YouTube Gold: A Rookie Sean Kemp Meets Fellow Hoosier Larry Bird

Larry Bird has been out of the game for a long time now, but Larry Bird stories are still the best. We’ve heard Xavier McDonald, Dominique Wilkins and other guys talk about how Bird would welcome them to the league, typically by telling them exactly how he was going to score on them.

McDonald said Bird told him precisely how he was gong to score and of course then did it.

Sean Kemp’s story was a little different.

Kemp said that McDonald, who was a teammate, was a bit banged up so he drew Bird in his first trip to Boston.

At the jump ball, Bird said this to Kemp: “You're the one that broke all my records in high school right? And you're the one that used to dunk on my brother too right, Andy?”

When Kemp affirmed that that was him, Bird answered “I’ve got something for you tonight.”

And then of course just lit him up, scoring, Kemp said, 50 points in three quarters.

When you are that good at something and supremely competitive, you do what you can to fire yourself up, and Bird was a master of that.