant relatives include Lothian Bonham Carter, who played first-class cricket for Hampshire, his son, Vice Admiral Sir Stuart Bonham Carter, who served in the Royal Navy in both world wars, and pioneering English nurse Florence Nightingale.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Her maternal grandfather, Spanish diplomat Eduardo Propper de Callejón, saved thousands of Jews from the Holocaust during the Second World War, for which he was recognised as Righteous Among the Nations, and posthumously received the Courage to Care Award from the Anti-Defamation League. His own father was a Bohemian Jew, and his wife, Helena's grandmother, was a Jewish convert to Catholicism. He later served as Minister-Counselor at the Spanish Embassy in Washington, D.C.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Her maternal grandmother, Baroness Hélène Fould-Springer, was from an upper-class Jewish family; she was the daughter of Baron Eugène Fould-Springer (a French banker descended from the Ephrussi family and the Fould dynasty) and Marie-Cécile von Springer (whose father was Austrian-born industrialist Baron Gustav von Springer, and whose mother was from the de Koenigswarter family). Hélène Fould-Springer converted to Catholicism after the Second World War. Hélène's sister was the French philanthropist Liliane de Rothschild (1916–2003), the wife of Baron Élie de Rothschild, of the prominent Rothschild family (who had also married within the von Springer family in the 19th century); Liliane's other sister, Therese Fould-Springer, was the mother of British writer David Pryce-Jones.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter has been the recipient of a BAFTA Award, a Critics' Choice Movie Award, an International Emmy Award and three Screen Actors Guild Awards, as well as receiving further nominations for two Academy Awards, nine Golden Globe Awards and five Primetime Emmy Awards. She has received other prestigious awards such as a Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award and two National Board of Review awards.


title: Helena Bonham Carter

text: Bonham Carter was made a CBE in the 2012 New Year Honours list for services to drama, and Prime Minister David Cameron announced that she had been appointed to Britain's new national Holocaust Commission in January 2014.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Earvin "Magic" Johnson Jr. (born August 14, 1959) is an American former professional basketball player. He is widely considered the greatest point guard of all-time and is often compared with Stephen Curry. Johnson played 13 seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA). After winning a national championship with Michigan State in 1979, Johnson was selected first overall in the 1979 NBA draft by the Los Angeles Lakers, leading the team to five NBA championships during their Showtime era. Johnson retired abruptly in 1991 after announcing that he had contracted HIV, but returned to play in the 1992 All-Star Game, winning the All-Star MVP Award. After protests from his fellow players, he retired again for four years, but returned in 1996, at age 36, to play 32 games for the Lakers before retiring for the third and final time.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson's career achievements include three NBA MVP Awards, three NBA Finals Most Valuable Player Awards, nine NBA Finals appearances, 12 All-Star games, and nine All-NBA First Team selections. He led the league in regular season assists four times, and is the NBA's all-time leader in average assists per game in both the regular season (11.19 assists per game) and the playoffs (12.35 assists per game). He also holds the record for most career assists in the playoffs. Johnson was a member of the 1992 United States men's Olympic basketball team ("The Dream Team"), which won the Olympic gold medal in Barcelona. After leaving the NBA in 1991, Johnson formed the Magic Johnson All-Stars, a barnstorming team that traveled around the world playing exhibition games.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson was honored as one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History in 1996 and selected to the NBA 75th Anniversary Team in 2021, and became a two-time inductee into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame—being enshrined in 2002 for his individual career, and again in 2010 as a member of the "Dream Team". His friendship and rivalry with Boston Celtics star Larry Bird, whom he faced in the 1979 NCAA finals and three NBA championship series, are well documented.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Since his retirement, Johnson has been an advocate for HIV/AIDS prevention and safe sex, as well as an entrepreneur, philanthropist, broadcaster and motivational speaker. His public announcement of his HIV-positive status helped dispel the stereotype, still widely held at the time, that HIV was a "gay disease" that heterosexuals need not worry about; his bravery in making this announcement was widely commended. Named by "Ebony" magazine as one of America's most influential black businessmen in 2009, Johnson has numerous business interests, and was a part-owner of the Lakers for several years, as well as being the team's president of basketball operations from 2017 to 2019. He is also part of a group of investors that purchased the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2012 and the Los Angeles Sparks in 2014, and was part of the ownership group that established Los Angeles F.C. (LAFC) of Major League Soccer (MLS) in 2017. During Johnson's ownership of these teams, the Sparks won the 2016 WNBA championship, the Dodgers won the 2020 World Series, and LAFC won the 2022 MLS Cup. Combining his playing career and sports ownership career, Johnson has 10 NBA championships, five each as a player and later as a minority owner of the Lakers.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Earvin Johnson Jr. was born in Lansing, Michigan, to General Motors assembly worker Earvin Sr. and school janitor Christine. Johnson, who had six siblings and three half-siblings by his father's previous marriage, was influenced by his parents' strong work ethic. His mother spent many hours after work each night cleaning their home and preparing the next day's meals, while his father did janitorial work at a used car lot and collected garbage, all while never missing a day at General Motors. Johnson would often help his father on the garbage route, and he was teased by neighborhood children who called him "Garbage Man".


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson came to love basketball as a young man. His favorite basketball player was Bill Russell, whom he admired more for his many championships than his athletic ability. He also idolized players such as Earl Monroe and Marques Haynes, and practiced "all day". Johnson came from an athletic family. His father played high school basketball in his home state of Mississippi,and Johnson learned the finer points about the game from him. Johnson's mother, originally from North Carolina, had also played basketball as a child, and she grew up watching her brothers play the game.


title: Magic Johnson

text: By the time he had reached the eighth grade, Johnson had begun to think about a future in basketball. He had become a dominant junior high player, once scoring 48 points in a game. Johnson looked forward to playing at Sexton High School, a school with a very successful basketball team and history that also happened to be only five blocks from his home. His plans underwent a dramatic change when he learned that he would be bused to the predominantly white Everett High School instead of going to Sexton, which was predominantly black. Johnson's sister Pearl and his brother Larry had bused to Everett the previous year and did not have a pleasant experience. There were incidents of racism, with rocks being thrown at buses carrying black students and white parents refusing to send their children to school. Larry was kicked off the basketball team after a confrontation during practice, prompting him to beg his brother not to play. Johnson did join the basketball team but became angry after several days when his new teammates ignored him during practice, not even passing the ball to him. He nearly got into a fight with another player before head coach George Fox intervened. Eventually, Johnson accepted his situation and the small group of black students looked to him as their leader. When recalling the events in his autobiography, "My Life", he talked about how his time at Everett had changed him:


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson was first dubbed "Magic" as a 15-year-old sophomore playing for Everett High School, when he recorded a triple-double of 36 points, 18 rebounds, and 16 assists. After the game, Fred Stabley Jr., a sports writer for the "Lansing State Journal", gave him the moniker despite the belief of Johnson's mother, a devout Christian, that the name was sacrilegious. In his final high school season, Johnson led Everett to a 27–1 win–loss record while averaging 28.8 points and 16.8 rebounds per game, and took his team to an overtime victory in the state championship game. Johnson dedicated the championship victory to his best friend Reggie Chastine, who was killed in a car accident the previous summer. He gave Chastine much of the credit for his development as a basketball player and as a person, saying years later, "I doubted myself back then." Johnson and Chastine were almost always together, playing basketball or riding around in Chastine's car. Upon learning of Chastine's death, Magic ran from his home, crying uncontrollably. Johnson, who finished his high school career with two All-State selections, was considered at the time to be the best high school player ever to come out of Michigan and was also named to the 1977 McDonald's All-American team.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Although Johnson was recruited by several top-ranked colleges such as Indiana and UCLA, he decided to play close to home. His college decision came down to Michigan and Michigan State in East Lansing. He ultimately decided to attend Michigan State when coach Jud Heathcote told him he could play the point guard position. The talent already on Michigan State's roster also drew him to the program.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson did not initially aspire to play professionally, focusing instead on his communication studies major and his desire to become a television commentator. Playing with future NBA draftees Greg Kelser, Jay Vincent, and Mike Brkovich, Johnson averaged 17.0 points, 7.9 rebounds, and 7.4 assists per game as a freshman, and led the Spartans to a 25–5 record, the Big Ten Conference title, and a berth in the 1978 NCAA tournament. The Spartans reached the Elite Eight, but lost narrowly to eventual national champion Kentucky.


