Never mind Yalta or Reykjavik. As summit meetings of superpowers go, nongeopolitical division, precedent for the one at a New York hotel ballroom in January could be found in French Lick, Ind.
There in the summer of 1985, Boston Celtics great Larry Bird, the two-time reigning NBA MVP, hosted Los Angeles Lakers great Magic Johnson at his mother’s house to shoot a Converse sneakers ad known as “Choose Your Weapon.” Though Bird and Magic had competed against one another since the 1979 NCAA championship, the rivals kept such distance between them that they had not yet even casually shaken hands, no less sat down at Georgia Bird’s kitchen table, as they did for a home-cooked meal that afternoon.
