Episode 86: Keith O'Brien

Bestselling author Keith O’Brien joins the show to discuss his new book, “Heartland: A Forgotten Place, An Impossible Dream, and the Miracle of Larry Bird.” The book focuses on the period between 1973-79 when Bird leaves tiny French Lick, Indiana to play for Bobby Knight’s Hoosiers; departs IU after just a few weeks; nearly quits college basketball altogether; and leads underdog Indiana State to the NCAA national championship game.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

All right, welcome back to On the Mall, the podcast from the Meravit Sports and Society initiative. I'm Andrew Meravitz. And our guest today is a familiar face, a second time uh uh guest on this podcast, Keith O'Brien. We talked to you about your uh amazing uh Pete Rose biography last time. This time we're here to talk about Heartland, uh, your book about Larry Bird and Indiana State and that period of if his life it's uh another home run or three-pointer, whatever the phrase should be at this point. But Keith, congratulations on another uh amazing book and and thank you so much for joining the show today.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

Oh, Andrew, always great to be with you, man. Thanks for having me back. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Oh, of course. And I'll read the subtitle of Forgotten Place and Impossible Dream and the Miracle of Larry Bird. Um, we were talking before I hit record that you were just in Carmel, Indiana, outside of Indianapolis, uh speaking about the book in front of what looked like an incredible crowd. Um, before we get into Larry Bird's story, what's it like to actually be back in Indiana telling the story of someone that I'm sure people there feel like they know, you know, like um what was that experience like?

SPEAKER_00 1:17

So actually, I just spent most of last week in Indiana on the book tour. Uh, I was in Carmel, I was in Franklin, Indiana, I was in Bloomington, but I launched the book in Terre Haute, you know, where where this all began, you know. Uh and they had invited me to do that last fall uh at the convention center downtown, maybe about a hundred meters from the arena where Bird became famous. And I said that'd be great, uh, you know, of course, uh, but I I thought, you know, maybe I'd do it in conversation with a couple of the players because a few of Larry's teammates, uh, one of whom who was his roommate, uh, you know, uh settled in Terre Hot. They still live there. And so uh, you know, I opened it up to them to do it in conversation with the couple of players. And then uh sort of an amazing thing happened about a month ago. Other players on the Indiana State team started to hear about this event and asked if they could come. And then I threw it open to everybody. And so last Monday night uh on a stage at the convention center was nine of nine players from the 1979 Indiana State Miracle team. And Bill Hodges, the head coach who found and and and really saved Larry Bird in 1975. It was an enormous crowd. I mean, you you've done book events, you know how this goes. Uh, it was just such an amazing night. Uh, and you know, it was emotional for the players at times, you know, to be back and talking about this again. But what was what was most remarkable to me was, you know, uh, even for the people who were there, you know, it was special, you know, and and that was sort of gets back to the nut of where this idea began. You know, I you know, everybody knows the bird magic story. We're always telling the Larry Bird Magic Johnson story, and we're always telling those stories together. Uh, and what I did here is just sort of tilt the camera a different way, you know, change the perspective just slightly, you know, focus in on this remarkable origin story of Larry Bird through the prism of those years in Terre Haute. And when you do that, you end up getting like a completely different story, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 3:35

Yeah. And I mean, Vanderbilt has played Indiana State in baseball, and like I don't know, someone my age, when you see Indiana State, you think of Larry Larry Bird, you know, um decades ago, and the school will always be associated with him and with with that team for Indiana State people. Is that still something that they appreciate and love? Or is it I guess looking back on that and and thinking, like you've said, like these stories are never going to happen again. Um how do they deal with the fact that this is a wonderful piece of history, but very unlikely that they'll ever return to this uh level of glory?

