Larry Bird on resignation as president of Indiana Pacers: 'You just get tired'

Larry Bird explains his decision to step away from the Pacers. (Getty Images)

Basketball legend Larry Bird seemed to go back and forth before he ultimately decided to resign as president of the Indiana Pacers back in June.

Bird, 55, stepped aside just weeks after the Pacers completed their most successful season since 2006 and little more than a month after he was voted the 2011-12 Executive of the Year.

"I've been working for nine years," Bird explained in an ESPN.com video interview. "Now it's time to take some time off, rest up and get in shape, get my shoulder worked on, and we'll see what happens."

Bird, a native of French Lick, guided his home-state Pacers from 2003-2012. He previously coached the team for three seasons after completing a 13-year Hall of Fame career with the Boston Celtics that began during the 1979-80 season.

After spending more than three decades in professional basketball, Bird said that he still wasn't ready to call this a full retirement.

"You never know," he said of a possible return to management. "It's got to be the right job, the right people, what their commitment really is. I've got some interest in some jobs out there but whether I do it again, who knows?"

Regardless of his future plans, it was clearly time for a break.

"It seemed like for the last 30-something years, I go out or I get up and somebody is wanting something," Bird said. "You just get tired. It wears you down. I just want to lay low."

The Pacers named long-time executive Donnie Walsh as Bird's replacement and promoted Bird's protege -- director of player personnel Kevin Pritchard -- to GM after parting ways with former GM David Morway.