Call it the “George Brett Syndrome.”

Brett, Kansas City’s Hall of Fame infielder, had three older brothers, one of whom (Ken) broke in with the Red Sox and pitched in the 1967 World Series less than a month after turning 19.

Get Starting Point

A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday.

Baby brother George came to the bigs six years later and was never bothered by anything. He almost hit .400 one season (.390 in 1980), won a World Series in 1985, and cruised into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot in 1999.

Same thing with a kid named Larry Joe Bird. Larry had two older brothers and came to Boston with confidence and attitude uncommon for a quiet rookie.

It was Mark and Mike Bird who made their kid brother fearless. They were the ones that first wiped their hands on the bottoms of their sneakers during pauses in play. They were the ones who first shot a million jumpers on cold winter afternoons on empty playgrounds of French Lick and West Baden, Ind.

“If I didn’t have older brothers who played sports, I probably wouldn’t have even played,” Bird told me in 1985, when he won the second of his three straight MVPs. “My brother Mark was three years older and I used to rebound for him. The ball would just come through the net so soft and I didn’t even have to move. That caught my eye. … After all them years playing with my brothers, I’ve never been intimidated on a basketball court.”

Celtics legend Larry Bird credited his older brothers for picking up basketball, and helping him excel at it.John Tlumacki/Globe staff / File

The wildly-popular champion 1980s Celtics were stocked with cocky younger brothers. Danny Ainge was the youngest of three boys and excelled in every sport ever invented. Bill Walton had an older brother, Bruce, who was Bill’s protector at San Diego’s Helix High School and made it all the way to the NFL. Dennis Johnson was one of 16 kids, most of them older brothers who sculpted DJ’s rugged, fearless game on Southern California playgrounds.

Many years later, New England was gifted with Rob Gronkowski, number four in a line of five gigantic brothers from Buffalo. Gronk became the greatest tight end in NFL history.

And now we have Maye, “the runt of the litter,” as he calls himself.

Maye stands 6 feet 4 inches, but his three older brothers are 6-7 or more, all able to eat candy off the top of his head.

Luke Maye, at 6-8, was a Tar Heels basketball star, an NCAA Tournament champ who famously canned the jumper that eliminated Kentucky in the 2017 Elite Eight. He currently plays professionally in Japan.

Luke Maye (32) walked on to the North Carolina basketball team and played a central role in the Tar Heels’ 2017 national championship. He also enjoyed beating up on Zion Williamson (1) and Duke.Streeter Lecka/Getty Images

Cole Maye was a 6-7 lefthanded hurler who won the NCAA baseball championship with the Florida Gators, and 6-8 Beau also played hoop for the Tar Heels. They helped make their baby brother great.

“We pushed Drake and made him as good as we could by beatin’ up on him the whole time” Beau told ESPN. “I knew he could be great. He’s got a great head on his shoulders and a good work ethic.”

All true. The kid brother is the shortest and best athlete of the big bunch.

Memo to talent evaluators: Always draft the kid with three older brothers. He’s battle-tested, humble, and can handle anything.

Now let’s see how Drake Maye does Sunday night in Baltimore.

▪ Quiz: 1. Name the Celtics top four career leaders in free throw percentage (minimum 350 games); 2. Name five Hockey Hall of Famers inducted after 2000 who ended their careers playing for the Bruins (answers below).

▪ Credit to the Knicks for not hanging a banner in the ancient rafters of Madison Square after winning the ridiculous NBA Cup with a win over the Spurs in Vegas Tuesday. I was worried for a while. On the morning after the big win, the back page of the vaunted NY Post featured OG Anunoby going to the hoop next to a sub headline which read, “Knicks fend off Spurs to win first title of any kind since 1973.” Excuse me? A “title”? It’s the Emirates NBA Cup, and who really wants to be associated with that? The Lakers and Bucks unveiled banners when they won the first two of these made-up events and it sure sounded like the Knicks were going to do the same. “Why not?,” asked Knick Josh Hart. “It’s a Cup. It’s a title. It’s something that you want to win. Hang a banner.” Ultimately, the Knicks showed some class and restraint. There’ll be no parade down the Canyon of Heroes for the NBA Cup and no banner. Each Knick nets $530,933 for winning the thing.

Karl-Anthony Towns (32) and his Knicks teammates were able to hoist a trophy for the first time more than 50 years when they won the NBA Cup on Tuesday. Ian Maule/Associated Press

▪ Another week of more nothing from the Red Sox, unless you want to count Fenway Sports Group’s sale of the Penguins. The Sox bosses are now sitting on a sports empire worth almost $13 billion. Look for them to try to get an expansion NBA team in Vegas (The Flying Elvises? The Wayne Newtons?) next time the league grows. As far as the Olde Towne Team goes, the Sox currently have no first baseman, no second baseman, and no third baseman, but otherwise things are swell. The hot rumor now has Arizona’s Ketel Marte being traded to Boston, allowing the Diamondbacks to sign Arizona resident Alex Bregman to play third. Look for the Sox to remain kings of the dumpster dives and one-year contracts.

▪ Sox fans expecting to hear from Theo Epstein regarding the current edition of the Local Nine are likely to be disappointed. Theo returned to the organization as a Fenway Sports Group Leadership “senior advisor” and FSG “partner” in 2024, but is too smart to attach his name to the obfuscations and shell-game shenanigans that have become part of every Sox offseason game plan since 2018.