SPEAKER_00 4:16

I mean, I think the prevailing feeling feeling is gratitude, you know. Uh, you know, the that one of the greatest players of all time, and I still think Larry Bird would have to be in the top 10 greatest players, uh, you know, came through there, you know, what was discovered there, uh, you know, uh uh put them on the map and still has this giant, giant footprint downtown. You know, there's a a statue of Byrd outside the arena. There's a 33-foot mural on main on the main drag downtown of Larry Bird's uh very first sports illustrated cover from 1977. The the Larry Bird Museum is right there. Uh, but you're right. I mean, uh, you know, and maybe we'll talk about this here today, but you know, unlike other schools over the years, you know, Gonzaga, for example, you know, who uh sort of found something at one point and then used that success to grow and become a powerhouse, uh, it didn't it didn't work that way for Indiana State. You know, they have this like one moment in time and then it all slips away again. Uh and and I do think that's hard when you think about it just practically speaking. You know, uh I've been told that the NIL budget, you know, for the men's basketball team these days at Indiana State is about $300,000. And that sounds like a lot of money, but you know, to put that in perspective for a second, uh, you know, Cooper Flagg, the great player at Duke last year, was, you know, uh reportedly paid $4.5 million. You know, Larry Bird in 2026 would get $5 million, right? So, you know, a school like Indiana State would simply never be able to retain uh that kind of star these days. Uh, and so that's going to make it really hard uh for for you know an Indiana State and other small market, small program teams to compete.

SPEAKER_01 6:27

So when you think back to those uh that team, you start the book with the year of the season before, and they're coming back on the plane from a disappointing loss to Rutgers and Bird gets in a fight after the game. Um but it's a team that goes to the championship. Who who are some of the other you mentioned how excited these guys were to come back and share stories. For those who haven't read the book yet or don't really remember that team so well, what were some of the other interesting stories, some of the other interesting characters on that team in 79?

SPEAKER_00 7:02

Yeah, again, you know, you know the deal, you know, people, we uh you the media even, you know, we like to simplify things. So we boil it down to bird magic or we just say it's bird, but it wasn't, you know. Uh for starters, uh, you know, Bill Hodges, the head coach of that team, you know, he starts it all. You know, he he finds Larry Bird in the darkest spring of Larry Bird's life. You know, he's dropped out of Indiana University, where he briefly, you know, had a scholarship to play for Bobby Knight, stayed for three weeks, left, hitchhiked back home to French Lick. Over the course of that winter, Larry Bird really does, you know, almost disappear. Uh, by February, March, April 75, Bird is playing effectively glorified pickup basketball in what was known as the Industrial League in rural Indiana. These were teams that were sponsored by taverns and liquor stores. Uh guys play on those teams used to be good, but now they were like 28, 30 years old. They had day jobs and wives. You know, that's where Bird is. You know, he's his family's struggling, his father has unraveled. Uh, and you know, in that moment, it's Bill Hodges, this sort of down on his luck assistant coach who finds Larry, uh, you know, plucks him from the edge of oblivion and coaxes him back to college. I do think there's an alternative universe out there that without Bill Hodges, maybe Bird never leaves French Lake. You know, uh, maybe none of this happens. Uh so that's number one. You know, number two, uh, you know, there's a guy in '79 during that miracle season who is Larry Bird's roommate uh in a rental house on South 11th Street in Terre Hope. Uh, and his name is Bob Heaton. Uh, Bob is a lot like Larry. He's from a tiny little town smaller than French Lick, actually, Cory, Indiana. Population about 400. Uh, you know, Bob Heaton nearly dies and loses his arm in a farm accident as a kid. Uh, survives. Uh, doctors save his arm, and now suddenly, you know, he's like a uh a wingman to Larry Bird on this team uh during that miracle season uh that will end in that famous Bird Magic game. It is Bob Heaton, not Larry Bird, uh who hits the most important shots, uh, the shots that preserve the undefeated season, the shots that uh propel them to the final four. Uh, you know, Bob Heaton is well known in Indiana, but outside of the state, uh almost no one knows who he is. Uh, he's crucial to this story. Uh, and then there's a you know, a great guard on this team, a man named Carl Knicks, uh, uh a player from the south side of Chicago, uh, who couldn't be more different from Larry Bird. Uh, you know, uh, he comes from an urban environment. You know, he's black, not white. Carl Nix loves to talk. Larry hates to talk. Uh, and really, you know, Carl Nix is an engine on this team. And these days, uh, Carl Nix, you know, thanks in part to that one moment, that one moment in time, that team, that relationship with Larry, you know, Carl Nix uh, you know, leverages that to get a job as a as a scout with the Indiana Pacers. And that great Indiana Pacers team last year that surprised us all going to the NBA finals. That was built in part uh, you know, by Carl Knicks.

