Larry Bird is one of the all-time greatest basketball players in the history of professional and college basketball. Bird surprisingly began playing basketball as a "thing to do" during high school. I believe Bird is of the all time greatest figures ever in the history of basketball.
Larry Bird was born on December 7, 1956. He was the fourth child of Joe and Georgia Bird. He started playing basketball as a sophomore and played the position of guard his sophomore and junior year. He got a lot better in the game during his senior year. During his senior year, he average 30.6 points and 20 rebounds per game. Colleges in the country started to scout him. Bird decided to play for Indiana University, but on his arrival he felt overwhelmed with the size of the campus and he left after only 24 days. He went back to his hometown of French Lick, Indiana and entered Northwood Institute for a short time. He finally then changed his mind back to original though, and headed back to Indiana University. He had to sit out for his first season there since he came back mid-season. He began his first season playing career with the Sycamores in 1976 and emerged a national collegiate start soon after. (Michael Goodman, pg 21-25).
Bird soon began being scouted by almost every NBA time that existed during his college career. The one team that had the strongest interest in Bird was the Boston Celtics. Bird was a tough bargainer, and before he would sign with any team Bird demanded for a lot of money (Michael Goodman, pg 25). It took a lot of time, but the Celtics finally signed Bird on June 8, 1979 with a contract of $3,250,000. It took a lot of talking to persuade the Celtic's owner to sign Bird, a junior in college, for this amount of money. The owned is quoted as saying that he has not regretted his decision to this day. They signed him during the 1979 college draft. After making his crucial decision to sign Bird, the owner, Auerbach, was very pleased because in only Bird's rookie season, he was considered "the most determined, tough-minded and competitive player in the entire professional league.