When the Game Was Ours (44 page)

Gaston nodded. M.L. did too. One week later, they announced with great fanfare the signing of Wilkins to a three-year, $11 million contract. 'Nique's brief tenure with Boston was a colossal disappointment. He bickered with coach Chris Ford, shot 42 percent from the floor, and eventually asked out of his deal so he could escape overseas. Wilkins's only contribution of any significance in a Celtics uniform was to score the final points in the legendary Boston Garden before it was torn down.

Bird officially terminated his relationship with the Celtics in 1997, but his connection to the only franchise he had ever played for had been damaged beyond repair long before that. The only reason
Larry didn't leave sooner was that, after undergoing fusion surgery on his back, his surgeon warned him the recovery would be slow and fraught with potential difficulty. Bird stayed on the Celtics payroll so he could continue to be treated by his Boston medical team.

Although Magic often publicly lamented Bird's fractured relationship with the Celtics, number 33 refused to dwell on the split.

"I'm pretty good at moving on," he said.

Upon his departure from the Celtics, Bird retreated to Naples, Florida, where he fished, played golf, splashed in his pool with his young children, Conner and Mariah, and spent many evenings watching the Miami Heat play. He became fixated on Pat Riley's ability to motivate his players, and as Bird took mental notes of Riley's strategies, for the first time he experienced the urge to try coaching himself.

In May 1997, Pacers president Donnie Walsh contacted Bird about Indiana's coaching vacancy, in part because he was Larry Legend from Indiana and would generate some buzz for the team. Yet Walsh also wanted some assurances that Bird had given some thought to his coaching style.

"So what would you do with this team?" Walsh asked Bird.

He was expecting a general answer. Instead, Bird took Walsh from his first practice all the way through the NBA Finals, something Walsh had never seen before and does not expect to see again. Bird's detailed response included specific examples of how he'd run practice, what time the plane would leave, what offense he'd use, how he'd deal with the media, and a breakdown of each player outlined by their strengths and weaknesses.

"Oh, and one more thing," Bird said. "I'm only coaching three years. No matter what happens. After three years, your players tune you out."

Some of his ideas were his own. Others he adopted from conversations with Portland assistant coach Rick Carlisle, who had given him a binder overflowing with coaching techniques before the interview.

After Bird landed the job, he lured Carlisle and fellow Portland assistant coach Dick Harter to Indianapolis. In their first meeting,
Bird told them, "I'm going to pump these guys up and give them so much confidence that by my third year here we'll make the Finals."

He gave Harter the responsibility of running the defense and put Carlisle in charge of the offense, including diagramming the plays in the huddle. It was a highly unusual move to give so much responsibility to an assistant, but Bird didn't care. He was learning. Carlisle was better than he was at drawing up the plays.

Bird's expectations were straightforward: be in shape, be respectful, be on time. He enforced all three. In his first year, the Pacers were taking a charter flight to Nashville, Tennessee, for an exhibition game against the Charlotte Hornets. At precisely 4:00
P.M.
, Bird signaled for the pilot to start the engine and take off. At 4:03, Dale Davis and Travis Best ran out onto the tarmac, bags in hand. The pilot cut the engine. Bird signaled for him to rev it up again. The door remained closed and the plane took off, leaving two of the team's key players standing on the runway in disbelief.

Bird was enthused about the team's nucleus: Reggie Miller, his scorer and his leader; center Rik Smits; veteran point guard Mark Jackson; and redoubtable forwards Dale Davis and Antonio Davis (no relation). His bench included Best and the versatile Jalen Rose, and when he acquired former Dream Team teammate Chris Mullin, Bird felt that he had the ammunition to make a run at Jordan and his Bulls.

Indiana catapulted from 39 to 58 wins, the biggest turnaround in franchise history. Bird was voted NBA Coach of the Year, and the team advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals, where they lost to the Bulls in seven games.

The Pacers limped home knowing they had been one play away from shocking Jordan's team. Midway through the fourth quarter of Game 7, Indiana was up by three points when a jump ball was called between Jordan and the seven-foot Smits.