SPEAKER_01 10:44

Well, well. All right. So you can't, I mean, Indiana, rural Indiana, you think about Hoosiers, you think about kids shooting baskets on an old rusty rim attached to a barn, the name French Lick, what a great name. Like what kind of character is French Lick or the state of Indiana in this book and the the just you know, Larry Bird's early life growing up there?

SPEAKER_00 11:10

I mean, a huge character. That's a great question. I mean, you know this, right? Like a setting, a place is a character, I think, in a book, you know, if you're doing it right. And, you know, 80% of this book really does unfold in small towns in Indiana. Uh, and so, you know, in order to sort of paint that portrait of that time, of those places, I really did go back, you know, and uh back to my roots, you know, back to the Midwest where I was born and raised, and spent a lot of time in those towns, specifically French Lick. You know, uh uh really at the end of the day, this is an origin story of Larry Bird. You know, the narrative unfolds between 73 and 79. Everything after 79 is essentially epilogue material for me. And so I wanted to, you know, uh have the reader feel what it would have felt like to live in French Lick in the 70s. Uh, you know, I spent days and days in the French Lick library, uh public library, uh, you know, going through the old uh uh issues of the Springs Valley Herald, uh the newspaper in town in those days, uh now defunct. Uh and you know, in that window of time where Larry Bird's coming up, uh, you know, French Lick and Orange County as a whole, where French Lick is located, uh, was one of the poorest places in Indiana at a time when Indiana was one of our poorest states. So it was a struggle. You know, Larry faces a ton of adversity uh in those years. Uh and really, uh, you know, were it not for uh, you know, an incredible growth spurt that happens between his junior and senior year of high school, uh, you know, you know, maybe it's all different. Uh, but that growth spurt, uh a stunning three or four inches in a matter of months, uh uh changes everything. And suddenly, you know, recruiters are descending on this remote, you know, outpost in the southwest corner of Indiana.

SPEAKER_01 13:27

Uh above your shoulder is a postcard of Pete Rose, who was the subject of your last book, another uh figure from the Midwest, uh with stardom in the 1970s. You know, I'm curious about um your interest in writing about these types of figures and and um how the process of writing this book and investigating this story were there unexpected similarities. Uh, I don't necessarily think about Pete Rose and Larry Bird being too similar, but um what what did you find that was especially uh interesting in comparing these two projects?

SPEAKER_00 14:02

Yeah, good question. I mean, right uh on the face of it, they are you know wildly different, you know. Uh Pete Rose loved to talk, often to his own detriment. Uh Larry can't stand to talk, you know, and and and withdraws. Uh Pete Rose's life was filled with scandal and lies and personal disaster. Uh Larry has lived a remarkably clean life, you know, for a superstar. Uh, you know, but there are similarities. Uh, you know, they both come from these hard scrabble backgrounds. Uh, you know, uh in each of their lives, uh their fathers, you know, loom large for different reasons. You know, Pete's father was overbearing and driving him, driving him, driving him uh to greatness. Uh, in some ways, you know, Pete's efforts to please his father, you know, or why he plays like he plays. You know, Larry's father is looms large for you know uh another reason. You know, he's he's struggling. Uh those struggles will end in tragedy. That tragedy, you know, you know, does, you know, form uh you know Larry's response to many things going forward. But I think the the greatest similarity is this. Uh you know, Rose loved a hit for the sake of hitting. You know, I I think actually Pete Rose loved hitting in the batting cage as much as he loved the game himself itself. You know, he just loved hitting and hitting. He loved everything about it. I remember Larry Boa, the great uh Philadelphia Philly, told me that in 1978, 79, when Rose joined the Phillies there, Rose is a megastar. He's now signed a $3.2 million deal, one of the richest deals in Major League Baseball at that time. And, you know, he's got nothing to prove. And early in that season, Boa is leaving Veterans Stadium one night. Uh, and down the tunnel, he hears the uh the batting cage, you know, thwack, thwack, thwack. Boa goes down. It's like 11:30 at night. It's Rose. You know, Rose is hitting after the game, you know? And that's sort of what Bird was like, you know? He loves shooting for the act of shooting, for the craft of it, you know. Uh, when he gets to Indiana State in August of 75, yeah, he's you know, sort of coming out of this broken environment. And Bill Hodges, the head coach who found him, you know, tries to build this like safety net around him. And one thing they do early on is they let Bird stay in the gym as much as he wants. It's his transfer year. He's redshirt and he can't play. It's devastating to Bird. Uh, so they let him shoot in the arena late, late at night. But university officials find out they don't like that for insurance reasons. They got to kick Larry out, you know, and you know, now Larry needs another place to go. So they lean on the local owner of the boys' club in Terre Haute who gives Larry a key. And one scene that I love from the book is that, you know, the boys' club was right there, right next to campus. A big old place, you know, a big old sort of like um rafters uh warehouse like establishment with windows up top there. And Bill Hodges was the lead recruiter for Indiana State. He would drive home to Terra Haute late at night, sometimes coming from some high school game somewhere, and the lights would be on. He could see it, you know, through those windows. He'd walk in the door. It's like 12 o'clock, one in the morning. You know, there's Larry Bird shooting and shooting.

