Each NBA team’s most clutch player of all-time

Boston Celtics, Larry Bird (Photo by Dick Raphael/NBAE via Getty Images)

Most clutch player in Boston Celtics history: Larry Bird

The Boston Celtics are a franchise packed with history and accolades. In Boston 17 title banners hang from the rafters, and the ranks of players to suit up in green and white are packed with Hall of Famers. Yet even with so many great players to choose from the most clutch player in Celtics’ history is easy to find: Larry Joe Bird himself.

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One of Bird’s nicknames is literally “Mr Clutch” because of the sheer magnitude of clutch shots he took and almost always made. He ruled the 1980s with three MVPs and three titles, and everyone in every game he played knew he would take the last shot for the Celtics. Teams doubled him, denied him the ball, packed the paint, and it did not matter. Larry Legend scored anyway. The Los Angeles Lakers had the only player to truly slow him down, Michael Cooper, or otherwise, Boston may have run unchecked through the league for the entire decade.

Highlight reels of Bird’s big moments abound, from “The Duel” with Dominique Wilkins to his triple double to close out the Houston Rockets in 1986. In the 1984 NBA Finals with the game tight, Bird buried a jumper in the face of Magic Johnson to win the game. Yet the most clutch play of Larry Bird’s career may not have been a shot at all.

Key Moment: In 1987 the Bad Boy Pistons were coming into their own, and were pushing to knock off Bird and the Celtics. Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals was in Boston, and Detroit took the lead late on an Isiah Thomas jumper ready to go up 3-2 and send the series back to Detroit. Bird saw his game-winning shot blocked by Dennis Rodman, ball to Detroit, five seconds before the Celtics fell.

Thomas immediately went to inbound the ball, but the Celtics had quickly moved to cover up the Detroit players. Thomas hesitated, and Bird realized his time to inbound was running out. He followed Thomas’ eyes and made a break on the ball as Detroit floated it in to Bill Laimbeer. Bird plucked the ball out of the air, then pivoted as his momentum carried him against the baseline and fired a pass to a cutting Dennis Johnson for the layup.

The Celtics won, and Bird sealed the series victory in Game 7 with a lefty bank shot to put away the Pistons and return to the NBA Finals. Bird came alive at the end of games, and whether it was hitting the shot or stealing a pass he was electric. If this was a list ranking the most clutch players in NBA history, Bird might very well stand at the top.