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Reggie Miller

basketball player; olympic athlete; television show host

Personal Information

Born Reginald Wayne Miller on August 21, 1965, in Riverside, CA; son of Saul and Carrie Miller; married Marita Stavrou
Education: Attended UCLA, 1983-87.

Career

Indiana Pacers, guard, 1987-; TV host, Indianapolis; coauthor, I Love Being the Enemy: A Season on The Court With The NBA's Best Shooter and Sharpest Tongue, 1995.

Life's Work

Reggie Miller is a talented man who comes from a very talented family in Riverside, California. One of five siblings, Miller is the second of two Millers to win an Olympic gold medal; the first was his older sister Cheryl, who earned her gold medal while playing for the United States women's basketball team during the 1984 Summer Olympics. Reggie won his medal in the 1996 Summer Olympics as a member of Dream Team III, the United States men's basketball team. His older brother, Darrell, was an outfielder for Major League Baseball's California Angels. Miller's other sister, Laura, played varsity volleyball at California State- Fullerton.

A 13-year National Basketball Association veteran, all with the Indiana Pacers, Miller is considered one of the league's most feared three-point shooters. On March 18, 2001, he hit his 2,000th three-point shot against the Sacramento Kings. In the same game, he also surpassed the 21,000-point plateau. Through the 2000-2001 NBA season, Miller averaged 19.5 points per game and scored 21,319 points.

As a youngster, Miller was plagued by a hip deformity that caused severely splayed feet, according to Indystar.com. For the first four years of his life he wore leg braces to correct the birth defect and doctors wondered if he would ever walk unassisted. But he persevered, and by the time he was five, Miller was walking normally. Despite the struggle that could prove inspirational for many people, he rarely discussed this portion of his life. Growing up in an athletic family had its advantages for Miller, who worked diligently to beat them in pickup games in the driveway.

Miller played exceptionally well during high school but always stood in the shadows of his other talented siblings. His sister, Cheryl, is considered one of the greatest women's basketball players in the history of the game, while older brother, Darrell was an outstanding catcher and outfielder prospect. Miller was out to make his own name, as he starred at Riverside Polytechnical High School from 1979 to 1983. His abilities caught the attention of nearby UCLA, which wanted to recruit the slender, silky shooter. By the time he finished his college career, Miller had amassed 2,095 career points, ranking second in the school's history behind only the legendary Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Averaging more than 20 points per game during his senior season at UCLA, Miller was regarded as the purest shooter in the game. With shooting guard John Long aging, Miller was the logical choice for the Indiana Pacers, who chose him in the NBA Draft. But the home folks preferred Steve Alford, a local boy who played his college basketball at Indiana University. With the 11th overall pick, Pacers coach Jack Ramsay nabbed Miller and not Alford, who was taken by the Dallas Mavericks, much to the chagrin of the fans.

Although he was the Pacers' career leading scorer, Miller didn't get much notoriety until the team made a playoff run in 1994. With each team that the Pacers played, Miller's reputation grew. Even in a seven-game series loss to the Knicks, Miller's performance was most memorable: he scored 25 points in one quarter. On June 1, 1994, Miller hit five three-point shots against the Knicks to set a NBA playoff record. He also flashed the "choke" sign to film director Spike Lee, who was sitting courtside at Madison Square Garden. The incident has established Miller as one of the league's most notorious "trash-talkers." Another playoff run ended in the 1995 Eastern Conference Finals, this time the Pacers lost to the Orlando Magic.

Miller's "newfound" fame garnered him a spot on Dream Team II, the U.S. men's basketball team playing for gold at the World Basketball Championship. He joined fellow NBA stars, Shaquille O'Neal, Alonzo Mourning, Shawn Kemp and Larry Johnson as they won the gold. Miller averaged 20 points per game and hit sixty percent of his three-point shots. He was also a member of Dream Team III, which included Grant Hill, Penny Hardaway, and David Robinson as they took home the gold in the 1996 Summer Olympics.

Off the court, Miller hosted a weekly TV show aimed at teenagers in Indianapolis. His topics ranged from homelessness to teen pregnancy. He has been heavily involved in the community. Miller explained to the Gary Post-Tribune, "People may think I'm a jerk, but that's just on the court. Off the court, I want to help." Miller also suffered a loss, when his home burned down. It was ruled arson, and the case remains unsolved. He has written his autobiography, I Love Being the Enemy: A Season On The Court With The NBA's Best Shooter and Sharpest Tongue.

