Who is Larry Bird? Though the name sounds like a character from Disney’s animated movies, the man himself has had a lot of action in his career and is a fierce NBA basketball player.
Larry Bird’s accomplishments and stats make him one of the greatest pure shooters of all time. Born in 1956, in the state of Indiana, this player is known as the biggest reason behind why the Boston Celtics were led to the NBA championship in 1981, 1984, and 1986. Looking at his stats alone, he is known as one of the greatest pure shooters in the history of basketball.
He is another basketball legend in this list whose passion for the sport sparkled in him at a very young age. While attending Indiana State University, Birds was so into basketball that he was trying to find ways to revive the basketball program back in his university. Some say he greatly succeeded as by the senior season, he was able to lead the team to a 33-1 record in a season. With a fantastic season in process, Indiana State however, lost against Michigan State, which started a famous rivalry in the NCAA between Magic Johnson and Larry Bird. This rivalry was so heated and known that it proceeded to become a centerpiece in the NBA as well.
After his junior year at Indiana State, he dropped out of college and joined the NBA, playing for the Celtics in 1979. In his first year, from 1979 – 1980, he won the rookie of the year award, due to his largest number of single season turnarounds. This is kind of when the trash talking and self complementing begins in his career. After this award in his first year of playing, he calls his legacy as one of the greatest in NBA history. Though his high confidence was matched by his high performance, whenever he stepped on the court tensions rose from his 6ft 9in body and strong character. With him, the Celtics won the NBA championship title three times: 1981, 1984, and 1986. He also played 12 times in the All star games and won the Most Valuable Player award 3 times in a row from 1984 to 1986. By the end of his career he scored 21791 points making it the 11th highest to the present day. In 1998 he was elected to be in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. He also played in the Olympics in 1992, with him and his team winning a gold medal.
He retired in 1992 and became the coach for the Celtics team. In 1997, he won the Coach of the Year award. He resigned from the post in 2000 and became Pacers’ president of basketball operations, winning the award of the Executive of the Year right before resigning from the job in 2012. He rejoined as the president in 2013 again, but then stepped down in 2017.
With a crazy amount of achievement, right till the very end of his career, maybe Bird wasn’t wrong when he said his legacy will be one of the greatest in basketball. Though he did have a big mouth on him, he was still able to fulfill and keep the words that came out of it.
Sources:
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Stephen-Curry
https://www.nbcsports.com/boston/celtics/larry-bird
loved reading about Larry Bird and his elite NBA career. The only confusing part about the blog is that it says that he took his college team to a large winning streak in senior year but then goes to say that he dropped out of college to go to the NBA in junior year.