Except for a few weeks in 1992, when they were part of the transcendent Dream Team, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson were never teammates on the floor.
Off the court was quite different, because in 1985, commercial sponsors and the two players discovered that if they teamed together, they could increase their incomes significantly.
Despite the considerable passage of time, the two most influential NBA players from the decade of the 1980s are still capable of generating headlines almost at will.
And that's exactly what they did Wednesday when their latest effort -- a book titled "When the Game Was Ours", written by veteran journalist and former "Boston Globe" writer Jackie MacMullan -- was released.
The book chronicles one of the two great rivalries in NBA history. Only Bill Russell vs. Wilt Chamberlain can be compared to Bird vs. Magic, and it can be argued that the latter was more significant because it occurred during the explosion of cable TV.
And it was the warmup act for Michael Jordan, who dominated the 1990s and propelled the NBA to its greatest heights.
The fascination with Magic vs. Bird continues and the principals are grateful for the interest.
"I'm still amazed after all these years that people bring up games that I played years ago," Bird said Monday in an hourlong teleconference to promote the book. "This has always just been a dream to me to play the game that I loved and people remember it and still enjoy talking about it."
Johnson agreed -- sort of. But then again, both players are aware of the impact they made and there is no false modesty.
"You still can't believe it," Johnson said, "but at the same time I guess we can believe it. It's something that people really respect -- the way we played. We were about winning, we were about making our teammates better, we were about playing the game the right way."
The first excerpts of the book were distributed almost two weeks ago and one of the explosive elements was Johnson's criticisms of one-time friend Isiah Thomas.
About a year after Johnson revealed that he had contracted the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), stories were published quoting Johnson that one unidentified NBA player had spread rumors that Johnson was bisexual.
The allegation was that Johnson had been infected because of homosexual relations. Johnson was upset at the time, but did not reveal the player, although several stories published quoted unnamed sources saying it was Thomas.
In MacMullan's book, Johnson is quoted for the first time publicly identifying Thomas. When Ian Thomsen of "Sports Illustrated" contacted Thomas with that information, Thomas went off on Johnson.
"I think Magic has been misled on a lot of things, and unfortunately this has been another one of them," Thomas told Thomsen. "I am hurt and disappointed that he has chosen to believe others as opposed to his closest friends."
When asked for a response Monday, Johnson said: "I don't have any. It's no surprise. It's a part of life."
Later, he was asked to elaborate why he chose to go public now. The obvious answer, of course, was that such juicy information will do nothing to hurt the sales of the book, but Johnson was more diplomatic.
"It was (the right) time," Johnson said. "We had an incredible relationship. We used to do everything together back in the day. And then that kind of faded. It was a tough period. Probably when (the Pistons and Lakers) played those two championships made that happen. And then (we) went in opposite directions from there.
"Even today I still want Isiah to be successful and I'm sure he still wants me to be successful, even though we're not where we used to be in terms of our friendship and everything. But sometimes what happened in the Olympics and on and on and on, those things have to be revealed sometime."
One of the other revelations of the book was Johnson's speaking on the record and saying that Thomas had no support among players to be on the Dream Team in 1992. At the time, there were a number of stories about Thomas' unpopularity among the players and much of the focus was on Michael Jordan, who had made no secret of his dislike for Thomas.
"Isiah killed his own chances when it came to the Olympics," Johnson said in the book. "Nobody on that team wanted to play with him. ... Michael didn't want to play with him. Scottie (Pippen) wanted no part of him. Bird wasn't pushing for him. Karl Malone didn't want him. Who was saying, 'We need this guy'? Nobody."
The Thomas sections, however, are only part of a larger picture. The primary focus is on the phenomenon of Bird vs. Magic. They entered the league in 1979, only a few months after Johnson's Michigan State team had defeated Bird's Indiana State team in the NCAA championship game.
Bird led the Celtics to a huge turnaround in the 1979-80 season. Boston had won only 32 games the previous season but Bird led the Celtics to 61 victories and a spot in the Eastern Finals, where they lost to the Philadelphia 76ers.
The Lakers went on to win the title and that began a period of nine years with either the Lakers or the Celtics winning the world title. Los Angeles won five championships, Boston won three and Philadelphia won the other.
During the '80s, the Lakers appeared in the NBA Finals eight times and the Celtics appeared five times. The teams met three times, with LA winning in 1985 and 1987 and the Celtics winning in 1984.
The book details what happened behind the scenes during those monumental moments, and it is a project that Bird and Johnson approached enthusiastically.
"There's a lot of different books and a lot of different teammates talking about us, thinking that they know what we were thinking at the time and in the Finals and in certain games," Bird said. "I really thought it was important on my side to just get the truth out there and tell people how I felt and what I was thinking during that time period."
Johnson summarized the project by saying: "Normally, you write them as individuals. But this way, the fans get two for one."
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