Tang Jianguo and Ah Gan decided to come to Naples to meet me personally and discuss the possibility of me becoming the coach of the Trail Blazers in person.
I knew that when Ah Gan decided to come see me personally, it would be hard for me to resist this job.
Coaching Ah Gan, is there any work more interesting and challenging than this?
I decided to pick him up from the airport, imagining the scene of meeting him in my mind. I couldn't wait to have a verbal spar with him.
But Ah Gan is always a surprising guy. As soon as he got off the plane, he rushed to me and shook my hand tightly.
He said, "Larry, give me a banana, and I'll play ball for you."
———— Excerpt from "Bird Watching," co-written by Larry Bird and Jackie MacMullan, published in 1999.
Bird watched Gan Guoyang happily eating bananas in the car, this was already his fifth one; Florida didn't lack bananas.
