- Would you rather be a great athlete or a great player?
Which would you choose?
A lot of young kids would say,
"I want to be a great athlete."
Well, that's your first mistake.
A great athlete gonna give you a lot of oohs and aahs.
A great basketball player gonna beat you every night.
That's who Larry Bird was.
I remember the first time I played against Bird,
I'll never forget this.
I go to shake his hand - I'm a rookie,
playing against the Boston Celtics
in the Boston Garden -
go to shake, and Larry put both hands behind his back.
He wouldn't shake my hand.
And I said, "O.K., he's just getting into the game."
First play of the game he said,
"You don't even belong in this league, Holmes,"
and he shoots a three.
Now, I wasn't mad that he made the three,
but I said, "Did this son of a bitch just call me Holmes?"
And he came down and did it again, so I'm pissed.
So next time down - see me on the break in that picture -
and I jump up, and I throw it down on on him. Right?
I mean, he fouls me. And he says,
"Hey rook, I like you. You got heart."
He said, "But I'm still getting 30 on your ass."
I mean, that's who he was. But that was the only time
he ever talked trash to me, because he respected me,
because he knew that I was going to keep coming.
That really taught me something, you know.
If you wasn't prepared to play against guys like that,
you got embarrassed.
Larry had 60 against us one game, in New Orleans.
I'll never forget that game.
He was so hot he started shooting threes
with his left hand.
I mean, it was mind-blowing.
He had an attitude, and a heart of a lion.
And he didn't like anybody. He didn't care who you were.
We never shook hands, for 13 years.
Never shook hands.
And it just pushes you to have that same toughness,
and that same attitude.
And we had some epic battles.
I ran into him at the Hall Of Fame
about a month and a half ago.
I said, "Larry, you know something, man?
All these years competing, and we've known each other,
and we've never taken a picture."
So, we took our first picture together.
That was special for me.
That's just showing respect and appreciation
for the era you played in.
I got one of Magic. I got Moses, Michael.
I mean, look, these are the guys I competed against, man.
This is what basketball was all about. So I'm just
paying respect to these guys.
First time I played against Michael was in college,
when he was a freshman. And the game went back and forth,
back and forth, close game all the way through.
And the last two minutes this young kid
named Michael Jordan took over.
He won the game for them.
And I said then, I said, "He gonna be a hell of a player."
As a freshman.
His attitude, his mentality,
he was a killer.
He wanted to take your heart out.
I will never forget this - I never had a player do this -
I remember us going to Chicago. Now, we're in suit and tie,
and we're sitting in the locker room.
We'd just walked in the locker room.
I remember, Michael Jordan walks into our locker room,
suit and tie. I'm like, "What in the hell is he doing in
our locker room?
Is he coming to the training room? Or what's going on?"
So he walks by me, he walks by Kevin.
When he gets to Randy Wittman he said,
"Lace 'em up, it's gonna be a long night."
I'm like, "Did he just come in our locker room?"
I didn't know what to say. I was shocked.
He had 60 that night.
He had 60 points that night.
We ended up winning the game, but the scoring performance
he put on that night was incredible.
Bob Lanier, we had a game, where at the end of the game
I was on the block. So, I come to the middle
and they cut me off, and I went back to baseline
and I jumped, and Bob Lanier jumped.
I remember turning in the air,
and I dunked on him at the end of the game.
He didn't speak to me for nine years after that,
nine years. I remember after we both retired and he said,
"I just started liking you."
I was like, "Why?"
He said, "When you dunked on me and I had to go home
and my kids said, 'How did you let
that little skinny kid dunk?'"
He said, "I hated you."
I'm like, "For real?"
But that was the emotion and attitude.
Now all of us are retired, we all live for these stories.
You don't lose the shot.
You might lose the legs, but you don't lose the shot.
My first dunk contest was when they had Larry Nance,
Dr. J, Darrell Griffith,
and all those guys was in that dunk contest.
And I didn't do that well in that dunk contest
because I was in awe of who was in it,
particularly Dr. J.
So, I didn't put my best effort because I'm sitting,
watching one of the greatest to ever do it, in Doc.
So, I was just happy to be in the dunk contest.
Now, the following year I'm not coming just to participate,
I'm coming to win.
That's what happened.
I appreciate, and I respect and love, the guys before us
for what they was able to create for us.
Dr. J, who was ... that was my idol.
And to have the chance to play against him,
and then later in life ask him
to introduce me into the Hall Of Fame....
Life just came full circle for me.
And to have someone that I truly love
bring me into an elite group,
I mean, what more could you ask for?
You know, to be in a room
with some of the greatest players to ever play -
you're in there with Kareem,
you're in there with Moses and Bill Russell -
and you hear the stories, you're in awe.
You're in awe, and all you can do is sit there and listen.
Those stories then ... I remember Clyde Drexler
and I was in room with all these guys,
and we were the youngest two in the room.
And again, we was in awe of the stories,
because Bill Russell commands your attention.
And, like I said, we were like two giddy kids,
and we just looked at each other like, "Hold on,
we Hall Of Famer's too." You know?
So, you know, we kind of poked our chests out
and we kind of joined in the conversation.
But man, that was priceless, man, to be in a room with that
many greats, and you just sharing stories.
And that's our time to really kind of come together
and talk about what we did as a league,
and even the guys before us.
Man, you can't buy those conversations. They're priceless.