Danny Ainge interview on Bill Simmons BS Report (good)

[BballTim]

In '88, he basically averaged the same.

In '88, the Pistons essentially shutdown Bird in the ECFs, where he was consistently below 50% FG for the entire series. I think his best game in that series was only a 46% FG night, which only netted some 20 points. And it was also the only game where he logged less than 40 minutes whereas the rest of the time, he played for most of the game.

This is the bane of KC Jone's style where in effect, he depended upon only the starters, to win or lose it all. At 31, with his increasing orthopedic problems, Bird needed to play a lot less than 44-48 minutes per contest.

  Bird picked up some kind of injury before (or very early in) the Detroit series. That effected his play, it wasn't a case of the Pistons shutting him down.

[TitleMaster]

In '88, he basically averaged the same.

In '88, the Pistons essentially shutdown Bird in the ECFs, where he was consistently below 50% FG for the entire series. I think his best game in that series was only a 46% FG night, which only netted some 20 points. And it was also the only game where he logged less than 40 minutes whereas the rest of the time, he played for most of the game.

This is the bane of KC Jone's style where in effect, he depended upon only the starters, to win or lose it all. At 31, with his increasing orthopedic problems, Bird needed to play a lot less than 44-48 minutes per contest.

  Bird picked up some kind of injury before (or very early in) the Detroit series. That effected his play, it wasn't a case of the Pistons shutting him down.

Piston's defenses were good but the nagging injury was Bird's orthopedic condition [ bone spurs and a lot of other stuff ] were in effect the reason why the man couldn't play 44-48 minutes per game, while maintaining a 50% FG average anymore. This is something which KC never prepared for, as he expected that Bird would put in, full time Chamberlain-like performances, series after series, without any rest.