He played basketball like chess, announced 40 point performances and mocked his opponents. Larry Bird was a legend. The rivalry with Magic Johnson and the Showtime-Lakers shaped the NBA like no other, but both had a close friendship. Birds arrival in Boston changed everything and enabled the Celtics the renaissance of glorious times. Everything would have been almost completely different.
This article was first published on 18. February 2015.
Larry Bird is down. He kneels on all fours on the 7th. November 1987 in the Capital Arena of the Washington Bullets and can’t believe it. He had just converted a threesome in the second overtime and brought his Celtics a few seconds before the end of the match – but Bird’s litter doesn’t count. Boston coach K. C. Jones had taken a split-second time-out earlier.
Then Larry gets up, his eyes get sharp again. He walks resolutely back to the bank and says,”Hey guys, give me the ball in exactly the same position and I’ll put it back in again,” drop Danny Ainge, pass to Bird on the three-line. Larry turns, jumps off with one foot and hits again! For the second time this evening, Larry sinks the decisive throw – and this time he counts. Washington scores again, but as if it were nothing, Bird follows with the Buzzer another threesome. Celtics wins 140-139. Bird scored 47 points.
Coach Jones later reported that Bird had told the Bullets before the throw-in that he would get the ball and hit the ball again to equalize. For any other player that would have caused unbelieving faces, but not for Larry Bird. Everyone in the league knew their way. A style that earned Bird respect, but which he has also consistently demonstrated with outstanding accomplishments that contributed to the creation of the Larry Bird legend. Before he became a star in the NBA, the life of the former Celtics was anything but easy.
As one in six children, Lawrence Joe Bird grew up in extremely poor circumstances. His home village, the little French Lick in the middle of Indiana, had just 2000 inhabitants – and a school whose gymnasium quickly became the centre of Bird’s life.
The news spread like wildfire throughout the district that a white boy had raised the local high school team to a new level. The games soon attracted 1600 spectators – more than three-quarters of French Lick’s residents – for one reason only: they wanted to watch Larry Bird, a moderately agile boy, play basketball. Larry played 31 points and 21 rebounds in his senior year for Springs Valley High School and became famous in the region.
Enough for Bobby Knight. The coaching legend brought Bird to the renowned Indiana University, but the glamorous world of the great college was nothing for Larry. After only a month in the Jersey of the Hoosiers he left and returned home – also because he wanted to take care of his family.
Bird was just 18 years old when his father took his own life. His mother could barely feed the children and Larry supported them in their misery. He began working as a garbage collector in his hometown to make a financial contribution to his family.
For a year, Bird led a modest existence between work, family and household. A life without basketball. But then he realized that this wasn’t all life had planned for him.
Despite all the love for his deceased dad – he wasn’t the type of guy who was doing his job in a small village that just brought in enough to make ends meet. He wanted to change something, wanted to give his mother a better life. And there’s one thing that Larry was particularly good at: playing basketball.
So Bird enrolled at the small and less successful Indiana State University in Terre Haute and continued exactly where he left off in high school. He dominated every playing field he entered and scored an average of more than 30 points and 10 rebounds for the Sycamores.
With Larry, the team clinched 82 victories in three years with only 13 defeats. In Bird’s senior year 1978/79, the university even reached the NCAA finals for the first time in its history. Against Michigan State, the Sycamores lost out because the Defense Bird made life hell – and because a certain Earvin “Magic” Johnson made a grandiose appearance on the Spartan side.
The matchup between the two exceptional talents electrified the entire country – and in the end it was only the first of many historical duels. At the same time, it laid the foundation for the greatest rivalry in NBA history and laid the foundation for a wonderful friendship.
Bird had already been drafted to sixth position by the Celtics in 1978, but like Johnson, he didn’t enter the NBA until 1979. After being named Most Outstanding Player at the March Madness with the first pick of the Lakers.
At the same time, Bird arrived at Celtics and changed everything. In his first game in green, Larry managed a double-double, and at the end of the season he was voted Rookie of the Year. Celtics improved by 32 victories to 61:21 and entered the conference finals. There they were defeated by the 76s around Julius Erving, but it was only a stopover on the way to the renaissance of the glorious old times of Bill Russell and Co. be.
Between 1980 and 1987 Boston entered the finals five times, and three times the C’s ended up lifting the Larry O’ Brien Trophy. In the other two final series, the Lakers led by Magic Johnson thwarted their plans.
The duel of the two stars polarized the league like no other and was exactly what American basketball needed at that time. The popularity of the NBA had declined sharply in the 1970s, but then came Larry and Earvin. The audience figures exploded suddenly.
The two different types were perfect for a rivalry that Hollywood couldn’t have drawn better. On one side Bird. White man from the village. The all-rounder with unshakeable self-confidence. In the jersey of the most successful franchise in history.
Opposite him the coloured Johnson. The head of the Showtime-Lakers. Always smiling. Always in a good mood. At home in the glamour world of Los Angeles with the arch-rival of Celtics, the Los Angeles Lakers.
But as bitter as Bird and Magic on the court were also fighting for supremacy in the NBA, they became close friends privately. The two opponents got to know each other – and especially appreciated each other – during a shoe-advertising shoot.
Although they saw each other only a few times a year, a special bond developed between them, partly because of the rivalry that surrounded them on the outside. So rang on the 7th. November 1991 Bird’s telephone in Boston and Magic told him – even before the official press conference – about his HIV infection and the upcoming resignation.
“We’ve always thought about each other and I was sure he wanted to know – personally,”says Johnson,”I was glad I could tell Larry and I knew he would support me.”
Bird has not forgotten the moment of this call to this day:”That was the worst feeling imaginable,” he later said,”At that time the diagnosis was like a death sentence, but I believed Earvin when he told me that he would survive. Still, I couldn’t usually wait to get into the hall, but the day I got that call was the only time I didn’t feel like playing basketball.”
The two eternal rivals experienced a special moment when Johnson came to Boston for Bird’s farewell ceremony at TD Garden in 1993. Under his Lakers-Jacket Magic wore a shirt of the Boston Celtics and held a moving speech – just like Bird nine years later at Johnson’s admission to the Hall of Fame.
Page 1: Beginnings and the Relationship to Magic
Page 2: Trash talker before the Lord