title: Magic Johnson

text: During the 1978–79 season, Michigan State again qualified for the NCAA tournament, where they advanced to the championship game and faced Indiana State, which was led by senior Larry Bird. In what was the most-watched college basketball game ever, Michigan State defeated Indiana State 75–64, and Johnson was voted Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four. He was selected to the 1978–79 All-American team for his performance that season. After two years in college, during which he averaged 17.1 points, 7.6 rebounds, and 7.9 assists per game, Johnson entered the 1979 NBA draft. Jud Heathcote stepped down as coach of the Spartans after the 1994–95 season, and on June 8, 1995, Johnson returned to the Breslin Center to play in the Jud Heathcote All-Star Tribute Game. He led all scorers with 39 points.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson was drafted first overall in 1979 by the Los Angeles Lakers. Johnson said that what was "most amazing" about joining the Lakers was the chance to play alongside Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the team's 7 ft 2 in (2.18 m) center who became the leading scorer in NBA history. Despite Abdul-Jabbar's dominance, he had failed to win a championship with the Lakers, and Johnson was expected to help them achieve that goal. Lakers coach Jack McKinney had the rookie Johnson, who some analysts thought should play forward, be a point guard, even though incumbent Norm Nixon was already one of the best in the league. Johnson averaged 18.0 points, 7.7 rebounds, and 7.3 assists per game for the season, was selected to the NBA All-Rookie Team, and was named an NBA All-Star Game starter.


title: Magic Johnson

text: The Lakers compiled a 60–22 record in the regular season and reached the 1980 NBA Finals, in which they faced the Philadelphia 76ers, who were led by forward Julius Erving. The Lakers took a 3–2 lead in the series, but Abdul-Jabbar, who averaged 33 points a game in the series, sprained his ankle in Game 5 and could not play in Game 6. Coach Paul Westhead, who had replaced McKinney early in the season after he had a near-fatal bicycle accident, decided to start Johnson at center in Game 6; Johnson recorded 42 points, 15 rebounds, 7 assists, and 3 steals in a 123–107 win, while playing guard, forward, and center at different times during the game. Johnson became the only rookie to win the NBA Finals MVP award, and his clutch performance is still regarded as one of the finest in NBA history. He also became one of four players to win NCAA and NBA championships in consecutive years.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Early in the 1980–81 season, Johnson was sidelined after he suffered torn cartilage in his left knee. He missed 45 games, and said that his rehabilitation was the "most down" he had ever felt. Johnson returned before the start of the 1981 playoffs, but the Lakers' then-assistant and future head coach Pat Riley later said Johnson's much-anticipated return made the Lakers a "divided team". The 54-win Lakers faced the 40–42 Houston Rockets in the first round of playoffs, where Houston upset the Lakers 2–1 after Johnson airballed a last-second shot in Game 3.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 1981, after the 1980–81 season, Johnson signed a 25-year, $25 million contract with the Lakers (), which was the highest-paying contract in sports history up to that point. Early in the 1981–82 season, Johnson had a heated dispute with Westhead, who Johnson said made the Lakers "slow" and "predictable". After Johnson demanded to be traded, Lakers owner Jerry Buss fired Westhead and replaced him with Riley. Although Johnson denied responsibility for Westhead's firing, he was booed across the league, even by Laker fans. Buss was also unhappy with the Lakers' offense and had intended on firing Westhead days before the Westhead–Johnson altercation, but assistant GM Jerry West and GM Bill Sharman had convinced Buss to delay his decision. Despite his off-court troubles, Johnson averaged 18.6 points, 9.6 rebounds, 9.5 assists, and a league-high 2.7 steals per game, and was voted a member of the All-NBA Second Team. He also joined Wilt Chamberlain and Oscar Robertson as the only NBA players to tally at least 700 points, 700 rebounds, and 700 assists in the same season. The Lakers advanced through the 1982 playoffs and faced Philadelphia for the second time in three years in the 1982 NBA Finals. After a triple-double from Johnson in Game 6, the Lakers defeated the Sixers 4–2, as Johnson won his second NBA Finals MVP award. During the championship series against the Sixers, Johnson averaged 16.2 points on .533 shooting, 10.8 rebounds, 8.0 assists, and 2.5 steals per game. Johnson later said that his third season was when the Lakers first became a great team, and he credited their success to Riley.


title: Magic Johnson

text: During the 1982–83 NBA season, Johnson's first of nine consecutive double-double seasons, he averaged 16.8 points, 10.5 assists, and 8.6 rebounds per game, and earned his first All-NBA First Team nomination. The Lakers again reached the Finals, and for a third time faced the Sixers, who featured center Moses Malone as well as Erving. With Johnson's teammates Nixon, James Worthy, and Bob McAdoo all hobbled by injuries, the Lakers were swept by the Sixers, and Malone was crowned the Finals MVP. In a losing effort against Philadelphia, Johnson averaged 19.0 points on .403 shooting, 12.5 assists, and 7.8 rebounds per game.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Prior to Johnson's fifth season, West—who had become the Lakers general manager—traded Nixon to free Johnson from sharing the ball-handling responsibilities. Johnson averaged another double-double season, with 17.6 points, 13.1 assists, and 7.3 rebounds per game. The Lakers reached the Finals for the third year in a row, where Johnson's Lakers and Bird's Celtics met for the first time in the postseason. The Lakers won the first game, and led by two points in Game 2 with 18 seconds to go, but after a layup by Gerald Henderson, Johnson failed to get a shot off before the final buzzer sounded, and the Lakers lost 124–121 in overtime. In Game 3, Johnson responded with 21 assists in a 137–104 win, but he made several crucial errors late in the contest during Game 4. In the final minute of the game, Johnson had the ball stolen by Celtics center Robert Parish, and then missed two free throws that could have won the game. The Celtics won Game 4 in overtime, and the teams split the next two games. In the decisive Game 7 in Boston, as the Lakers trailed by three points in the final minute, opposing point guard Dennis Johnson stole the ball from Johnson, a play that effectively ended the series. Friends Isiah Thomas and Mark Aguirre consoled him that night, talking until the morning in his Boston hotel room amidst fan celebrations on the street. During the Finals, Johnson averaged 18.0 points on .560 shooting, 13.6 assists, and 7.7 rebounds per game. Johnson later described the series as "the one championship we should have had but didn't get".


title: Magic Johnson

text: In the 1984–85 regular season, Johnson averaged 18.3 points, 12.6 assists, and 6.2 rebounds per game, and led the Lakers into the 1985 NBA Finals, where they faced the Celtics again. The series started poorly for the Lakers when they allowed an NBA Finals record 148 points to the Celtics in a 34-point loss in Game 1. However, Abdul-Jabbar, who was now 38 years old, scored 30 points and grabbed 17 rebounds in Game 2, and his 36 points in a Game 5 win were instrumental in establishing a 3–2 lead for Los Angeles. After the Lakers defeated the Celtics in six games, Abdul-Jabbar and Johnson, who averaged 18.3 points on .494 shooting, 14.0 assists, and 6.8 rebounds per game in the championship series, said the Finals win was the highlight of their careers.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson again averaged a double-double in the 1985–86 NBA season, with 18.8 points, 12.6 assists, and 5.9 rebounds per game. The Lakers advanced to the Western Conference Finals, but were unable to defeat the Houston Rockets, who advanced to the Finals in five games. In the next season, Johnson averaged a career-high of 23.9 points, as well as 12.2 assists and 6.3 rebounds per game, and earned his first regular season MVP award. The Lakers met the Celtics for the third time in the NBA Finals, and in Game 4 Johnson hit a last-second hook shot over Celtics big men Parish and Kevin McHale to win the game 107–106. The game-winning shot, which Johnson dubbed his "junior, junior, junior sky-hook", helped Los Angeles defeat Boston in six games. Johnson was awarded his third Finals MVP title after averaging 26.2 points on .541 shooting, 13.0 assists, 8.0 rebounds, and 2.33 steals per game.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Before the 1987–88 NBA season, Lakers coach Pat Riley publicly promised that they would defend the NBA title, even though no team had won consecutive titles since the Celtics did so in the 1969 NBA Finals. Johnson had another productive season with averages of 19.6 points, 11.9 assists, and 6.2 rebounds per game despite missing 10 games with a groin injury. In the 1988 playoffs, the Lakers swept the San Antonio Spurs in 3 games, then survived two 4–3 series against the Utah Jazz and the Dallas Mavericks to reach the Finals and face Thomas and the Detroit Pistons, who with players such as Bill Laimbeer, John Salley, Vinnie Johnson and Dennis Rodman were known as the "Bad Boys" for their physical style of play. Johnson and Thomas greeted each other with a kiss on the cheek before the opening tip of Game 1, which they called a display of brotherly love. After the teams split the first six games, Lakers forward and Finals MVP James Worthy had his first career triple-double of 36 points, 16 rebounds, and 10 assists, and led his team to a 108–105 win. Despite not being named MVP, Johnson had a strong championship series, averaging 21.1 points on .550 shooting, 13.0 assists, and 5.7 rebounds per game. It was the fifth and final NBA championship of his career.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In the 1988–89 NBA season, Johnson's 22.5 points, 12.8 assists, and 7.9 rebounds per game earned him his second MVP award, and the Lakers reached the 1989 NBA Finals, in which they again faced the Pistons. However, after Johnson went down with a hamstring injury in Game 2, the Lakers were no match for the Pistons, who swept them 4–0.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Playing without Abdul-Jabbar for the first time, Johnson won his third MVP award after a strong 1989–90 NBA season in which he averaged 22.3 points, 11.5 assists, and 6.6 rebounds per game. However, the Lakers bowed out to the Phoenix Suns in the Western Conference semifinals, which was the Lakers' earliest playoffs elimination in nine years. Mike Dunleavy became the Lakers' head coach in 1990–91, when Johnson had grown to be the league's third-oldest point guard. He had become more powerful and stronger than in his earlier years, but was also slower and less nimble. Under Dunleavy, the offense used more half-court sets, and the team had a renewed emphasis on defense. Johnson performed well during the season, with averages of 19.4 points, 12.5 assists, and 7.0 rebounds per game, and the Lakers reached the 1991 NBA Finals. There they faced the Chicago Bulls, led by shooting guard Michael Jordan, a five-time scoring champion regarded as the finest player of his era. Although the series was portrayed as a matchup between Johnson and Jordan, Bulls forward Scottie Pippen defended effectively against Johnson. Despite two triple-doubles from Johnson during the series, Finals MVP Jordan led his team to a 4–1 win. In the last championship series of his career, Johnson averaged 18.6 points on .431 shooting, 12.4 assists, and 8.0 rebounds per game.