Pacers' coach Larry Brown resigned after the 1996-1997 season and was replaced by legendary Boston Celtic and Indiana State star Larry Bird. That spring, the Pacers pushed the Chicago Bulls, led by Michael Jordan, to the brink, but lost again in seven games. In the 1998-1999 season, the Knicks eliminated the Pacers in the Eastern Conference Finals for a fourth time. For the 10th year in a row, Miller was the Pacers' leading scorer, but still hadn't reached the NBA Finals.

The 1999-2000 season proved to be Miller's most memorable. He helped the Pacers advance to their first NBA Finals appearance against the Los Angeles Lakers. Miller had worked well with Jalen Rose, but the Lakers' Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant proved too much for the neophyte Pacers. In August of 2000, Miller signed a new three-year contract for $36 million and there was more change: Bird resigned and Pacers president Donnie Walsh hired new coach Isiah Thomas, another basketball legend with Indiana ties. In Thomas' first season, the Pacers fought the eventual Eastern Conference champion Philadelphia 76ers hard but lost in the first round. Still, Miller has remained upbeat about playing for Thomas and just playing altogether.

"I still get nervous before games," Miller told Yahoo Sports. "Looking down at the opposing two-guard, I still get excited for the rivalry no matter which it is. I always think I'm going to have my hands full, and I want to make sure they have their hands full." Through the years, Miller has established himself as one of the NBA's best players. According to the New York Daily News, "Reggie Miller's talent is more than his shot, even more than his mouth....Miller possesses in abundance that quality sportwriters crave more than any other: charisma."

Reggie Miller

Position	Shooting guard
Nickname	Miller Time, The Knick Killa
Height	ft in ( m)
Weight	lb ( kg)
Nationality	USA
Born	August 24 1965 (1965--) (age 42) Riverside, California
College	UCLA
Draft	11^th overall, 1987 Indiana Pacers
Pro career	1987–2005
Former teams	Indiana Pacers (1987–2005)
Awards	5-Time NBA All-Star^[1]

Olympic medal record
Men's Basketball
Gold	1996 Atlanta	United States

Early life

Miller was born with leg deformities which caused an inability to walk correctly. After a few years of continuously wearing braces on both legs, his leg strength grew enough to compensate. One of five siblings, he comes from an athletic family. His brother Darrell is a former Major League Baseball catcher; his sister Tammy played volleyball at California State University, Fullerton; and his older sister Cheryl is arguably the best women's basketball player of all time. Cheryl was a member of the 1984 U.S. gold-medal winning Olympic basketball team and is currently an analyst for Turner Sports. One of the family anecdotes Reggie liked to recall was when Cheryl used to beat him in games of 1-on-1 prior to his professional career. According to Reggie, they quit playing when Reggie was finally able to block Cheryl's shot.

College

Reggie Miller attended Riverside Polytechnic High School,California. He then attended the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) where he received a degree in history.^[2] In the 1984-1985 NCAA season he helped the Bruins to an NIT championship. In his senior season, 1986-1987, he led the Bruins to a Pac-10 regular season championship and the first Pac-10 tournament championship. His final game was a loss in the second round of the 1987 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament to the Wyoming Cowboys. He finished second in all-time scoring at UCLA behind only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. As of 2006, he still holds the UCLA single-season records for most league points, highest league scoring average, and most free throws. He also holds several individual games records.

NBA career

Reggie was selected by the Pacers with the 11th pick in the 1st round of the 1987 NBA Draft. Miller wore jersey number 31 while playing on the Pacers, backing up shooting guard John Long before he became a starter. Also, fans were initially upset that the Pacers chose Miller over Indiana University product Steve Alford; fans watching the 1987 NBA Draft booed Pacers President Donnie Walsh for the selection. Miller gained a respectable following early in his career as he helped turn the Pacers into a perennial playoff team.

Miller became a household name during the 1994 Eastern Conference Finals against the New York Knicks, due to his phenomenal shooting performance in Game 5 of the series on June 1, 1994, in which he scored 39 points total and 25 in the fourth quarter of the Pacers' 93-86 victory at Madison Square Garden. Miller made several long three-pointers during the quarter and engaged in an animated discussion of his ongoing performance with noted Knicks fan Spike Lee, who was seated courtside. The win gave the Pacers a 3-2 series lead over the heavily favored Knicks, but the Pacers lost the next two games and thus the series.

