A Rivalry for the Ages

I started watching NBA basketball in earnest back in 1987. In the NBA Finals, I saw Earvin “Magic” Johnson of the Los Angeles Lakers launch a hookshot over the Boston Celtics led by Larry Bird. From then on, I was addicted to the NBA and became a diehard fan of Magic and the Lakers. I couldn’t stand Bird or the Celtics. They were too white, too green, too un-LA. The Lakers, on the other hand, played uptempo basketball, had Magic leading the fastbreak, and finishers like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, James Worthy and Byron Scott to highlight their “Showtime” style of play.

When I borrowed the book When the Game Was Ours, I felt like I was being handed the keys to how Magic’s and Bird’s brains worked. The old archrivals came together to write this book (with sportswriter Jackie MacMullan) in order to clarify some things that had been written about them and to set the record straight on others. It was a relationship that I thought began when they first clashed in the NCAA Basketball Finals in 1979. I was surprised to learn that they were previously teammates the previous year at a World Invitational Tournament. After that, with Bird’s Indiana State team on one side and Magic’s Michigan State squad on the other, the greatest rivalry in basketball history was born.

When the Game Was Ours chronicles the lives of two men who, on the outside, looked like polar opposites. Larry Bird was white, a self-confessed “hick”, wasn’t very fast, and kept to himself. Earvin Johnson, Jr. was black, grew up outside Detroit, and had a magnetic personality. But these two shared such a love for basketball, enjoyed making their teammates better, and absolutely hated losing so badly that they ended up being good friends once they let their guard down. So intense was their rivalry that both admitted that one of the first things they did when they woke up was to check the box scores to see how the other did. Both grew up relatively poor but were drafted by the two premiere franchises in the NBA and immediately brought them back to prominence. They are credited as the men who supposedly "saved the NBA" although neither would claim so lofty a title.

The insights shared by each superstar help make this book the enjoyable read that it was. From their recollections of specific games or even specific plays, it’s clear that they lived through those moments and cherished the highs that only competing against the best could give. On the flipside, they also recall the most painful defeats, and still relive the mistakes that could have swung a series in their favor. Elite athletes like Johnson, Bird and Michael Jordan are all ruthless competitors, unusually driven, and hate losing at anything, and this book only helps to cement those stories.

It truly is amazing to see how each looked at the other as their ultimate measuring stick, how each was so committed to beating the other man that they devoted more time to practices and workouts so that they wouldn’t be outdone by their rival. When the rivalry did begin to thaw and a friendship began to bloom, it’s heartwarming to know that their similarities eventually allowed both to appreciate how special their place in basketball history had become. It even got to the point that when Magic found out that he was HIV-positive, Larry was one of the first people he called. Bird’s reaction, feeling like he was punched in the gut, reflected his own concern for the man who he had wanted to beat more than any other.

Their eventual final teaming as Olympic teammates for the original Dream Team at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics also allowed them to build closer relationships with peers. Bird became inseparable from Patrick Ewing, while Magic and Jordan presided over the greatest basketball game that was never caught on tape. Their individual enshrinements into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame and their lives after the NBA have only made their bond stronger as, to this day, both claim that people often ask them where the other is. These two guys are why I got into basketball in the first place. This book just helps crystallize why I still love the game so dearly.