SPEAKER_01 17:47

Wow. You mentioned um briefly earlier that in Terra Haute, there's the um the mural of the Sports Illustrated, famous Sports Illustrated cover, Larry Bird and the Indiana State cheerleaders. Um what did you learn about how that all came together? Such an iconic uh cover for those of us who used to subscribe to Sports Illustrated.

SPEAKER_00 18:09

Well, I mean, I'm sure you do this too, Andrew. You know, when you identify like big moments in your narrative, you know, those turning points, low points, high points, scenes, right? That's where we go deep, right? Like that's where we want to know everything. And that for me, well, you know, the sports illustrated cover is one of those moments. Uh, you know, uh, for those who don't remember it, it's November 77. Uh, it's one of the most iconic uh sports illustrated covers, I think, at least of the latter half of the 20th century. Uh, and it's certainly a lightning bolt moment for Larry Bird, uh, you know, a before and after kind of moment. Uh, after that cover, he'll never have another anonymous day in his life, you know, much to his own chagrin. So, yeah, I want to know everything about it. So, you know, I talked to the sports information directors at Indiana State who set it up. I talked to the sports illustrated editors who assigned it. Uh, you know, if you remember the image, it's Larry Bird flanked by two Indiana State cheerleaders. You know, I interviewed the the last surviving of those two cheerleaders. And, you know, I also interviewed the photographer himself, a man named Lane Stewart. And Lane is an icon himself. He's in his 80s now. In the 70s, he shot some of the most famous sports illustrated covers. He's got, you know, uh covers that included not just Bird, but Pete Rose, Magic Johnson, many others. And, you know, I track Lane down. And Lane, God bless him. You love this about sources. He kept his diaries of all his photo shows. So Lane goes down to the basement, you know, he grabs the diary, he pulls it out. He's got everything in there, you know, the date, the time, the shots, the sketches, what lenses he used. I mean, everything. And so, you know, I did two lengthy interviews with Lane, you know, and have this incredible portrait of this day where, you know, the sports information director at Indiana State, a man, you know, in his late 30s, he knows this is gonna change everything for all of them, you know. Uh, but you know, Larry's a kid, you know, he's like 19 years old, 20 years old, you know, the cheerleaders are kids. Uh, you know, they fly up to Chicago in this little uh, you know, two-row plane, you know, the cheerleaders in back with Larry Bird. You know, Larry doesn't even know why he's there. He doesn't even want to go. He's going, he's going just because his coaches want him to go. He's doing them a favor, you know, and you know, that day, you know, Lane, uh, Lane Stewart, the photographer, he struggles to get the shot he wants, you know, because Larry is just, you know, not engaged, you know, not connected to what Lane is doing. Uh, but of course, you know, Lane gets the shot or a shot. And, you know, these days, it is a 33-foot mural in downtown Terre Haute. Uh, you know, it's a it's a beautiful mural, too. I it's one of my favorite spots in Terre Haute. I I, you know, I usually stayed at the hotel right across the street. You can see it from the windows, the sun rising over Wabash Avenue as you walk out in the morning in the winter. And you know, there's Larry Bird, and there's two cheerleaders, you know, just like captured in time as if in amber. It's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 21:45

Wow. Wow, what a story. And what a gold mine to find uh the photographer with a diary. Unbelievable. Um, how did uh you've mentioned many times that, you know, and I think the perception of Bird that those of us who haven't studied His life is that he didn't really like to talk, it didn't it wasn't really about publicity. Um but of course he couldn't really help it that it was going to come. Um how did he deal with that? How did his teammates react to the fact that it was him that was getting the attention? And then there's an aspect to it that was sort of defined by race also, and he came to be seen as kind of one of those great white hope type of figures. Um what did he think of that and how did he react to that characterization?

