A quick way to start a fight among sports fans is to ask who is the greatest. For example, since this is football season, who is the greater football quarterback, Tom Brady or Peyton Manning? Among golfers you might ask, how would Jack Nicolaus have done against Tiger Woods? To go back a few years, how about Magic Johnson and Larry Bird?

I was reading recently about a Larry Bird fan named Eric Torpy. Let me tell you just how much Torpy admires Larry Bird. In 2005 when Torpy was sentenced to 30 years in prison for armed robbery and attempted murder, he said to the judge, “Why not make it 33 years?” The reason he was willing to add three years to his sentence was that 33 was Larry Bird’s jersey number.

Amazingly, the judge granted Torpy’s request. However, after serving the first few years…