On May 7, 1995, Miller scored eight points in 8.9 seconds in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference semifinals against the Knicks, leading the Pacers to a stunning 107-105 victory. With 16.4 seconds remaining and the Pacers trailing by six points, Miller made a three-point shot, stole the inbounds pass, then dribbled BACK to the three-point arc and tied the game with a second three-pointer, stunning the Knick bench and their fans. On the ensuing possession, Knicks guard John Starks was fouled by Pacer Sam Mitchell but missed two free throws; Miller rebounded the second miss and was fouled. Miller made both free throws, and the Pacers' defense denied the Knicks' last chance for the win. The Pacers outlasted the Knicks in a seven-game series before losing to the Orlando Magic in the conference finals, also four games to three. Near the end of the 1996 season, Miller fell to the floor and suffered an eye injury, making him unable to play in the playoffs until before Game 5 of the first round against the Atlanta Hawks. The Pacers lost to the Hawks and were eliminated.

The Pacers made their next appearance in the Eastern Conference Finals three years later. On May 25, 1998, the Pacers trailed the Chicago Bulls two games to one in the series and were behind 94-93 in Game 4 at Market Square Arena with less than three seconds remaining. Miller fought free of defender Michael Jordan, caught an inbounds pass from McKey, turned and made a game-winning three-point shot. The Pacers eventually pushed the series to a decisive seventh game in Chicago, a game in which the Pacers led in the fourth quarter before fading in the final minutes. The Bulls took the series and went on to win their sixth and final championship with Jordan.

In Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals against the Philadelphia 76ers on May 6, 2000, Reggie and teammate Jalen Rose each scored 40 points — becoming the highest-scoring pair of teammates in playoff history; in the Pacers' 108-91 victory. The Pacers won that series 4-2 and returned to the Eastern Conference Finals for the fifth time in seven years. This time they finally crashed through the gates, defeating the rival Knicks four games to two. The deciding Game 6 on June 2, 2000 was sealed by Reggie's 34 points, half of which came in the fourth quarter.

Reggie Miller taking a curtain call during his last game.

The Pacers thus advanced to the NBA Finals for the first time in franchise history, facing the Los Angeles Lakers of Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant. The Pacers lost the series and the championship four games to two, but Miller and Rose put on a shooting clinic in the Pacers' resounding Game 5 win that staved off elimination, scoring 25 and 32 points respectively. Miller averaged 24.3 points per game for the series.

In 2002, Miller almost single-handedly eliminated the top seed and eventual Eastern Conference Champion New Jersey Nets in the fifth and final game of the first round of the playoffs. First, following two missed free throws from New Jersey's Richard Jefferson, Miller sent the game into overtime by banking in a 39 foot three-point shot at the buzzer. Next, with the Pacers down by 2 points in the final seconds of the first overtime, Miller drove into the lane and dunked over three Nets defenders to send the game into a second overtime period. While the Pacers would eventually fall to the Nets 120-109, that game had added another chapter to Miller's legacy as a clutch performer.

In the twilight of his career, Miller deferred his leadership role to All-Star teammate Jermaine O'Neal. Miller was an important locker-room leader for his team and served as an inspiration to his teammates who wanted to "win one [a championship] for 'Uncle Reg'". While Miller was no longer the team's leading scorer, he remained a go-to player in clutch time to the very end of his career.

In 2005, following the lengthy suspensions of star teammates O'Neal, Stephen Jackson, and Ron Artest for a brawl with fans in Detroit, Miller showed he could still score points in bunches, averaging nearly 20 points per game for stretches of the season. He even scored 39 points against the Los Angeles Lakers on March 18 at the age of 39. In January, Miller angrily shot down rumors that he would retire at the end of the season, saying that if he did decide to retire, he would announce it through his sister Cheryl Miller. On February 10, Cheryl, now a sideline reporter for TNT, reported that her brother had told her the previous day that he would indeed retire. On April 11, in a game against the Toronto Raptors, Miller passed Jerry West to move into 12th on the NBA's all-time scoring list.

Miller's last game was on May 19, 2005, at Conseco Fieldhouse, when the Pacers lost 88-79 to the Detroit Pistons in the Eastern Conference Semifinals, ending the series four games to two. In the game, Miller led the Pacers with 27 points, making 11 out of 16 field goals including four of eight 3-pointers. When he was taken out with 15.7 seconds to play, the Indianapolis crowd gave him a last standing ovation. Pistons coach (and former Pacers coach) Larry Brown then called an additional timeout during which the Pistons players joined in the ovation, providing closure not only to Miller's career but also to a season that had been largely overshadowed by the early-season brawl between the two teams.

International career

Miller was a member of the gold medal-winning Olympic men's basketball team in 1996 and of the US national team for the 1994 FIBA World Championship and 2002 FIBA World Championship. The 2002 team did not win the championship that year, which was the first time that NBA players competed against international competition and lost. Miller was injured during the 2002 World Championships and played limited minutes.