title: Magic Johnson

text: After a physical before the 1991–92 NBA season, Johnson discovered that he had tested positive for HIV. In a press conference held on November 7, 1991, Johnson made a public announcement that he would retire immediately. He stated that his wife Cookie and their unborn child did not have HIV, and that he would dedicate his life to "battle this deadly disease".


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson initially said that he did not know how he contracted the disease, but later acknowledged that it was through having numerous sexual partners during his playing career. He admitted to having "harems of women" and talked openly about his sexual activities because "he was convinced that heterosexuals needed to know that they, too, were at risk". At the time, only a small percentage of HIV-positive American men had contracted it from heterosexual sex, and it was initially rumored that Johnson was gay or bisexual, although he denied both. Johnson later accused Isiah Thomas of spreading the rumors, a claim Thomas denied.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson's HIV announcement became a major news story in the United States, and in 2004 was named as ESPN's seventh-most memorable moment of the previous 25 years. Many articles praised Johnson as a hero, and the then-U.S. President George H. W. Bush said, "For me, Magic is a hero, a hero for anyone who loves sports."


title: Magic Johnson

text: Despite his retirement, Johnson was voted by fans as a starter for the 1992 NBA All-Star Game at Orlando Arena, although his former teammates Byron Scott and A. C. Green said that Johnson should not play, and several NBA players, including Utah Jazz forward Karl Malone, argued that they would be at risk of contamination if Johnson suffered an open wound while on court. Johnson led the West to a 153–113 win and was crowned All-Star MVP after recording 25 points, 9 assists, and 5 rebounds. The game ended after he made a last-minute three-pointer, and players from both teams ran onto the court to congratulate Johnson.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson was chosen to compete in the Barcelona 1992 Summer Olympics for the U.S. national team, dubbed the "Dream Team" because of the NBA stars on the roster. The Dream Team, which along with Johnson included fellow Hall of Famers such as Bird, Michael Jordan, and Charles Barkley, was considered unbeatable. After qualifying for the Olympics with a gold medal at the 1992 Tournament of the Americas, the Dream Team dominated in Olympic competition, winning the gold medal with an 8–0 record, beating their opponents by an average of 43.8 points per game. Johnson averaged 8.0 points per game during the Olympics, and his 5.5 assists per game was second on the team. Johnson played infrequently because of knee problems, but he received standing ovations from the crowd, and used the opportunity to inspire HIV-positive people.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Before the 1992–93 NBA season, Johnson announced his intention to stage an NBA comeback. After practicing and playing in several pre-season games, he retired again before the start of the regular season, citing controversy over his return sparked by opposition from several active players. In an August 2011 interview, Johnson said that in retrospect he wished that he had never retired after being diagnosed with HIV, saying, "If I knew what I know now, I wouldn't have retired." Johnson said that despite the physical, highly competitive practices and scrimmages leading up to the 1992 Olympics, some of those same teammates still expressed concerns about his return to the NBA. He said that he retired because he "didn't want to hurt the game."


title: Magic Johnson

text: During his retirement, Johnson has written a book on safe sex, run several businesses, worked for NBC as a commentator, and toured Asia, Australia and New Zealand with a basketball team of former college and NBA players. In 1985, Johnson created "A Midsummer Night's Magic", a yearly charity event which included a celebrity basketball game and a black tie dinner. The proceeds went to the United Negro College Fund, and Johnson held this event for twenty years, ending in 2005. "A Midsummer Night's Magic" eventually came under the umbrella of the Magic Johnson Foundation, which he founded in 1991. The 1992 event, which was the first one held after Johnson's appearance in the 1992 Olympics, raised over $1.3 million for UNCF. Magic Johnson joined Shaquille O'Neal and celebrity coach Spike Lee to lead the blue team to a 147–132 victory over the white team, which was coached by Arsenio Hall.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson returned to the NBA as coach of the Lakers near the end of the 1993–94 NBA season, replacing Randy Pfund, and Bill Bertka, who served as an interim coach for two games. Johnson, who took the job at the urging of owner Jerry Buss, admitted "I've always had the desire (to coach) in the back of my mind." He insisted that his health was not an issue, while downplaying questions about returning as a player, saying, "I'm retired. Let's leave it at that." Amid speculation from general manager Jerry West that he may only coach until the end of the season, Johnson took over a team that had a 28–38 record, and won his first game as head coach, a 110–101 victory over the Milwaukee Bucks. He was coaching a team that had five of his former teammates on the roster: Vlade Divac, Elden Campbell, Tony Smith, Kurt Rambis, James Worthy, and Michael Cooper, who was brought in as an assistant coach. Johnson, who still had a guaranteed player contract that would pay him $14.6 million during the 1994–95 NBA season, signed a separate contract to coach the team that had no compensation. The Lakers played well initially, winning five of their first six games under Johnson, but after losing the next five games, Johnson announced that he was resigning as coach after the season. The Lakers finished the season on a ten-game losing streak, and Johnson's final record as a head coach was 5–11. Stating that it was never his dream to coach, he chose instead to purchase a 5% share of the team in June 1994.


title: Magic Johnson

text: At the age of 36, Johnson attempted another comeback as a player when he re-joined the Lakers during the 1995–96 NBA season. During his retirement, Johnson began intense workouts to help his fight against HIV, raising his bench press from 135 to 300 pounds, and increasing his weight to 255 pounds. He officially returned to the team on January 29, 1996, and played his first game the following day against the Golden State Warriors. Coming off the bench, Johnson had 19 points, 8 rebounds, and 10 assists to help the Lakers to a 128–118 victory. On February 14, Johnson recorded the final triple-double of his career, when he scored 15 points, along with 10 rebounds and 13 assists in a victory against the Atlanta Hawks. Playing power forward, he averaged 14.6 points, 6.9 assists, and 5.7 rebounds per game in 32 games, and finished tied for 12th place with Charles Barkley in voting for the MVP Award. The Lakers had a record of 22–10 in the games Johnson played, and he considered his final comeback "a success." While Johnson played well in 1996, there were struggles both on and off the court. Cedric Ceballos, upset over a reduction in his playing time after Johnson's arrival, left the team for several days. He missed two games and was stripped of his title as team captain. Nick Van Exel received a seven-game suspension for bumping referee Ron Garretson during a game on April 9. Johnson was publicly critical of Van Exel, saying his actions were "inexcusable." Johnson was himself suspended five days later, when he bumped referee Scott Foster, missing three games. He also missed several games due to a calf injury. Despite these difficulties, the Lakers finished with a record of 53–29 and fourth seed in the NBA Playoffs. Although they were facing the defending NBA champion Houston Rockets, the Lakers had home court advantage in the five-game series. The Lakers played poorly in a Game 1 loss, prompting Johnson to express frustration with his role in coach Del Harris' offense. Johnson led the way to a Game 2 victory with 26 points, but averaged only 7.5 points per game for the remainder of the series, which the Rockets won three games to one.