As the players gathered around the circle, Bird noticed Scottie Pippen and Reggie Miller jockeying for position. He didn't like how Pippen was a shade in front of Miller.

"Reggie could get beat on that," he thought to himself.

Indiana's alignment was set up perfectly for Smits to tip behind
his head—except that, as Bird realized in a moment of horror, his center never tipped that way.

The coach turned to his assistants to make sure he had a timeout. In that moment of hesitation, the ball was tossed. Bird hollered for time, but it was too late. Pippen stepped in front of Miller to intercept the tip, and the Bulls turned the possession into a Steve Kerr three-pointer. Indiana went on to lose the game and the series.

For the next three months, Bird brooded over his rookie mistake. He knew from his own playing days that chances at the Finals were fleeting, and it gnawed at him that he had cost his veterans a chance to get there.

The following season Smits battled foot troubles, and some of the older players began grumbling about their reduced roles. Again the Pacers made it to the Eastern Conference Finals, and again they were denied a trip to the Finals, this time by Patrick Ewing of "Harry and Larry" fame.

The Pacers juggled their personnel during the off-season, trading Antonio Davis for high school phenom Jonathan Bender and placing Jalen Rose in the starting lineup. He responded by leading the team in scoring. Bird perused the NBA rosters, searching for a scorer and rebounder who could put them over the top. He called the seaside town of Split, Croatia, and tracked down former Celtic Dino Radja, who had played two and a half seasons with Boston but left under vague circumstances.

"Dino, this is Larry Bird," he said. "I want to talk to you about coming back to the NBA and playing with the Pacers."

"How did you get this number?" Radja said.

"I don't remember who gave it to me—what difference does it make?" Bird said. "If this is a bad time, I can call you back. I'm trying to make you an offer to come back and play."

"Oh, okay ... I see," Radja said.

"We have a chance to win a championship," Bird said. "We could use another front-court player. I thought you would fit in nicely with what we are trying to do."

"I'm sorry," Radja said. "How did you say you got this number?"

An exasperated Bird finally hung up. Years later, he ran into
Radja during a scouting trip in Croatia. "You know, Dino, you cost me a real good chance of winning a championship," he said.

"I know, Larry," Radja said. "I'm sorry. I was going through some tough times."

In November 1999, in Bird's third (and final) season as head coach, the team stood at 7–7 and had just been thrashed by Seattle on the road. With Portland up next, Indiana was looking at the prospect of its first losing month since Bird arrived.

Bird had said little about the poor showing against the Sonics the night before. But when he gathered his team together minutes before tip-off against the Blazers, he let them know he hadn't forgotten.

"Listen," Bird said, "I'm going to give you guys one more chance tonight, because what happened in Seattle was an embarrassment to the game of basketball. If you guys don't play, don't worry. I'll find someone who will."

Indiana went on to beat Portland and won 15 of its next 17 games. It was the springboard to a 56-win season, a 25-game winning streak at home, and the elusive trip to the Finals against league MVP Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, and the Los Angeles Lakers.

The Lakers were heavily favored, and the Pacers couldn't match their depth or talent, even when Kobe went down with an injured ankle. After Indiana fell in six games, Smits retired, Jackson signed elsewhere, and Dale Davis was traded. Bird resigned, just as he said he would, despite entreaties from Walsh to remain.

He drove back down to Florida, looked around his beautiful home, and asked Dinah, "Now what am I going to do?"

Both Magic and Bird had visions of owning an NBA franchise. Johnson joined a bid to buy the Toronto Raptors headed by construction magnate Larry Tanenbaum and Labatt Breweries (a founding partner of the Toronto Blue Jays baseball team), but they lost out to a group that swayed the expansion committee by proposing a centrally located downtown site accessible by public transportation.

Bird and businessman Steve Belkin formed a group to buy a new
franchise in Charlotte, but the expansion committee instead chose a group headed by billionaire Robert Johnson, the founder of Black Entertainment Television (BET), making him the first African American majority owner in the NBA.