Achievements

Miller played more games with the same team than all but two players in NBA history, John Stockton and Karl Malone of the Utah Jazz. Over the course of his career, Miller scored 25,279 points, with an average of 18.2 points per game. He shot .471 from the field, .395 from 3-point range and .888 from the free throw line.
Miller made the All-NBA First Team three times throughout his career and received his only MVP votes in 1998 and 2000.
Miller was the first Indiana Pacer to start in an NBA All-Star Game, first doing so in 1995. He was also selected to the team in 1990, 1996, 1998 and 2000. During the 98 player introductions, the PA announcer mistakes Miller as a two-time Olympic gold-medalist.
The book Who's Better, Who's Best by Elliott Kalb lists Miller among the top 50 NBA players of all time.
Miller is the all-time NBA leader in total 3-point field goal made (2,560) and ranks at 13th place in total points (25,279)^[1], 7th in free throw percentage (88.8%), 6th in minutes played (47,619) and 7th in games played (1,323).^[1] He is also all-time NBA leader in total three-point field goals made in the playoffs (320).
Miller also holds the record for most taken three point field goals in an NBA career.(6,486)
Miller led the league twice in three-point field goals made (1992-93, 1996-97). He also led the league in free throw percentage five times, including his last season.
Miller is the NBA's career leader in four-point plays with 24.
Miller made a three-pointer in 68 consecutive games from November 15, 1996 to April 6, 1997.
In 2003, Reggie Miller was ranked 42nd on SLAM magazine's Top 75 NBA players of all time.
Reggie Miller is one of only five members of the 50-40-90 club along with Larry Bird, Mark Price, Steve Nash and Dirk Nowitzki. This club is for players who during the course of a season shot 50% or better from the field, 40% or better from three-point range, and 90% or better from the free throw line.

Retirement

Miller served as the 2005 Indianapolis 500 Festival Parade Grand Marshal. Archbishop Daniel M. Buechlein, OSB of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis opened the day with the prayer "Keep these drivers safe and God bless Reggie!" before Miller waved the green flag to start the race.
In August 2005, Miller announced his plans to join TNT as an NBA analyst; his sister, Cheryl is a NBA sideline reporter for the network. Recently Miller served as guest host of the network television talk show Live with Regis and Kelly, filling in for host Regis Philbin.
Miller's number 31 was retired at halftime in a ceremony on March 30, 2006, at Conseco Fieldhouse.
In June 2005, Miller also became a weekly contributor to The Dan Patrick Show on ESPN Radio, providing the show with commentary.
Miller splits his time between his home on Geist Reservoir in Fishers, Indiana and Malibu, California.

Possible return

On August 8, 2007 it was reported by ESPN that Miller was contemplating a return to the NBA to play for the Boston Celtics after Celtics general manager Danny Ainge and head coach Doc Rivers discussed with him about joining their revamped roster including Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, and longtime Celtic Paul Pierce in a reserve role.^[1] On August 12, his former coach Rick Carlisle was quoted in The Boston Globe as saying "we (me and Miller) talked about it and agreed that it was something that deserved careful consideration."^[3]

On August 24th 2007, Miller decided against a comeback with the Boston Celtics or anyone else, according to The Indianapolis Star. "Physically, I know I could have done it. But mentally, when you do something like this, you've either got to be all in or all out. And I've decided I'm all out." ^[4]

Quotes

"[The Knicks] won't do it, but there should be something here [at Madison Square Garden] with Reggie's name or number on it." - Pacers coach Rick Carlisle. November 15, 2003 after Miller scored 31 points (10/12 field goals, 6/7 threes) in the Pacers' win over the Knicks.
“When he’s old and in a wheelchair, they’re going to roll him out onto the [Madison Square] Garden court and he’s still going to hit threes." - Film director Spike Lee. November 15, 2003.
"When you can score your age in this league, it's not time to quit. If I were Reggie's agent, I'd try to sign him to a multiyear contract" - Lakers coach Frank Hamblen. March 18, 2005 after Miller scored 39 points in the Pacers' win over the Lakers.
"The most dependable shooter in the history of the NBA." - Former Pacers Coach, and NBA Legend Larry Bird
"No matter how good you are, there is a lot of luck involved." - Reggie Miller

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e
^ NBA.com: Reggie Miller Bio. Retrieved on 2006-07-22.
^ Shira Springer, They Back His Comeback, The Boston Globe
^ Miller Won't Return to the NBA

External links

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Reggie Miller

1996 Olympic Champions Men's Basketball – United States
Charles Barkley \| Penny Hardaway \| Grant Hill \| Karl Malone \| Reggie Miller \| Hakeem Olajuwon Shaquille O'Neal \| Gary Payton \| Scottie Pippen \| Mitch Richmond \| David Robinson \| John Stockton
Coach: Lenny Wilkins

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