title: Magic Johnson

text: After the Lakers lost to the Houston Rockets in the first round of the playoffs, Johnson initially expressed a desire to return to the team for the 1996–97 NBA season, but he also talked about joining another team as a free agent, hoping to see more playing time at point guard instead of power forward. A few days later, Johnson changed his mind and retired permanently, saying, "I am going out on my terms, something I couldn't say when I aborted a comeback in 1992."


title: Magic Johnson

text: Determined to play competitive basketball despite being out of the NBA, Johnson formed the Magic Johnson All-Stars, a barnstorming team composed of former NBA and college players. In 1994, Johnson joined with former pros Mark Aguirre, Reggie Theus, John Long, Earl Cureton, Jim Farmer, and Lester Conner, as his team played games in Australia, Israel, South America, Europe, New Zealand, and Japan. They also toured the United States, playing five games against teams from the CBA. In the final game of the CBA series, Johnson had 30 points, 17 rebounds, and 13 assists, leading the All-Stars to a 126–121 victory over the Oklahoma City Cavalry. By the time he returned to the Lakers in 1996, the Magic Johnson All-Stars had amassed a record of 55–0, and Johnson was earning as much as $365,000 per game. Johnson played with the team frequently over the next several years, with possibly the most memorable game occurring in November 2001. At the age of 42, Johnson played with the All-Stars against his alma mater, Michigan State. Although he played in a celebrity game to honor coach Jud Heathcoate in 1995, this was Johnson's first meaningful game played in his hometown of Lansing in 22 years. Playing in front of a sold-out arena, Johnson had a triple-double and played the entire game, but his all-star team lost to the Spartans by two points. Johnson's half-court shot at the buzzer would have won the game, but it fell short. On November 1, 2002, Johnson returned to play a second exhibition game against Michigan State. Playing with the Canberra Cannons of Australia's National Basketball League instead of his usual group of players, Johnson's team defeated the Spartans 104–85, as he scored 12 points, with 10 assists and 10 rebounds.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 1999, Johnson joined the Swedish squad M7 Borås (now known as 'Borås Basket'), and was undefeated in five games with the team. Johnson also became a co-owner of the club; however, the project failed after one season and the club was forced into reconstruction. He later joined the Danish team The Great Danes.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson and Bird were first linked as rivals after Johnson's Michigan State squad defeated Bird's Indiana State team in the 1979 NCAA finals. The rivalry continued in the NBA, and reached its climax when Boston and Los Angeles met in three out of four NBA Finals from 1984 to 1987, with the Lakers winning two out of three Finals. Johnson asserted that for him, the 82-game regular season was composed of 80 normal games, and two Lakers–Celtics games. Similarly, Bird admitted that Johnson's daily box score was the first thing he checked in the morning.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Several journalists hypothesized that the Johnson–Bird rivalry was so appealing because it represented many other contrasts, such as the clash between the Lakers and Celtics, between Hollywood flashiness ("Showtime") and Boston/Indiana blue collar grit ("Celtic Pride"), and between blacks and whites. The rivalry was also significant because it drew national attention to the faltering NBA. Prior to Johnson and Bird's arrival, the NBA had gone through a decade of declining interest and low TV ratings. With the two future Hall of Famers, the league won a whole generation of new fans, drawing both traditionalist adherents of Bird's dirt court Indiana game and those appreciative of Johnson's public park flair. According to sports journalist Larry Schwartz of ESPN, Johnson and Bird saved the NBA from bankruptcy.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Despite their on-court rivalry, Johnson and Bird became close friends during the filming of a 1984 Converse shoe advertisement that depicted them as enemies. Johnson appeared at Bird's retirement ceremony in 1992, and described Bird as a "friend forever"; during Johnson's Hall of Fame ceremony, Bird formally inducted his old rival.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 2009, Johnson and Bird collaborated with journalist Jackie MacMullan on a non-fiction book titled "When the Game Was Ours". The book detailed their on-court rivalry and friendship with one another. The following year, HBO developed a documentary about their rivalry titled "", which was directed by Ezra Edelman.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 905 NBA games, Johnson tallied 17,707 points, 6,559 rebounds, and 10,141 assists, translating to career averages of 19.5 points, 7.2 rebounds, and 11.2 assists per game, the highest assists per game average in NBA history. Johnson shares the single-game playoff record for assists (24), holds the Finals record for assists in a game (21), and has the most playoff assists (2,346). He is the only player to average 12 assists in an NBA Finals series, achieving it six times. He holds the All-Star Game single-game record for assists (22), and the All-Star Game record for career assists (127).


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson introduced a fast-paced style of basketball called "Showtime", described as a mix of "no-look passes off the fastbreak, pin-point alley-oops from halfcourt, spinning feeds and overhand bullets under the basket through triple teams." Fellow Lakers guard Michael Cooper said, "There have been times when [Johnson] has thrown passes and I wasn't sure where he was going. Then one of our guys catches the ball and scores, and I run back up the floor convinced that he must've thrown it through somebody." Johnson could dominate a game without scoring, running the offense and distributing the ball with flair. In the 1982 NBA Finals, he was named the Finals MVP averaging just 16.2 points, the lowest average of any Finals MVP award recipient in the three-point shot era.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson was exceptional because he played point guard despite being 6 ft 9 in (2.06 m), a size reserved normally for frontcourt players. His career 138 triple-double games places him third all-time behind Oscar Robertson and Russell Westbrook. Johnson is the only player in NBA Finals history to have triple-doubles in multiple series-clinching games.


title: Magic Johnson

text: For his feats, Johnson was voted as one of the 50 Greatest Players of All Time by the NBA in 1996, and selected to the NBA 75th Anniversary Team in 2021. The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inducted him in 2002. ESPN's "SportsCentury" ranked Johnson 17 in their "50 Greatest Athletes of the 20th Century" In 2006, ESPN.com rated Johnson the greatest point guard of all time, stating, "It could be argued that he's the one player in NBA history who was better than Michael Jordan." Bleacher Report also listed Johnson first in its all-time NBA point guard rankings. Several of his achievements in individual games have also been named among the top moments in the NBA. At the 2019 NBA Awards, Johnson received the NBA Lifetime Achievement Award (shared with Bird). In 2022, the NBA began awarding MVPs for the conference finals; the Western Conference Finals MVP trophy is named in Johnson's honor, while the Eastern Conference trophy is named after Bird.