SPEAKER_00 22:33

Yeah, yeah. Uh, you know, so that cover in 77, November 77, that we just discussed, it's the college basketball preview issue. There's no real story with it, not about Larry. It's just a bunch of capsules, you know, we can picture that. So Larry didn't have to sit for some lengthy interview and talk about his life. All he had to do was weather that five-hour photo session with Lane Stewart in Chicago. Uh, but you know, after that cover, uh, you know, Indiana State starts to have a great year. Uh, they start the year 13-0. You know, they move into the top 10 and national rankings. They're on, they're on the radar. And, you know, who comes calling now but the national media? And from the moment they start to show up in Terre Haute in January 1978, it just goes badly. You know, they want to talk to him for the same reason why I wanted to talk to him, frankly, because this is an incredible, unlikely underdog story. And uh, you know, they want to talk about his past, they want to talk about his childhood, they want to learn, you know, how he came out of French Lick. Uh, and Larry can't do it, won't do it. You know, he he has some open secrets that are well known in Terre Hod in those days that he does not want the world to know. You know, he briefly was married uh to his high school sweetheart. You know, that marriage ended uh, you know, before he ever started playing for Indiana State. There is a daughter born of that brief marriage uh that he doesn't want to discuss. And, you know, there is the tragedy of his father looming out there as well. And so, you know, from the moment the national media comes, Larry won't have it. And really for the next year and a half, uh, you know, he's at war, or at least, you know, uh embroiled intention uh with the media, openly antagonistic with the print media in particular, who he believes are constantly digging into his personal life. Uh and, you know, I've read these stories, you know, that upset Larry. Uh and I gotta say, you know, they're exceedingly positive, you know. They just happen to mention things, you know, that Larry would rather people didn't know. Uh, and so, you know, he's antagonistic with the media, uh, you know, snapping at them at times, cursing at them at times. Uh, and you know, to be completely frank, you know, a black star in the 70s couldn't have acted that way without at least paying a price for it, you know. Um uh Larry doesn't really pay a price for it. Uh, and and there are other things, you know, that Larry Bird does, you know, in 78 and 79, uh, you know, on two different occasions, he strikes uh a fan, an opposing fan, uh, once on the floor, uh, as fans storm the floor at Rutgers in March 1978, uh, strikes a fan in the face, uh, injuring him so badly that he has to be taken off on a stretcher. And uh a second time, uh about 10 months later, during a game at New Mexico State in Las Cruces, he throws a punch at a fan in the crowd. Uh, you know, in both of these cases, you know, this these altercations are completely buried by the press. You know, they go away like they didn't happen at all. And, you know, one one black player I spoke to, you know, who was right there on the floor at Ruckers, standing, you know, within, you know, reach, you know, touching distance of Larry when Larry threw that uh elbow or punch at that uh student at Rutgers, uh, told me that, you know, uh if it had been he who had done it, uh the story would be completely different.

SPEAKER_01 26:38

Um you know, along with that, we think of it's almost impossible to think about uh Larry Bird without thinking about Magic Johnson. Um what did you learn about uh that we might not know about the way that they uh developed a friendship or uh at least a respectful rivalry and uh during that time? I think we've seen interviews since then, or maybe commercials since then it appears that they uh get along. But what was a relationship like back at that time?