▪ Playing in the image of their inflexible coach, the stubborn Celtics made one of 18 3-pointers in the second and third quarters of their 112-105 Garden loss to the Pistons Monday. This was after missing 16 in a row against Milwaukee last week. Keep on chuckin’, guys.

Philip Rivers cut a pretty full figure when he made his first NFL start in five years as he quarterbacked the Colts against the Seahawks last Sunday. Lindsey Wasson/Associated Press

▪ Falstaffian, 44-year-old Philip Rivers completed 18 of 27 passes for 120 yards in last weekend’s Colts’ loss to the Seahawks. It was a remarkable performance. Rivers returned to the field with only one week of practice, a full five years since his last game. He’s expected to get a second start Monday night against the 49ers. Rivers was listed at 228 pounds in his playing days and isn’t telling us what he weighs now, except to say it’s “not what it was” when he retired. He looks to be about 260 and might be the heaviest starting quarterback in NFL history. The biggest NFL QB ever was probably the late Jared Lorenzen, who tipped the scales at 285 pounds and got into four games as Eli Manning’s backup with the Giants in 2006 and ’07. Dubbed “the hefty lefty”, Lorenzen won a Super Bowl ring the night Eli beat the undefeated Patriots in Glendale, Ariz.

▪ I’d never heard of rapper Travis Scott until last weekend. Scott was the fool dancing in Hip Hop Bob Kraft’s box when the Pats went up, 21-0, against the Bills in the second quarter last Sunday. The Pats featured Scott on their massive videoboard in a premature celebration, then coughed up the lead in the second half. No more Travis Scott, please. He’s bad luck.

▪ Speaking of Kraft, he’s not a lock for the Pro Football Hall of Fame when 50 voters convene the day before February’s Super Bowl in Santa Clara, Calif., to select the class of 2026 for enshrinement in Canton, Ohio. Kraft is on a special category ballot where he’s pitted against Bill Belichick, and three players who’ve been retired for more than 25 years: Roger Craig, Ken Anderson, and L.C. Greenwood. A candidate needs at least 40 of the 50 votes to gain admission. If no candidate on this special ballot reaches 40 voters, the candidate with the most votes will be elected. Belichick is a virtual certainty. Will Kraft be able to get the necessary 40 votes? Voters can only vote for as many as three, and Belichick, Craig, Anderson, and Greenwood will have a lot of supporters. How many voters are going to opt for an owner over a longtime head coach and decorated former players?

▪ I don’t care if the 2025-26 Oklahoma City Thunder finish 80-2, they will never be as good at the 1985-86 Celtics, who went 50-1 at home (including playoffs and Hartford games) and featured Larry Bird, Robert Parish, Kevin McHale, Bill Walton, Dennis Johnson, and Danny Ainge. The 2015-16 Warriors finished an NBA record-best 73-9, then lost in the Finals to LeBron James’s Cavaliers.

▪ Wrote last week about the outrageousness of no LeBron, Luka, or Smart — and no advance warning — when the Lakers made their only appearance in Boston earlier this month. A local reader responded: “Last summer, my 16-year-old grandson asked if I could get him tickets for the Laker game for his birthday. I made a purchase online, then received an email from StubHub saying my tickets were ready with an order number. I forked over $1,746.35 for two seats in Loge 5, Row 20. I am ashamed how much I paid. Yes, the Celtics won but that was little consolation. To pay all that cash for a game with no LeBron, no Luka, to Marcus Smart was maddening.”

▪ The WNBA’s current collective bargaining agreement is set to expire January 9 and there’s been no progress in negotiations for a new deal. A work stoppage is exactly what the league does not need.

▪ Hats off to the President’s Chief of Staff, Susie Wiles, daughter of 10-year NFL vet and Hall of Fame sportscaster Pat Summerall. For telling the truth.

▪ Best wishes to Brown University freshman volleyball player Spencer Yang, a victim of the horrific shooting on the Brown campus last weekend. According to a Brown volleyball Instagram post, “After several days of care in the hospital, Spencer is now safely recovering at home with his family. Even after being shot, Spencer selflessly provided aid to a severely wounded classmate until first responders arrived. That is the kind of person he is. We are beyond proud of him and are wishing him a speedy recovery.” Wang participated in the Boston Volleyball Festival at the Boston Convention Center last March and was featured in Stan Grossfeld’s “As I See It” Globe column.

▪ Dr. Ed Lacerte, head trainer for the Celtics for 30 years, also trainer of the USA’s gold medal Dream Team at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992, has an aggressive form of leukemia and will require a blood stem transplant following chemo. The Celtics are encouraging fans ages 18-to-35 at their home games Dec. 19, and Dec. 22 to join the blood stem cell donor registry by getting their cheeks swabbed on Level 4 behind Sections 18 and 19.

▪ Quiz answers: 1. Ray Allen (91.4 percent), Larry Bird (88.6), Bill Sharman (88.3), Danny Ainge (86.7); 2. Paul Coffey (inducted 2004), Cam Neely (’05), Brian Leetch (’09), Rogie Vachon (’16), Mark Recchi (’17).

Dan Shaughnessy is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at daniel.shaughnessy@globe.com. Follow him @dan_shaughnessy.