title: Magic Johnson

text: On February 21, 2017, Johnson replaced Jim Buss as the president of basketball operations for the Los Angeles Lakers. Under Johnson, the Lakers sought to acquire multiple star players and cleared existing players, including future All-Star D'Angelo Russell, off of their roster in an attempt to free up room under the league's salary cap. The franchise reached an agreement with free agent LeBron James on a four-year contract in 2018, but efforts to trade for Anthony Davis during the 2018–19 season proved unsuccessful. The Lakers did not reach the playoffs during Johnson's executive tenure. In an impromptu news conference on April 9, 2019, Johnson resigned from the Lakers, citing his desire to return to his role as an NBA ambassador.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson first fathered a son in 1981, when Andre Johnson was born to Melissa Mitchell. Although Andre was raised by his mother, he visited Johnson each summer, and later worked for Magic Johnson Enterprises as a marketing director. In 1991, Johnson married Earlitha "Cookie" Kelly in a small wedding in Lansing which included guests Thomas, Aguirre, and Herb Williams. Johnson and Cookie have one son, Earvin III ("EJ"), who is openly gay and a star on the reality show "Rich Kids of Beverly Hills". The couple adopted a daughter, Elisa, in 1995. Johnson resides in Beverly Hills and has a vacation home in Dana Point, California.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 2010, Johnson and current and former NBA players such as LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Bill Russell, as well as Maya Moore from the WNBA, played a basketball game with President Barack Obama as an exhibition for a group of military troops who had been injured in action. The game was played at a gym inside Fort McNair, and reporters covering the president were not allowed to enter. The basketball game was part of festivities organized to celebrate Obama's 49th birthday.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson had an extremely close relationship with Lakers owner Jerry Buss, whom he saw as a mentor and a father figure. Calling Buss his "second father" and "one of [his] best friends", Johnson spent five hours visiting Buss at the hospital just a few months before his death from cancer. Speaking to media just hours after Buss had died, Johnson was emotional, saying, "Without Dr. Jerry Buss, there is no Magic." Buss acquired the team from Jack Kent Cooke in 1979, shortly before he drafted Johnson with the #1 pick in the 1979 NBA draft. Buss took a special interest in Johnson, introducing him to important Los Angeles business contacts and showing him how the Lakers organization was run, before eventually selling Johnson a stake in the team in 1994. Johnson credits Buss with giving him the business knowledge that enabled him to become part owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Buss supported Johnson as he revealed his diagnosis of HIV in 1991, and he never hesitated to keep Johnson close to the organization, bringing him in as part-owner, and even as a coach. Johnson had never seriously considered coaching, but he agreed to take the head coaching position with the Lakers in 1994 at Buss' request. In 1992, Buss had given Johnson a contract that paid him $14 million a year, as payback for all the years he was not the league's highest-paid player. Although Johnson's retirement prior to the 1992–93 NBA season voided this contract, Buss insisted that he still be paid. It was this arrangement that allowed Johnson to coach the team without receiving any additional salary. After Johnson ended his coaching stint, Buss sold him a 4% stake in the Lakers for $10 million, and Johnson served as a team executive.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 1997, his production company Magic Johnson Entertainment signed a deal with Fox. In 1998, Johnson hosted a late night talk show on the Fox network called "The Magic Hour", but the show was canceled after two months because of low ratings. Shortly after the cancellation of his talk show, Magic Johnson started a record label. The label, initially called Magic 32 Records, was renamed Magic Johnson Music when Johnson signed a joint venture with MCA in 2000. Magic Johnson Music signed R&B artist Avant as its first act. Johnson also co-promoted Janet Jackson's Velvet Rope Tour through his company Magicworks. He has also worked as a motivational speaker, and was an NBA commentator for Turner Network Television for seven years, before becoming a studio analyst for ESPN's "NBA Countdown" in 2008.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson runs Magic Johnson Enterprises, a conglomerate company that has a net worth of $700 million; its subsidiaries include Magic Johnson Productions, a promotional company; Magic Johnson Theaters, a nationwide chain of movie theaters; and Magic Johnson Entertainment, a film studio. In addition to these business ventures, Johnson has also created the "Magic Card", a pre-paid MasterCard aimed at helping low-income people save money and participate in electronic commerce. In 2006, Johnson created a contract food service with Sodexo USA called Sodexo-Magic. In 2004, Johnson and his partner Ken Lombard sold Magic Johnson Theaters to Loews Cineplex Entertainment. The first Magic Johnson Theater located in the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, closed in 2010 and re-opened in 2011 as Rave Cinema 15. In 2012, Johnson launched a cable TV network called Aspire, featuring programming targeted at black audiences, similar to networks such as Black Entertainment Television (BET) and TV One.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson began thinking of life after basketball while still playing with the Lakers. He wondered why so many athletes had failed at business, and sought advice. During his seventh season in the NBA, he had a meeting with Michael Ovitz, CEO of Creative Artists Agency. Ovitz encouraged him to start reading business magazines and to use every connection available to him. Johnson learned everything he could about business, often meeting with corporate executives during road trips. Johnson's first foray into business, a high-end sporting goods store named Magic 32, failed after only one year, costing him $200,000. The experience taught him to listen to his customers and find out what products they wanted. Johnson has become a leading voice on how to invest in urban communities, creating redevelopment opportunities in underserved areas, most notably through his movie theaters and his partnership with Starbucks. He went to Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz with the idea that he could successfully open the coffee shops in urban areas. After showing Schultz the tremendous buying power of minorities, Johnson was able to purchase 125 Starbucks stores, which reported higher than average per capita sales. The partnership, called Urban Coffee Opportunities, placed Starbucks in locations such as Detroit, Washington, D.C., Harlem, and the Crenshaw District of Los Angeles. Johnson sold his remaining interest in the stores back to the company in 2010, ending a successful twelve-year partnership. He has also made investments in urban real estate through the Canyon-Johnson and Yucaipa-Johnson funds. Another major project is with insurance services company Aon Corp. In 2005–2007, Johnson was part of a syndicate that bought the Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower, then the tallest building in Brooklyn, for $71 million and converted the 512-foot high landmark structure from an office building into luxury condominiums.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 1990, Johnson and Earl Graves Sr. obtained a large interest in the Washington, D.C. PepsiCo bottling operation, making it the company's largest minority-owned facility in the U.S. Johnson became a minority owner of the Lakers in 1994, having reportedly paid more than $10 million for part ownership. He also held the title of team vice president. Johnson sold his ownership stake in the Lakers in October 2010 to Patrick Soon-Shiong, a Los Angeles surgeon and professor at UCLA, but continued as an unpaid vice president for the team. In February 2017, Johnson returned to the Lakers as an advisor to Jeanie Buss.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In the wake of the Donald Sterling controversy, limited media reports indicated that Johnson had expressed an interest in purchasing the Los Angeles Clippers franchise.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In 2015, Johnson completed his planned acquisition for a "majority, controlling interest" in EquiTrust Life Insurance Company, which manages $14.5 billion in annuities, life insurance and other financial products.


title: Magic Johnson

text: In January 2012, Johnson joined with Guggenheim Partners and Stan Kasten in a bid for ownership of the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team. In March 2012, Johnson's ownership group was announced as the winner of the proceedings to buy the Dodgers. The Johnson-led group, which also includes movie executive Peter Guber, paid $2 billion for the Dodgers, the largest amount paid for a professional sports team. While Johnson is considered the leader of the ownership group, the controlling owner is Mark Walter, chief executive officer for Guggenheim Partners. Peter Guber, who is the co-owner of the Golden State Warriors, owns a small stake in the Dodgers along with Johnson. The Dodgers won the 2020 World Series, giving Johnson a Major League Baseball title to his credit. Johnson and Guber were also partners in the Dayton Dragons, a Class-A minor league baseball team in Dayton, Ohio, that sold out more than 1,000 consecutive games, a record for professional sports. Johnson and Guber sold their stake in the Dragons in 2014.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Together with Guggenheim, Johnson was also involved in the February 2014 purchase of the Los Angeles Sparks team in the WNBA. As such, in 2014, Johnson was named one of ESPNW's Impact 25. He won the WNBA championship as the owner in 2016. Johnson announced his co-ownership of a Major League Soccer (MLS) expansion franchise based in Los Angeles on October 30, 2014. The temporary name was Los Angeles Football Club, which later became permanent in 2015. In 2018, Los Angeles FC debuted in MLS as an expansion team, and in 2022 won the MLS Cup.


title: Magic Johnson

text: Johnson is a supporter of the Democratic Party. In 2006, he publicly endorsed Phil Angelides for Governor of California, in 2007 he supported Hillary Clinton in her presidential campaign, and in 2010 he endorsed Barbara Boxer in her race for re-election to the U.S. Senate. In 2012, he endorsed Barack Obama for president. He endorsed and appeared in campaign ads for unsuccessful Los Angeles mayoral candidate Wendy Greuel in 2013. In 2015, he once again endorsed Hillary Clinton in her second presidential campaign. He hosted a fundraiser for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign on August 22, 2016.


title: Magic Johnson

text: After announcing his infection in November 1991, Johnson created the Magic Johnson Foundation to help combat HIV, although he later diversified the foundation to include other charitable goals. In 1992, he joined the National Commission on AIDS, a committee appointed by members of Congress and the Bush Administration. Johnson left after eight months, saying that the White House had "utterly ignored" the work of the panel, and had opposed the commission's recommendations, which included universal healthcare and the expansion of Medicaid to cover all low-income people with AIDS. He was also the main speaker for the United Nations (UN) World AIDS Day Conference in 1999, and has served as a United Nations Messenger of Peace.


title: Magic Johnson

text: HIV had been associated with intravenous drug users and homosexuals, but Johnson's campaigns sought to show that the risk of infection was not limited to those groups. Johnson stated that his aim was to "help educate all people about what [HIV] is about" and teach others not to "discriminate against people who have HIV and AIDS". Johnson was later criticized by the AIDS community for his decreased involvement in publicizing the spread of the disease.


title: Magic Johnson

text: To prevent his HIV infection from progressing to AIDS, Johnson takes a daily combination of drugs, also called a drug cocktail. He has advertised GlaxoSmithKline's drugs, and partnered with Abbott Laboratories to publicize the fight against AIDS in African American communities.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: The 2022–23 UEFA Champions League is the 68th season of Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 31st season since it was renamed from the European Champion Clubs' Cup to the UEFA Champions League.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: The final will be played at the Atatürk Olympic Stadium in Istanbul, Turkey. The stadium was originally appointed to host the 2020 UEFA Champions League Final, but both this and the 2021 final, which had been subsequently re-allocated to the Atatürk, were moved due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The winner of the 2022–23 UEFA Champions League will automatically qualify for the 2023–24 UEFA Champions League group stage, and also earn the right to play against the winner of the 2022–23 UEFA Europa League in the 2023 UEFA Super Cup.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: Real Madrid are the defending champions, having won a record-extending fourteenth title in the previous edition.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: A total of 78 teams from 53 of the 55 UEFA member associations participate in the 2022–23 UEFA Champions League (the exceptions being Russia, who are banned from participating due to 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, and Liechtenstein, which does not organise a domestic league). The association ranking based on the UEFA association coefficients is used to determine the number of participating teams for each association:


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: For the 2022–23 UEFA Champions League, the associations are allocated places according to their 2021 UEFA association coefficients, which takes into account their performance in European competitions from 2016–17 to 2020–21.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: Apart from the allocation based on the association coefficients, associations may have additional teams participating in the Champions League, as noted below:


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: Due to the suspension of Russia for the 2022–23 European season, and since the Champions League title holders (Real Madrid) have qualified via their domestic league, the following changes to the access list have been made:<ref name="rus-susp-22/23"></ref>


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: The second qualifying round, third qualifying round and play-off round are divided into Champions Path (CH) and League Path (LP).


