Larry was a rare Bird indeed

First appeared on June 29th, 2012
in The Lebanon Reporter

Larry Bird was a good man. I think it’s Proverbs that says “A man of understanding is of an excellent spirit”; that was Larry, always full of life…what’s that? He’s not dead? Oh, sorry I guess it’s just the melodramatic side of me that wants to wax poetic about someone retiring as if they were dead.

It’s the natural reaction all card carrying part time pretend sports columnists are required to have anytime someone in the sports world hangs them up. And Larry is. Well, at least for a year anyway. The kids call it flirting with retirement and that’s what you do when you’ve seen the top.

It would seem Americans are good at three things. Fighting, eating and waxing sentimental over the lives of people they’ve never met and most likely never will. But we’re Hoosiers and when Larry Bird is involved all bets are off. The rules simply don’t apply.

Most first saw him in the baby blue of Indiana State, hair gold as a shock of wheat and socks pulled to his ears. He would go on to become part of so many seminal moments in basketball history-the 1979 NCAA Title Game, the Lakers and Celtics rivalry of the 80’s and the Olympic Dream Team of 1992, that his place on the Mount Rushmore of basketball was solidified long before he was both NBA Coach and Executive of the year (1998 & 2012).

When I was twelve my Dad took me to a Celtics game at Market Square Arena. It was like stepping into another world, as if we’d been teleported to Boston upon clearing the turnstiles. The entire arena (and that is not an exaggeration) was a sea of green.
The crowd cheered louder for the Celtics and booed anytime the Pacers dared to fight back. Watching Bird warm up was more memorable than the game. There were no reverse dunks or three quarter court shots with his back to the basket; but the guy didn’t miss a shot, not one. I should know because after he’d made his fifth straight three pointer my eyes didn’t leave him for the rest of pregame.

Bird’s range extended well beyond the 23 feet 9 inches of the NBA three point line too. When I was in elementary school I wore his black Converse Weapons and my best friend Todd had the Lakers version (purple and gold). We wound up on opposing intramural teams fully expecting life to imitate art.

In a perfect world Todd would have had a baby sky-hook and we’d have played for the championship 3 times. And after realizing that whipping a towel over my head wouldn’t be enough to beat him I would have sulked in the locker room before telling the press my fourth grade teammates played like a “bunch of sissies”.

Larry was the sole reason a pimply 14 year old in Cass County Indiana wore the same Celtics jersey everyday for countless summers. At the time he fancied himself a tough match up on the blacktop, but looking back he supposes it had more to do with the fact nobody wanted to guard him since his mother refused to do the laundry more than once a week.

So we’re left to find a way to deal with his loss again. To close another of life’s chapters and find a way to move on knowing there are moments we can simply never have back. And while Todd and I may never film a Converse commercial together, he knows I’d still own him anytime, anywhere and I guess that’s enough.

© 2012 Eric Walker Williams