Both Magic and Larry walked away from their ownership bids bitterly disappointed. While they still enjoyed unparalleled cachet in basketball circles, when it came to buying an NBA team they were simply two more businessmen trying to cash in on the success of the very league they helped grow into a flourishing multimillion-dollar empire. Magic had already been a minority owner of the Lakers for years, but he still wistfully wondered what it would be like to have his own team.

Although Bird had been retired from basketball for almost a decade, he was still in demand for private shows and appearances for Fortune 500 companies. The most lucrative requests were for Magic and Larry to appear in tandem. During these occasional rendezvous, both men noted that the laughter came more easily and the camaraderie more naturally now that there were no championships at stake.

And every time they made solo appearances, they fielded the same questions: What's Larry like? What's Magic like? Their lives had become intertwined, like vines from an old tree that had crossed paths so many times they were permanently entangled. The world remained fixated on their relationship.

"When I came into the league," Bird told an audience of financiers, "I wanted to make a million dollars. Magic wanted to make a hundred million dollars. And we both got what we wanted."

As a player, Magic cut his own licensing agreement with the NBA and left other players kicking themselves for not thinking of it first. When the Lakers were on the road, he'd hobnob with corporate executives in each city, becoming friendly with power brokers like Hollywood's Michael Ovitz and Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz.

Johnson's mission was to establish thriving businesses in under-served communities. Where others saw urban blight and decay,
Magic saw opportunity. He signed a partnership with Sony Entertainment and opened a 12-screen multiplex theater at the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza in Los Angeles. His inner-city theaters featured murals of African American heroes like Martin Luther King Jr. and Jackie Robinson. He insisted on multiple concession stands offering cultural snacks and stadium seating.

As Magic conceptualized the revitalization of city neighborhoods, it was apparent to him that the glaring omission in his vision was the lack of a meeting place. In 1998, through a partnership with Starbucks, he opened his first Urban Coffee Opportunities store in Los Angeles.

His formula proved to be a stunning success. Magic Enterprises grew to be worth more than $500 million, yet it was his unique way of assisting minorities while still turning a profit that made him the envy of his NBA peers. Players who used to flock to Johnson for basketball advice now approached him as their business guru.

"Forget all the basketball stuff," said Charles Barkley. "The economic opportunities he provided poor people in their own communities is the most remarkable thing he's ever done."

Johnson continued to educate the world about HIV and AIDS, writing children's books and appearing regularly on the talk-show circuit. When both diseases emerged as a major problem in China, he filmed public service announcements with national hero Yao Ming.

"My goal after I found out I was HIV-positive was not to let that define me," Johnson said. "It has been a long road, but I think people only see that as a small part of my life now."

In 2002 Bird finally relented and accepted an offer from Donnie Walsh to return to the Pacers in a front-office role as president of basketball operations.

On the surface, the Pacers had all the tools to contend for a title. They had Reggie Miller, one of the most lethal shooters of all time, and Jermaine O'Neal, a blue-chip center in the prime of his career. Forward Ron Artest, the most versatile player on the roster, was
powerful, hit shots, could defend, and was notably unselfish on the floor. In 2003–2004, Artest averaged 18.3 points, 5.7 rebounds, and 3.7 assists and was named Defensive Player of the Year.

After Artest led Indiana to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2004, Bird and Walsh briefly discussed trading him while his value was at its peak. Ultimately, the Pacers stood pat, and for a while the decision paid dividends.

Artest, O'Neal, and the mercurial Stephen Jackson set the tone in practice with hard fouls and incessant trash-talking. Their emotions were their greatest asset and their biggest weakness. Reggie Miller, the consummate professional, tried to provide a calming influence, but there was only so much he could do.

"Some days he'd just look at me and shake his head," Bird said.

On the night of November 19, 2004, Bird sat in his living room watching his team put the finishing touches on a critical win over the Detroit Pistons in Auburn Hills, Michigan. There were only 45.9 seconds to go when Artest thumped Detroit big man Ben Wallace as he drove to the basket. It was a hard foul in a game that was already decided, and Wallace wheeled around and shoved Artest to articulate his displeasure. That ignited a mild skirmish between both benches, but officials separated the players and appeared to successfully quell any further tensions.