Roaming the basketball court during his heyday, Larry Bird was a genius, an artist, a purist, and perfectionist, an ingenious passer, deadeye shooter, savvy rebounder and sly defender. Of course, that’s just the abbreviated list of attributes. Ego-puncturing trash-talker definitely should have been mentioned sooner.
During the 1984-85 season, Bird was 28 years old and all of those powers — visceral, intangible, and virtually unprecedented and unmatched – were operating at peak levels. Bird averaged 28.7 points and 10.5 rebounds that season, hit 42.7 percent of his 3-pointers, 52.2 percent of his field goal attempts, and 88.2 percent from the foul line.