NBA Hall-of-Famer Earvin "Magic" Johnson beat a lot of top competition on his way to winning five NBA championships. With that in mind, it may surprise you that despite staring down fellow greats like Larry Bird and Michael Jordan, Johnson doesn't consider either of them his toughest opponent. Johnson said that distinction belongs to the board for Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX).
Johnson's post-NBA career exploits as a businessman are well-known, but Rome wasn't built in a day, and he faced numerous challenges on the way to becoming a real estate and business mogul. One of his earliest deals was to open a Starbucks coffee store in South Los Angeles. At the time, there were very few, if any, Starbucks serving urban neighborhoods and Johnson wanted to change that. There was just one problem.
