how good was larry birds layup

Its fun to think that Larry Bird played a game entirely left-handed, but it didnt quite happen that way.

Midway through the 1985-86 season, the Boston Celtics were on a long Western Conference trip. They had lost just once over the past five weeks, so maybe Bird needed to break the monotony. Also, the Celtics had an upcoming game with their rival, the Los Angeles Lakers.

“Tomorrow night’s the last game of the trip; I’m going to play this one left-handed. Well, at least through three quarters,” Bird reportedly said before the game against the Portland Trail Blazers. “I’m saving my right hand for the Lakers.”

Bird finished the game with 47 points, 14 rebounds and 11 assists in a 120-119 overtime victory. He scored 20 points left-handed, on baskets 10 feet and in. He made 3 3-pointers — and critical 15-footers late in regulation and overtime — right-handed.

While it’s entertaining to imagine, Larry Bird didn’t actually play the entire game with his left hand.

Midway through the 1985-86 season, the Boston Celtics were on a long Western Conference trip. They had lost just once over the past five weeks, so maybe Bird needed to break the monotony. Also, the Celtics had an upcoming game with their rival, the Los Angeles Lakers.

“Tomorrow night’s the last game of the trip; I’m going to play this one left-handed. Well, at least through three quarters,” Bird reportedly said before the game against the Portland Trail Blazers. “I’m saving my right hand for the Lakers.”

Bird led the team to an overtime victory of 120-119, finishing with 47 points, 14 rebounds, and 11 assists. He made 10 foot and in baskets to score 20 points with his left hand. He was right-handed and made three 3-pointers in addition to crucial 15-footers late in regulation and overtime.

But it was more than that. Displaying the unselfish offense of three future Hall of Famers, it was the best of the Dream Team distilled into a single play. Never actually challenged by the awed opposition, U.S. superstars were free to show a brand of basketball that was the ultimate crowd-pleaser. In their role as “goodwill ambassadors,” exquisitely worked layups that would otherwise have been forgotten afterthoughts took on more meaning.

Since that time, no members of the Celtics have ever played for Team USA at the Olympics. For Bird, a co-captain of the greatest basketball team ever assembled, it’s one more Celtics distinction that he could hold on to for a long time.

Yet his final two points were made in garbage time of the 1992 Olympic semifinal (he was the only Dream Team player to go scoreless in the gold medal game).

In retrospect, it was an anticlimactic moment for one of the greatest basketball players of all time. Bird had played more than 34,000 minutes in the NBA, winning three MVP awards. He had totaled 3,897 points in the playoffs alone, making some of the most clutch shots of any Celtic in the team’s storied history. And with Magic Johnson, he helped to elevate the league’s popularity in the course of their great rivalry.

After yet another incredible game, Michael Jordan was by that point comfortably resting on the bench. He got up to wave his towel and grinned. Jordan, understandably, was cheering the precision play without realizing what he and the audience had just seen.

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