Re: May: Pitino Disputes Bird Book

[j.hironaka@unesco.org]

Dan Forant Sr wrote:

> So what's Larry going to do now? Bitch in a book. Why did he leave Boston
> like a mouse if he's miffed. He should have stayed and fought. Doesn't seem
> the Celts wanted or needed him. You need personality and patience for
> management. Sounds like sour grapes coming from the Bird man.

Larry Bird occasionally reveals a side of him that is a bit petty and mean
spirited. Coming from a player of his stature, it seems gratuitous to take
parting cheap shots at far lesser players like Dee Brown, David Wesley, Dana
Barros. It's not that his player evaluations aren't often wonderfully
on-the-mark (I love that he praised Sherman Douglas and trashed ML's Antique
Wilkins signing), but IMO Bird should have just criticized all these kids to
their face, or kept his thoughts to himself. For these reasons, I'm not sure I
would enjoy reading this particular book. Maybe someone can write a Celts list
"book review" before we all rush out to order it from Amazon.com. I prefer to
remember #33 exactly as I want to.

BTW, the far more striking thing about the weekend Peter May article was how
Rick Pitino categorically called Larry Bird a liar. That blew my mind. Taking
on ML Carr is one thing, but now our beleaguered coach is flailing back against
the legend. Weirdly enough, it sounds like even Red Auerbach might privately
back up Pitino. Red also sounds a little fed up and impatient on the subject of
Bird, and Larry himself noted with dismay that their relationship has changed.
It's strange and sad that Bird won't consider working for our Celtics
organization. We really have reached the end of an era.

> This won't be the end of the story. Indiana on the way down, and the Celts on
> the way up,
> he doesn't like it.

I've said it before. IMO, it took a lot of character for Larry Bird to
basically throw away any legitimate chance to win his fourth ring in his final
NBA coaching year by trading critical veterans while continuing to draft kids
(Al Harrington, Jonathan Bender) whose best years will come under Coach Rick
Carlisle. He's doing this for the sake of the hometown Indiana organization,
not for himself.

Go Y2K Celts!  It's less than a month before the exhibition season!

Joe

p.s. FWIW several weeks ago I e-mailed On-Hoops to defend the Mercer-Fortson
trade after they had confidently trashed and ridiculed the deal. Maybe some of
you other Celts listers mailed them as well. In any case, this might help
explain the curious flip-flop (now OnHoops is claiming the Celts made an
excellent trade, and that's without mentioning the inclusion of a likely Denver
lottery pick to add to the Celts' playoff nucleus in a few years).

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