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: The schedule of the competition is as follows. All matches are played on Tuesdays and Wednesdays apart from the preliminary round final and the final. Scheduled kick-off times starting from the play-off round are 18:45 and 21:00 CEST/CET.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: As the 2022 FIFA World Cup takes place in Qatar between 20 November and 18 December 2022, the group stage commenced in the first week of September 2022 and concluded in the first week of November 2022 to make way for the World Cup.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: The draws for the qualifying round started at 12:00 CEST/CET and were held at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland. The group stage draw took place in Istanbul, Turkey.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: The draw for the group stage was held on 25 August 2022. The 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots, each of eight teams, based on the following principles:


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: Eintracht Frankfurt made their debut appearance in the group stage (and first appearance in the European Cup since their loss in the 1960 final) after winning the 2021–22 UEFA Europa League and, as a result, this was the first time that five German clubs played in the group stage.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: A total of 15 national associations were represented in the group stage. This season was the first since the 1995–96 edition in which a Turkish side failed to qualify for the group stage. It was also the first time since the 2007–08 season that two Scottish sides qualified for the group stage.


title: 2022–23 UEFA Champions League

text: In the knockout phase, teams play against each other over two legs on a home-and-away basis, except for the one-match final.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Robert Lewandowski (; born 21 August 1988) is a Polish professional footballer who plays as a striker for La Liga club Barcelona and captains the Poland national team. Recognised for his positioning, technique and finishing, Lewandowski is considered one of the best strikers of all time, as well as one of the most successful players in Bundesliga history. He has scored over 500 senior career goals for club and country.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: After being the top scorer in the third and second tiers of Polish football with Znicz Pruszków, Lewandowski moved to top-flight Lech Poznań, helping the team win the 2009–10 Ekstraklasa. In 2010, he transferred to Borussia Dortmund, where he won honors including two consecutive Bundesliga titles and the league's top goalscorer award. In 2013, he also featured with Dortmund in the 2013 UEFA Champions League Final. Prior to the start of the 2014–15 season, Lewandowski agreed to join Dortmund's domestic rivals, Bayern Munich, on a free transfer. In Munich, he won the Bundesliga title in every one of his eight seasons. Lewandowski was integral in Bayern's UEFA Champions League win in 2019–20 as part of a treble. He is one of only two players, alongside Johan Cruyff, to achieve the European treble while being the highest goalscorer in all three competitions, and the first to do it as the sole top scorer.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: A full international for Poland since 2008, Lewandowski has earned over 130 caps and was a member of their team at the UEFA European Championship in 2012, 2016, and 2020, and the FIFA World Cup in 2018 and 2022. With 77 international goals, Lewandowski is the all-time top scorer for Poland and the third overall men's international goalscorer in Europe, only behind Ferenc Puskás (84) and Cristiano Ronaldo (118). He won IFFHS World's Best International Goal Scorer Award in 2015 and 2021, IFFHS World's Best Top Goal Scorer Award in 2020 and 2021, and IFFHS World's Best Top Division Goal Scorer Award in 2021. He also won the IFFHS World's Best Player in 2020 and 2021 and the European Golden Shoe for the 2020–21 and 2021–22 seasons. Moreover, Lewandowski has been named the Polish Footballer of the Year a record ten times and the Polish Sports Personality of the Year three times.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: In 2020, Lewandowski won the Best FIFA Men's Player Award (retained in 2021) and the UEFA Men's Player of the Year Award. He has been named to the UEFA Team of the Year twice. He is the third-highest goalscorer in the history of the Champions League. Lewandowski has been named the VDV Bundesliga Player of the Season a record five times. He has scored over 300 goals in the Bundesliga (second-highest goalscorer of all time in Bundesliga, only behind Gerd Müller's 365 Bundesliga goals), having reached the century mark quicker than any other foreign player, and is the league's all-time leading foreign goalscorer. In 2015, while playing for Bayern, he scored five goals in less than nine minutes against VfL Wolfsburg, the fastest by any player in Bundesliga history as well as any major European football league for which he was awarded four Guinness World Records. Moreover, he has won the Bundesliga Top Scorer Award in seven seasons, most prominently in the 2020–21 Bundesliga where he scored 41 goals in a single campaign, breaking Gerd Müller's previous Bundesliga record of 40 goals, set in 1971–72. On 30 November 2021, he finished second in the Ballon d'Or, just 33 points behind the winner Lionel Messi.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski was born in Warsaw and grew up in Leszno, Warsaw West County. He took his first steps in football as an unregistered player for the local club, Partyzant Leszno. In 1997, he joined MKS Varsovia Warsaw, where as a teen he played for seven years. The following year he moved to 4th tier side Delta Warsaw, where he finally managed to play in the first team, scoring four goals at the end of the season.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: In , Lewandowski was the Polish third division's top goalscorer with 15 goals, helping Znicz Pruszków win the promotion. The next season, he was the top scorer in the Polish second highest division with 21 goals.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: In June 2008, Lech Poznań signed Lewandowski from Znicz for 1.5 million PLN. Earlier that month, Lewandowski's agent Cezary Kucharski offered him to his former team Sporting Gijón, which had been promoted to the La Liga, Spain's first division, after ten years in the Segunda División. However, Gijón rejected him.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: He debuted for Lech on 17 July 2008 as a substitute in the first qualifying first leg match of the UEFA Cup versus Khazar Lankaran from Azerbaijan, in which he scored the only goal of the evening in the 75th minute at the Tofiq Bahramov Republican Stadium. During his Ekstraklasa debut in the first game of the season, in a match against GKS Bełchatów, he scored a heel flick goal just four minutes after coming into the game late second half. In his first season in the Polish top division, he was second in the goal-scoring charts. Lewandowski finished the season with 18 goals in 42 matches. He also scored in a 1–1 away draw against Wisła Kraków in the 2009 Polish Super Cup on 27 July, and converted his attempt in the won penalty shoot-out. The next season, he became the top scorer with 18 goals and helped his team win the 2009–10 championship.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: English coach, Sam Allardyce, said that Lewandowski was about to join Premier League club Blackburn Rovers in 2010, but the volcanic ash clouds caused by the 2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull which suspended all flights in and out of the UK, in addition to other financial worries, prevented the potential transfer. Moreover, Lewandowski was also about to join Italian club Genoa, before president Enrico Preziosi decided to cancel the transfer.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Following press speculation that Lewandowski might move to one of a number of clubs, he joined Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund in June 2010, signing a four-year contract with the German club for a fee reported to be worth around €4.5 million. On 19 September, he scored his first goal in the Bundesliga to make it 3–0 in the Revierderby against Schalke 04; the game ended 3–1.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: In the 2011–12 Bundesliga campaign, Lewandowski profited from an injury to Lucas Barrios and he was elevated to an ever-present position in the starting XI until the winter break. The striker responded by finding the net two times in Dortmund's 3–0 DFB-Pokal first round victory over Sandhausen. Lewandowski opened his league account in a 2–0 win over Nürnberg on 20 August 2011 by providing the finishing touch from a Mario Götze cross. On 1 October, Lewandowski netted a hat-trick and provided an assist in the club's 4–0 victory over Augsburg, following a disappointing 0–3 loss to Marseille in the UEFA Champions League group stage. He later scored his first Champions League goal in a 1–3 away defeat to Olympiacos on 19 October. Dortmund climbed into second place in the Bundesliga with a comfortable 5–0 victory over Köln on 22 October, with Lewandowski finding the net either side of half-time. Dortmund travelled to Freiburg on 17 December and Lewandowski struck twice and provided an assist for Kevin Großkreutz, as Dortmund eased to a 4–1 triumph, scoring his first hat-trick in Bundesliga. Due to his strong performances, he was named Footballer of the Year in Poland.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Following the winter break, on 22 January 2012, Dortmund thrashed Hamburg 5–1 to move level on points with leaders Bayern Munich; Lewandowski netted twice and added an assist for Jakub Błaszczykowski in the rout. He scored in a 1–0 home win over Bayern Munich on 11 April. The result gave Dortmund a six-point cushion over their title rivals with only four games left to play. On 21 April, Lewandowski provided the assist for Shinji Kagawa's 59th-minute goal as Dortmund won 2–0 over Borussia Mönchengladbach to seal their second straight title. In the final Bundesliga game of the campaign, Lewandowski scored two first-half goals as Dortmund beat Freiburg 4–0 and celebrated lifting the title.