When the Game Was Ours - Larry Bird [84]
"Well, they're here," he said, to no one in particular.
Inside the second limousine, Earvin Johnson sat perched by the window. He surveyed the landscape of the modest Indiana town adjacent to French Lick, the birthplace of his most ardent competitor. Magic was surprised to discover it stirred memories of his own midwestern roots.
"This reminds me of Lansing," he said to his agent, Charles Tucker, squinting through the tinted windows.
Johnson fidgeted in the back seat. He was uneasy. He had spent the balance of his young career aiming to establish the upper hand in this increasingly heated rivalry between himself and Bird, the Lakers and the Celtics, and yet now he was traveling to Bird's backyard to engage in a joint endorsement campaign for Converse sneakers.
He knew how his Lakers coach, Pat Riley, would feel about it. He would be enraged. Riley despised the Celtics and would undoubtedly chafe at the knowledge that his star player was knowingly and willingly embracing his nemesis.
As the limos snaked up Bird's gravel driveway, Johnson leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes.
"Maybe," he lamented, "I shouldn't be doing this."
Bird, trailing the caravan back to his house, was also having second thoughts. He regularly chastised Celtics teammates who fraternized with the opponent before big games, yet here he was, hosting the player who had proved to be his most worthy adversary.
Bird didn't like the commotion that three luxury vehicles kicking up dust on his town's main thoroughfare was bound to cause. As he watched the limos driving toward his house, he wondered to himself, "Why in hell did I say yes to this?"
***
The finished product took all of 28 carefully scripted seconds, but the tenor of the relationship between pro basketball's premier dueling superstars was altered permanently on that early fall afternoon when Magic and Larry came together to sell Lakers gold and purple and Celtics black Converse basketball sneakers.
Until that point, the interaction between the two had been limited to cursory small talk. That was by design. As Boston and Los Angeles emerged as the premier teams in the NBA, the inevitable animosity between the two franchises—and their main characters—began festering. Whenever queried on his partner in this East versus West dance, Bird was predictably restrained, making it clear he had no interest in developing a relationship with his rival.
"I admired the hell out of Magic," Bird said, "but I didn't care to know him."
Although the two players rarely engaged in banter on the court during their twice-a-year regular season meetings, it did not preclude them from issuing challenges away from the action. In Bird's and Magic's second season in the league, Johnson was sidelined with a knee injury when the Celtics made their annual pilgrimage to the Forum on February 11, 1981. Bird spotted Johnson sitting on the bench in street clothes and went over to shake his hand.
"Now you just sit there and relax. I'm going to put on a show for you," Bird said.
By the time Bird was done, his stat line encompassed a cornucopia of basketball delights: 36 points, 21 rebounds, 6 assists, 5 steals, 3 blocks. He also played all but one minute of the 105–91 Celtics win. All Magic could do was watch as Bird unveiled one spectacular play after the next, pointedly staring in Johnson's direction after each basket.
"Drove me crazy," Magic admitted. "He was sticking it right in my face."
No wonder, then, that there was hesitation from both men about letting down their competitive guard for the sake of an endorsement payday.
Converse hatched the idea of the "Choose Your Weapon" shoe campaign while chronicling the drama of the 1984 and 1985 Finals. They approached Bird's and Johnson's representatives about a joint venture, and predictably, the initial response was negative.
"Forget about it," Magic said.
Bird was equally emphatic. Although his attorney, Bob Woolf, lobbied for him to do the commercial by pointing out the obvious financial benefits, Boston's forward was unmoved.
"Magic was the enemy,"