SPEAKER_00 27:08

So I would say, you know, three surprising things for me that I learned. Uh number one, you know, when Magic Johnson, you know, first appears on the scene, you know, as a high school senior uh in the spring of 77, uh, you know, up in Michigan, he's almost like a fully formed version of his future self. You know, like he's not even 18 years old, and and he's exactly the person he is today. You know, he's charismatic, uh articulate, uh comfortable in his own skin, no secrets whatsoever, uh happy to talk to the press, happy to answer the same question a hundred times. Uh, all of these things that you know magic will be known for later, he's doing as a 17-year-old. It's it's sort of incredible. Uh, number one. Number two, you know, uh, I know, you know, that you know, we like to tell the bird magic story together for all the obvious reasons, but they they hardly know each other in '79. You know, they've met one time, uh, you know, briefly during uh an all-star uh sort of team that plays together for about a week uh in uh the spring of 78, uh, at the end of Larry's junior year and at the end of Magic's uh freshman year. Um during that week, they hardly interact, they barely talk. Uh so you know, they're not friends, they're not rivals, uh, they're not really anything to each other. You know, Magic Johnson is really no different to Bird than Sidney Moncrief, you know, a star, you know, who he'll play against at Arkansas, or uh Mark Aguirre, you know, a star who he'll play against at DePaul. I mean, uh, you know, these are these guys are pretty much the same to Larry. Uh so you know, the rivalry comes, of course, after that, you know, Indiana State, Michigan State game, after they land in Boston and LA and suddenly are playing against each other, you know, in NBA finals. Uh, but you know, one scene I love is you know, initially they're not really friends, you know, they are rivals or you know, just you know, competitors, uh, but they're both signed by Converse Shoes. And uh in 1985, uh there's a famous commercial that's shot with Bird and Magic. Uh, and it's shot in West Baden Springs, Indiana. West Baden is basically a little town contiguous to French Lick. In his childhood, Larry sometimes lived in West Baden, sometimes in French Lick. Uh, when he uh you know signed his contract with the Celtics, Bird built a nice house in West Baden with a full court uh basketball court outdoors in a grove of trees there that he put in. And Converse films a commercial there on that court. Magic comes in for a couple days, they're staying there in French lick, and you know, they're going out at the nights, uh, you know, drinking beers together, sometimes with Larry Bird's high school teammates. And it's really around that time that you know they do become friends.

SPEAKER_01 30:34

I was curious if you see some similarities between Larry Bird and Caitlin Clark, you know, just thinking about this Midwestern star uh who's white, who TV ratings for women's college basketball, you know, or uh the thought that she would inspire interest in the WNBA the same way that Byrd uh comes to uh inspire interest in the NBA at a time that it was changing so much. Um I know that your story takes place in a very distinct period in the 1970s, but is that a fair uh comparison?

SPEAKER_00 31:11

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's stunningly similar, really, you know. Uh you know, back to your question you asked a moment ago, you know, about people calling Larry the great white hope. You know, that's a tough question to lay on any 21 or 22-year-old uh athlete. I mean it's a tough question to land on a on a 35-year-old athlete. Uh, you know, Larry did his best to answer those questions, you know, when he was forced to talk to the media, you know, in late 1979. Uh, but he is shouldering that, you know, at a time when the NBA was struggling, you know, you know, trying to hold on to market share, trying to hold on to relevance. And I do think, you know, Caitlin Clark, you know, faced a lot of that uh, you know, same uh that same responsibility or those same questions when she came out two years ago. Uh, you know, uh, she's coming up in a time when the MBA or when the WMBA is growing, you know, trying to, you know, grow its market share, uh, grow its relevance. Uh, you know, Caitlin Clark, just like Larry, regardless of race, is an incredible talent, an incredible athlete. Um, but you know, uh, just as people spoke out loud in the 70s, and by people I mean uh NBA general managers, uh, you know, NBA team owners, uh television executives, you know, spoke about the importance of Larry's whiteness. Uh, you know, I uh uh for better or for worse, uh, right or wrong, those same people were talking about Caitlin Clark's, you know, race two years ago. And that's that's a tough burden, you know, on a young athlete.

SPEAKER_01 33:00

Um one thing I think is interesting in um the way you talk about the book is you could look back at the growth of the NCAA tournament or the growth of the NBA since the time of Bird and Magic and think that they were the ones that created it, but you say that the Bird, especially, you know, he rode the wave. It was already kind of coming. Um, and I think that may be surprising to some people. What did you learn about that?