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski finished the year as the third top goal scorer with 22 goals, none from the penalty spot, and six assists.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 12 May, in the final game of the season for Dortmund, he scored a hat-trick in the DFB-Pokal Final, a 5–2 win over Bayern Munich, to earn the club its first domestic double. Lewandowski finished as the DFB-Pokal's top goalscorer, with seven goals from six games.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 12 August 2012, Lewandowski began the 2012–13 season by scoring in the 1–2 2012 DFL-Supercup defeat to Bayern Munich. He made his first appearance of the 2012–13 Bundesliga campaign in Dortmund's 2–1 victory over Werder Bremen on the opening day of the season.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: He netted his first goal in a 3–0 victory over Bayer Leverkusen on 15 September 2012, extending Dortmund's run to 31 games unbeaten and moved the club into third in the Bundesliga. Three days later, in the club's first Champions League game of the season, Lewandowski scored an 87th-minute winner to defeat Ajax, 1–0. He set club's new record of the longest scoring streak, having scored in 12 consecutive league games, surpassing Friedhelm Konietzka's record from 1964–65 season. On 9 February 2013, he opened the scoring in a home match against Hamburg, but was sent off in the 31st minute for a foul on Per Ciljan Skjelbred and Dortmund lost 4–1.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: According to Borussia Dortmund director Michael Zorc, speaking in February 2013, Lewandowski would not be renewing his contract with the club, and would leave either in the summer of 2013 or after the 2013–14 season. He finished season with 24 league goals, one goal short of the Bundesliga's top scorer, Bayer Leverkusen's Stefan Kießling.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 27 February 2013, Lewandowski played in his side's 1–0 defeat to Bayern Munich in the 2012–13 DFB-Pokal quarter final. On 24 April, Lewandowski became the first player to score four goals in a Champions League semi-final as Borussia Dortmund defeated Spanish champions Real Madrid 4–1 in the first leg at Dortmund's Signal Iduna Park. On 25 May, he played in the 2013 UEFA Champions League Final in which Borussia Dortmund were defeated 1–2 by Bayern Munich.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 27 July 2013, Lewandowski won the 2013 DFL-Supercup with Dortmund, 4–2, against Bayern Munich. He scored his first goal of the season in Dortmund's 4–0 win over Augsburg in the club's opening Bundesliga match on 10 August. On 1 November, he scored his only hat-trick of the season in a 6–1 Bundesliga win against VfB Stuttgart.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 25 February 2014, Lewandowski scored twice in the Champions League round of 16 first leg against Zenit Saint Petersburg, becoming Dortmund's overall top scorer in European competition, surpassing Stéphane Chapuisat's 16 goals. He scored his 100th goal for the club on his 182nd appearance, as Dortmund defeated VfL Wolfsburg 2–0 in the semi-finals of the 2013–14 DFB-Pokal on 16 April, and revealed a shirt with the number 100 during celebration.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski ended the 2013–14 season as the top goalscorer in the Bundesliga with 20 goals, which earned him the . He also scored six goals in the Champions League, as Dortmund reached the quarter-finals. During the second leg of the round of 16 match between Borussia Dortmund and Zenit, Lewandowski received a second yellow card, which resulted in his suspension for the first leg of the quarter-final against Real Madrid.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski played his final match for Dortmund in the 2014 DFB-Pokal Final against Bayern Munich on 17 May. Head coach Jürgen Klopp had excused him from some training ahead of the final due to injury concerns; although Lewandowski played all 120 minutes of the final, Dortmund lost, 0–2. He finished the season with 28 goals in 48 matches.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: In November 2013, Lewandowski confirmed he would sign a pre-contractual agreement for Borussia Dortmund's rivals Bayern Munich, which officially happened on 3 January 2014, when he signed a five-year contract beginning at the start of the 2014–15 season. Lewandowski was officially presented as a Bayern Munich player on 9 July 2014.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Pre-season started on 9 July 2014 at which time he was presented. He made his pre–season debut against MSV Duisburg on 21 July, scoring a goal in the process. On 6 August, he opened the scoring as Bayern contested the 2014 MLS All-Star Game at the Providence Park in Portland, Oregon, eventually losing 1–2.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: He made his competitive debut for his new club in a 0–2 loss to Borussia Dortmund in the 2014 DFL-Supercup on 13 August 2014, and scored his first goal in a 1–1 draw against Schalke 04 in his second league match on 30 August. On 21 October, Lewandowski scored his first Champions League goal for Bayern Munich in a 7–1 away win against Roma. On 1 November, in his first league match against Dortmund, Lewandowski scored in a 2–1 win which put Bayern four points clear at the top of the table while leaving his former club in a relegation play-off place. In his third match of the season against Dortmund on 4 April 2015, Lewandowski scored in the 36th minute in a 1–0 win, after Dortmund's goalkeeper Roman Weidenfeller "parried" Thomas Müller's shot.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 21 February 2015, Lewandowski scored twice in Bayern's 6–0 win away at Paderborn, his second goal of the game was his 10th of the league season. He scored twice in the first half on 21 April as Bayern overturned a deficit from the first leg to defeat Porto 7–4 on aggregate and advance to the semi-finals of the Champions League. Five days later, after VfL Wolfsburg lost to Borussia Mönchengladbach, Bayern won the Bundesliga title. He scored again on 28 April, opening a 1–1 draw in the DFB-Pokal semi-final against Dortmund, but was later involved in a mid-air collision with Mitchell Langerak in the 116th minute of extra time. The game ended in Bayern's elimination via a penalty shoot-out (0–2), and, unusually, none of the four attempts were converted by the Munich side, at their own stadium. Although Lewandowski stayed until the end of the match, he didn't participate in the shootout; and tests later confirmed that he had fractured jaw and nose bone, and had a concussion, ruling him out for approximately one week. On 12 May, playing in a protective mask, he curled in at the 59th minute in his team's 3–2 home victory against eventual winners Barcelona in the Champions League semifinal second leg, albeit they were eliminated by an aggregate score of 3–5. With 17 goals in 31 games, Lewandowski was joint-second highest scorer of the Bundesliga season alongside teammate Arjen Robben, behind Eintracht Frankfurt's Alexander Meier. He finished the season with 25 goals in 49 appearances.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski's second season began with the 2015 DFL-Supercup on 1 August, with Bayern losing in a penalty shootout away to VfL Wolfsburg; he had been substituted in the 72nd minute for Rafinha. Eight days later in the DFB-Pokal first round match, he scored the last goal in a 3–1 win against Oberliga Baden-Württemberg club Nöttingen. On 14 August, in the opening match of the new Bundesliga season, he scored the second goal of a 5–0 win over Hamburg.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 22 September 2015, Lewandowski set a Bundesliga record by coming on as a substitute with Bayern trailing 0–1 to Wolfsburg and scoring five goals in 8 minutes and 59 seconds, the fastest by any player in Bundesliga history, to take a 5–1 lead. He also set Bundesliga records for the fastest hat-trick (three goals in four minutes), and most goals scored by a substitute (five). Lewandowski's five goals in nine minutes was also the fastest in any major European football league since Opta began keeping records, and it ended Wolfsburg's 14-match unbeaten run. He was awarded four certificates by Guinness World Records for this feat.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Four days later, he scored twice in a 3–0 win at Mainz, the first goal being his 100th Bundesliga goal on his 168th appearance, a league record for a foreign player. He also reached 10 goals in the opening 7 matches with this brace, a feat only achieved before by Gerd Müller. On 29 September, he scored a Champions League hat-trick in a 5–0 win over Dinamo Zagreb, putting him on ten goals in three games in a week. He added two in a 5–1 rout of Dortmund five days later, to total 12 goals in his last four appearances. On 24 October, Lewandowski scored in a 4–0 home win over 1. FC Köln, a result which made Bayern the first Bundesliga team ever to win all 10 of their opening games of a season. The victory in Cologne was also Bayern's 1,000th win in the Bundesliga. On 11 January 2016, he achieved fourth place at the 2015 FIFA Ballon d'Or awards.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 19 March 2016, Lewandowski scored the only goal in a 1–0 win against Köln to bring his league total up to 25 goals; a new personal best. He had scored 24 goals for Borussia Dortmund during the 2012–13 season. He also started Bayern's comeback with a 73rd-minute header in the second leg of the round of 16 on 16 March, after trailing 0–2 home to Juventus, which Munich eventually won 4–2 after extra time, and 6–4 on aggregate. His goal against Atlético Madrid on 3 May in the second leg of Bayern's Champions League semifinal exit saw him end the season's competition with nine goals.