Larry Bird's baseball career: A lofty .500 batting average

There is the Larry Bird people know, the Boston Celtics legend, the hick from French Lick, the Indiana State University basketball king.

And then there is a lesser known Bird, the college baseball player who finished the sport with one of the best career batting averages — .500 — of any player to ever play for the Sycamores.

But as with any remarkable athletic feat, and often as there is with any legendary Bird story, there are myths and there are truths.

Here is the truth about Bird and baseball, a story that involves a dare from a coach, a field filled to the brim, a nearly ruined NBA career and, ultimately, Bird walking away from the sport.

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It was 1979 and Bird was lazing about in a training room in the gym at ISU. The 6-9 basketball standout was always icing, his legs, his back, his arms, any body part with an ache.

Bob Warn, ISU's baseball coach at the time, noticed the icing night after night and finally decided to put Bird in his place.

He could handle it. After all, he had just led the Sycamores basketball team to a 33-1 record, marred only by a loss in the NCAA championship game to Magic Johnson and Michigan State.

" 'You're a real wuss,' " Warn recalls telling Bird. " 'Every night, I see you. You're just here in the training room icing.' "

Bird snarled at Warn and made a wisecrack. The next night, Bird was icing again. Warn walked up for round two — and a challenge.

"I told him, 'You know? Real men play games with balls this size.' " Warn said, forming his hands into the shape of a baseball. "I said, 'Anybody can play games with balls this size.' " Warn formed his hands into a basketball. " 'You just have to have a large basketball or you can't do it.' "

Bird looked at Warn, acknowledged the challenge that was unfolding before him and pondered for a moment.

"I could do that," Bird said. "I could play baseball."

With a non conference doubleheader approaching on April 28, 1979 against Kentucky Wesleyan, Warn asked Bird to play baseball for Indiana State.

Bird said yes.

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There was just one problem. The Sycamores baseball program wasn't used to suiting up 6-9 guys.

"We had some pants stretched out so they would go at least below his knees anyway," Warn said. "And we got the biggest jersey we had and got the biggest hat we had. I told him he had a melon head anyway. But we found somehow a uniform that would fit him."

Game day came and Bird, who made the No. 33 famous, instead wore No. 24, the only jersey that fit. His long blond hair spilled out beneath his cap.

But unlike basketball, which came naturally to him, Bird looked visibly nervous before that game, Warn said.

He came up behind the dugout and asked to talk to the coach. Bird told Warn he was worried he would "mess up and let the team down."

"He didn't want to hurt the game, the team, the program —just because he and I were having a small (friendly) bet," Warn said.

Buried in the stories of Bird playing baseball is the notion the game was more of a publicity stunt than anything else.

"Warn wanted Larry to try baseball primarily because he knew that it would boost crowd attendance against a lower level opponent," said Tom James, the sports information director at ISU at the time, who now lives in Indianapolis. "Coach was big on trying different things in order to boost attendance."'

If it was a stunt, it worked. Attendance that day was like nothing ISU baseball had ever seen. Bird had just played in the NCAA title game, the most-watched game in the history of the sport.

"We advertised that he's going to play. The place is just filled with people," Warn said, estimating the crowd at 3,000. "There isn't a blade of grass that isn't covered."

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Much to the dismay of the thousands in attendance, Bird didn't start the first game. The crowd broke out in a roaring boo.

Warn didn't budge. This was a doubleheader. He had plenty of time to play Bird.

But exactly which of the games Bird played in remains murky. ISU didn't have stats sheets for the games that day, just a summary of the 1979 season, which does confirm Bird finished with a .500 batting average.

What is known is that Bird, at some point, was brought in to play first base in game two. And while playing the position, he made nine putouts.

When it was time for his first at bat, either as the DH in game one or while playing first in game two, he wasn't as successful. He swung at the first pitch, wildly.

"It was like he was swinging a slow pitch softball bat," Warn said. "He looked terrible."

Then Bird swung wildly again. And again. Strike out. The crowd still gave him a standing ovation as Bird walked back to the dugout.

Preston Williams, the first baseman who'd been trumped that day by Bird, shook his head.

"I did that five times last week and nobody ever clapped for me," he told Warn.

Bird redeemed himself in his second at bat, drilling a single up the middle to drive in two runs.

"That gave us a 3-1 lead," Warn said. "Did he win that game for us? I wouldn't tell him that. But his runs proved to be the winning runs because they didn't score any more."

That day of baseball could have ended just like that. Bird 1-for-2 with two RBIs. ISU winning both games of the doubleheader. But it didn't.

While later playing first base, Bird made a move that silenced the monstrous crowd. A play, that for a few moments, some thought had ended Bird's upcoming NBA career.

"Larry collided with the catcher and they both went down and they just laid there not moving," Warn said. "I thought, 'Oh my God, what have I done?' "

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One of the spectators at the game was the late Bob Woolf, who later became Bird's NBA agent.

"Woolf was, reportedly, not pleased with Larry's decision to give baseball a try," James said, "(He feared) an injury that would wreck his NBA career before it ever got started."

Those fears almost came true.

In the second game, there was an infield pop-up between first base and home plate. Warn had told Larry to take it easy on plays like that and allow the catcher to make the call.

"But Larry being Larry, he went after the pop-up and charged in," James said. "The catcher tried calling him off and was in better position to make the play."

Bird plowed forward anyway.

"They ran hard and they collided. They hit each other and they went down," Warn said. "The ball was caught. I think Larry hung on to the ball but they both laid there and didn't move."

A groan went through the crowd and then silence.

"Woolf looked like he was going to have a heart attack," James said.

Bird eventually got up and was OK. Myth has it that Bird had a wad of chewing tobacco in his mouth that he swallowed during the collision.

"He just got the wind knocked out of him," James said.

Warn quickly took Bird out of the game.

And with that, Bird's short-lived college baseball career was finished. He never played again.

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Bird was once asked in college if he hadn't played basketball what other sport would he play.

The answer, without hesitation, was baseball.

He played softball in a Terre Haute league during the summers while he was in college. He was great at it. But softball isn't baseball.

And then his senior year, one day after his college basketball jersey was retired at ISU, he got to make his dream of playing another sport come true.

It didn't turn out quite like Bird had expected.

"All the time I'd been playing basketball, I've never been knocked out," Bird once said. "One baseball game and I get it. I was really hurt. So, end of career — one for two, .500 average, two RBI. I figured I couldn't do much better than that."

Follow Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow.