Larry Bird is one of the greatest small forwards ever, and he is considered to be one of the 10 greatest players of all time. He was known as an all-around player that excelled in all aspects of the game but in particular his scoring and playmaking.
One of the things that come to mind when one thinks about Larry Bird is his ability to talk trash to his opponents. Recently, Byron Scott claimed that Larry Bird was “the biggest” trash talker in the league during his playing days, saying that he would tell players where he would go, score on them, then “run back down the floor”.
“The thing I love about him is that he was a s**t talker. The dude would just tell you where he’s going, shoot it in your face, talk s**t to you and run back down the floor. He was the biggest s**t talker in the league back in the day. He would tell you exactly where he was going, what he was gonna do. And he did that to us in the Finals.”
Byron Scott’s account of Larry Bird’s trash-talking abilities matches up with what others said about him. Magic Johnson once told a similar story about Larry Bird, claiming that Bird told him that he’d shoot the ball right in his face, and proceeded to do exactly that.
As I’m running out to Larry Bird, he’s talking trash to me.
“I don’t know why you’re running out here.” Who says that in the middle of the game?
He says, “Imma wait till you get one step away from me and Imma shoot it right in your face”
So I got one step away, he shoots it, all net. 3PTer, good.
He turns to me and says, “You did all that running for nothing”.
Trash talk is part of the game, and while it happens less in modern basketball, there are still instances where it does happen. There are definitely a lot of fans who like seeing players talk trash in a competitive environment.
Generally, trash talking is harmless when it doesn’t spill out off the court. There’s nothing wrong with getting a little chippy when playing basketball, and it’ll continue to happen in the future.