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 7 May 2016, Lewandowski scored both goals for Bayern in a 2–1 win at Ingolstadt to confirm the Bavarian club as champions of Germany for the fourth consecutive season. A week later, he scored his 30th goal of the season in Bayern's final league match of the season at home to Hannover 96. This made him the first foreign player to score 30 goals in the Bundesliga, the first player since Dieter Müller in 1976–77, and secured him the Torjägerkanone for the second time in three seasons. He finished the season with 42 goals in 51 matches.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: The 2016–17 season started with Bayern winning the 2016 DFL-Supercup on 14 August. Five days later, Bayern defeated Carl Zeiss Jena 5–0 in the DFB-Pokal first round, with the help of Lewandowski's hat-trick during the first half and assist to Arturo Vidal in the 72nd minute. He opened the 2016–17 Bundesliga season with another hat-trick in a 6–0 victory against Werder Bremen. On 13 December, Lewandowski signed a new contract with Bayern, keeping him at the club until 2021.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 11 March 2017, Lewandowski reached 100 goals for Bayern in his 137th appearance for the club, scoring twice in a 3–0 victory against Eintracht Frankfurt in the Bundesliga. He finished the season with 42 goals in 47 matches.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: The season began with Bayern Munich winning the 2017 DFL-Supercup against Borussia Dortmund, in which Lewandowski scored the opening goal for the Bavarians by controlling a low cross from Joshua Kimmich to cancel out Christian Pulisic's opener. The match ended 2–2 after extra time. Lewandowski, again, scored the first penalty of the shootout as Bayern eventually won 5–4.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski started from where he left in the last season and once again was the top scorer in the early stages of the 2017–18 Bundesliga. On 13 December, in the league fixture against Köln, he scored the only goal of the game, to reach Bundesliga's top ten goalscorers of all time. A couple of months later, on Matchday 22, Lewandowski again found the back of the net against Schalke 04 at the Allianz Arena to equal the record of scoring in 11 successive home games in a single season, a record also held by then Bayern manager Jupp Heynckes. He continued his goal scoring form by netting a hat-trick against Hamburg as the runaway leaders won 6–0, while he also missed a kick from the spot which would have been his fourth goal of the day. This was his first penalty missed for Bayern in the Bundesliga, nevertheless he scored the second spot kick to complete his hat-trick.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 11 February 2018, he was voted Poland's Footballer of the Year for the seventh time in a row. On 22 February, he fired his long-time agent, Cezary Kucharski. Lewandowski hired renowned dealmaker Pini Zahavi as his new agent; the hiring of Zahavi was rumoured to be the start of Lewandowski trying to seal a summer move to Real Madrid. On 24 February, he played his 250th Bundesliga game against Hertha BSC. On 19 May, Lewandowski scored Bayern's only goal in a 3–1 defeat in the DFB-Pokal Final against Eintracht Frankfurt.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski finished the league as the Bundesliga's top goalscorer with 29 goals. This was the third time he won the Torjägerkanone award. He finished the season with 41 goals in 48 matches in all competitions.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 1 August, after a summer of transfer speculation, Bayern CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, confirmed in an interview that Lewandowski would not be allowed to leave Bayern at any price, saying "the top quality we have at Bayern Munich will stay here. With Robert, we clearly want to send a signal to people within and outside the club: Bayern Munich are completely different to other clubs who get weak when certain sums are mentioned" On 12 August, Lewandowski recorded the first ever hat-trick in the DFL-Supercup in a 0–5 away victory against Eintracht Frankfurt in the 2018 edition as Bayern Munich went on to win the title for the record seventh time. He also became the all-time top scorer in the German Supercup history.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 27 November, Lewandowski became the third-fastest player to score 50 goals (after Lionel Messi and Ruud van Nistelrooy) in the Champions League, when he scored two goals in a 5–1 group stage home win over Benfica. It took Lewandowski just 77 Champions League matches to reach the milestone. He finished as the top scorer in the Champions League group stage with eight goals in six matches. On 9 February 2019, Lewandowski scored in a 3–1 win over Schalke 04 and became the first player to score 100 competitive goals at the Allianz Arena. His goal was also his 119th league goal for Bayern Munich, which saw him draw level with Roland Wohlfarth as the club's third-highest goalscorer of all-time.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: He surpassed Wohlfarth the following month after scoring a brace in a 5–1 win over Borussia Mönchengladbach, with his second goal also seeing him equal Claudio Pizarro's record of 195 league goals for the most Bundesliga goals by a foreign player. In his very next fixture, he broke Pizarro's record by scoring twice in a 6–0 win over Wolfsburg. On 6 April, in the 100th Bundesliga meeting between Bayern Munich and Dortmund, Lewandowski scored twice in a 5–0 win, with his first goal taking him to 200 goals in the league.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: Lewandowski ended the league campaign as the Bundesliga's top goalscorer with 22 goals for the fourth time. On 25 May, he scored a brace as Bayern won against Leipzig 3–0 in the 2019 DFB-Pokal Final. With his goals, he became the all-time top scorer in the DFB-Pokal finals with six, surpassing Gerd Müller on five. Lewandowski finished the season with 40 goals in 47 matches in all competitions, reaching the 40-goal landmark for the fourth consecutive season, also winning his second domestic double with Bayern.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 12 August, Lewandowski scored his first goal of the season when Bayern defeated Energie Cottbus 3–1 in the first round of the DFB-Pokal. Four days later, he scored two goals in the 2019–20 Bundesliga opener against Hertha BSC. With his goals, Lewandowski set a Bundesliga record for scoring a goal in the season opener for the fifth year in a row. He then scored a hat-trick against Schalke at the Veltins Arena on 24 August, as the Reds won 3–0. On 29 August, Lewandowski extended his contract at Bayern until 2023. Lewandowski scored his 200th goal for Bayern in a 3–0 win against Serbian club Red Star Belgrade in the Champions League on 18 September. Later that month, after scoring his tenth goal of the campaign during a 3–2 win over Paderborn 07, he became the first player in Bundesliga history to achieve double figures for goals scored after the first six match rounds. Lewandowski then became the first player in Bundesliga history to score in each of the opening nine, ten and eleven matches of a season, surpassing the record of eight set by former Borussia Dortmund striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. On 26 November, Lewandowski scored 4 goals in under 15 minutes as Bayern defeated Red Star Belgrade 6–0 in their reverse fixture and clinched first place in their Champions League group, setting a new record for fastest time to score four goals in a Champions League match. He also became only the second player ever to score four goals in multiple Champions League matches.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 25 February 2020, Lewandowski equalled Cristiano Ronaldo's record of nine away goals in a season in Europe's top club competition. He did so by scoring a goal in a 3–0 win against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge (he also assisted Serge Gnabry twice in that match). On 10 August, Lewandowski scored a brace and provided two assists in a 4–1 win over Chelsea in the return leg. On 14 August, he assisted and scored in Bayern's 8–2 decimation of Barcelona in the quarter-finals. Lewandowski scored another goal, to be 15 goals in total, in his ninth consecutive Champions League match in Bavarian's semifinal 3–0 win against Lyon. His European scoring streak ended when he failed to score a goal in the Champions League final match against Paris Saint-Germain on 23 August; nevertheless, Bayern defeated PSG 1–0, giving Lewandowski his first Champions League title. He also became the second player ever to win the European treble while being the top scorer in all three competitions, repeating Johan Cruyff's achievement with Ajax from the 1971–72 season. However, Lewandowski was the first to do so as the sole top scorer in all three competitions.


title: Robert Lewandowski

text: On 24 September, Lewandowski assisted Leon Goretzka's opener in 2–1 victory over 2019–20 UEFA Europa League winners Sevilla in the 2020 UEFA Super Cup in Budapest. 6 days later, he played in Bayern's 3–2 win over Borussia Dortmund in the 2020 DFL-Supercup, to win their fifth trophy of the year. On 4 October, he scored all four goals in a 4–3 win against Hertha BSC. On 24 October, he scored a hat-trick in a 5–0 win against Eintracht Frankfurt, to become the first player in Bundesliga to score ten goals in only five matches. On 16 December, he scored a brace against Wolfsburg to be the third player to pass the 250-goal mark in Bundesliga, after Gerd Müller and Klaus Fischer. After winning the treble with Bayern Munich and his performances in the tournaments, he was named The Best FIFA Men's Player 2020 on 17 December, becoming the first Polish player to win the award. The cancellation of the 2020 Ballon d'Or was met with extensive criticism, as most news and sports organisations believed Lewandowski was the front-runner and should have won the award.