SPEAKER_00 33:28

Yeah, I I do think that's true. You know, uh in the 1970s, as you know from your own projects, you know, the capitalism of all sports is growing. You know, the NFL, Major League Baseball, NCAA sports, they're all growing into these, you know, corporations that we see today. Uh, and uh the the television numbers bear it out, you know, up until 1972, uh the NCAA Final Four was played in the afternoon, you know, not in prime time on the weekends, right? And even in 1972, you know, that final game sets a television record for viewing audiences. With all of that growth, the NCAA decides maybe we should shift it. We'll play the the first two games of the Final Four on Saturday evening, and then we'll play that final game on Monday night. You know, they're borrowing that Monday night premise from, of course, Monday night football, which started three years earlier. Hey, if it works for football, maybe it will work for this. What happens in 73? That game sets a television viewing record. In 1975, you know, they shatter that record, and then here comes Bird and Magic in 79, you know, ready to break it again. I do think that even without Magic in 1979, even if it was Indiana State at 33-0, a Cinderella coming out of nowhere, you know, with this incredible talent, uh Larry Bird, uh, even if it had just been that, you know, against a different team, they very may have well have broken the record in '79 anyway. You know, as one NBC executive said out loud, just a few days before the Final Four started in late March 79 in Salt Lake City, you know, if Indiana State is in the finals, he said, we will go over the top. And, you know, uh, so you know, it was a moment in time. And, you know, as often happens in history, you know, uh, you know, worlds are colliding here, uh, you know, trends are colliding here, and these two figures who will become icons, uh, Byrd and Magic are just arriving on the scene at the exact right time.

SPEAKER_01 35:58

Yeah. Um, all right. We're I promised you 30 minutes, we've already gone over, but I and you're probably tired of answering this question, but you probably weren't too surprised. I imagine that Larry Byrne did not want to do an interview for the book just based on his his history. Do you think he missed an opportunity? And do his teammates think maybe more important that he missed an opportunity to shine a light on on them? You know, even if he didn't want to talk too much about himself, he could have talked about uh his teammates. And I wondered what what you've picked up uh on that side of things. And also, in some ways, I imagine you can write a better book without the participation of the subject in a way. Um uh what are your thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_00 36:43

Yeah. So, you know, uh back to your original question. I mean, of course I want to talk to everybody, right? And of course I want to talk uh to Larry Bird if I can get him. Um but uh, you know, I've learned, you know, over the course of my reporting and certainly over the course of these past two books in particular, you know, my book on Pete Rose and this book here, uh, that you can often get a more accurate portrait, you know, of the person by talking to 15, 40, 100 people around that person than you can by talking to the person him or herself. Um you know, uh, and and I believe I've done that here. Uh, you know, I did more than 200 hours of interviews with the folks who were there in the room, you know, on the court, on the bus, on the plane, uh, in the press box, uh, and with all of his college teammates. Um, I'm sure that they would have appreciated, you know, if if Bird had participated. That would have amplified, I think, you know, their story. Uh, but, you know, you know, this book is bigger than Bird. You know, it is, as you know, it's it's about a team, it's about a time, it's about a place, it's about a moment that reverberates, you know, through the lives of many people. Uh, you know, honestly, hundreds of thousands, hundreds and thousands of people. You know, uh, last week, you know, I'm in Indiana for that book tour, you know, at that event in Terra Hotes, you know, the the fans I met, you know, were emotional in speaking to me about that time, and they didn't even take a shot. They weren't even on the floor, you know, and so um uh it was uh a real thrill uh to be there, you know, with that group of uh people. Uh and um, you know, I uh I'm I'm thrilled that I was able to tell this story.

SPEAKER_01 38:53

Yeah, well, you did a great job as expected and as usual. Here's the book, uh Heartland by uh Keith O'Brien, uh one of the masters of the game of narrative nonfiction, uh sports related, the types of books that I love. I know so many other people uh do as well. So, Keith, congratulations on another uh masterpiece and uh thank you again for coming onto this show. I highly uh recommend the book for anybody that's listening.

SPEAKER_00 39:20

Oh, Andrew, it's always great to be with you, man. Uh uh, thanks so much for having me. I love the conversation.

SPEAKER_01 39:26

All right, we'll hope to see you here in Nashville someday soon.