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bird and Johnson each measured their success by the number of championships they won
an edge held by magic
as superstars and the leaders on two elite NBA teams
who entered the league at the same time
they were destined to be compared to each other
and although they played different positions their individual accomplishments and accolades were
remarkably similar
in addition to being in the hall of fame
each won the MVP award three times
each was named to the all NBA first team nine times
each is a twelve time all star and
each was co-captain of the Olympic team
bird played eight hundred ninety seven games in his career and magic played nine hundred and six
and each played exactly the same number of minutes in his career thirty four thousand four hundred forty
three
as Bird and Johnson reveal in the introduction to the book
these statistics did more than help their own teams
they helped to motivate each other
larry writes
when I was young the only thing I cared about was beating my brothers mark and mike were older than
me and that meant they were bigger stronger and better
in basketball baseball everything
they pushed me
they drove me
I wanted to beat them more than anything more than anyone
but I hadn't met magic yet once I did he was the one I had to beat
what I had with magic went beyond brothers
I never let on how much he dominated my thoughts during my playing days I couldn't
but once we agreed to do this book
I knew it was finally time to let people in on my relationship with the person who motivated me like no other
and from magic larry
was a different kind of cat
he didn't say much and he kept to himself
but oh could he play
I had never seen a player with his size pass the ball the way he did
right away we had chemistry
we played on the second team with a bunch of college all-stars and we just embarrassed the starters
I knew I'd see him again and I did
everywhere
when I got to the NBA and played for the lakers
I watched as many celtics games as I could so I could keep track of what he was doing
he became my measuring stick
the first time we played head to head in the finals
in nineteen eighty four larry got the best of me
it took me years to get over it
actually I'm not sure I am over it yet
I was surprised to hear larry describe watching me win the NBA championship in my rookie season
he admitted he was jealous which really shocked me
because he never ever showed it back then
of course as you'll learn when you start reading this book I had my own bouts of jealousy when it came to
larry