Reggie Miller was robbed of basketball transcendence.
It’s easy to think otherwise, of course. He’s the most famous Indiana Pacer in franchise history, was a no doubt Hall of Fame inductee, and ranks second on the league’s list of career three-pointers. He’s a five-time All-Star, three-time member of the All-NBA Third Team, and won a gold medal with USA Basketball at the 1996 Olympics.
If Miller isn’t a legend, he’s certainly something close – the type of player and personality who would have starred in any era. But his rise to prominence at UCLA in the mid-1980s and subsequent heyday with the Pacers over the next decade-plus kept Miller from reaching the hallowed threshold of true NBA blue-bloods, an unfortunate and wholly inevitable development derived from his date of birth.
Michael Jordan and Clyde Drexler were always better than Miller. The Chicago Bulls high-flier and his Portland Trail Blazers counterpart boasted the well-rounded, two-way games that Miller never could, not to mention the athletic flash that naturally led to immediate fame he wouldn’t reach. Miller might not be one of the top-five shooting guards ever, but that his prime coincided with those of two all-time greats certainly diminished his star.
It certainly didn’t help that Miller wasn’t blessed with a stellar supporting cast until the latter half of his career, either. Where were coach Larry Bird and Most Improved Players Jalen Rose and Jermaine O’Neal when the Pacers’ icon consistently lived up to that billing on the court?
But even more than Indiana’s general mediocrity or elite positional competition, Miller’s biggest roadblock to hoops immortality – during his playing days or after them – was the league’s strategic identity. Consider this: He never led the NBA in three-point attempts despite shooting better than 40 percent from beyond the arc in an amazing 10 seasons. And though Miller’s career 61.4 true shooting percentage ranks first among all qualified perimeter players, he’s frequently overlooked when discussing the greatest shooters ever.
Just imagine the extent to which Reggie would be appreciated if he played in the modern NBA. Where long-balls are hoisted at a record pace, efficiency is trumpeted more than ever before, and the value of preternatural floor-spacers is finally understood the way it always should have been. Miller was an All-Star during the rough-and-tumble 1990s; in the free-flowing 2010s, it’s not crazy to suggest he’d be a perennial MVP candidate.
Miller’s misfortunate, though, isn’t just about the basketball court. Off it is where his name would grow even bigger if entrenched as a face of the present day NBA.
Remember this?
That’s Miller dropping 25 points in the fourth quarter of Game 5 of the 1994 Eastern Conference Finals to lead the Pacers to a win over the New York Knicks. And yes, he was obviously spurred by a constant back-and-forth with Madison Square Garden super-fan Spike Lee.
What if that happened today? This sequence is already one of the most legendary in league history, and it occurred well before the advent of social media. Think of Miller roasting the Knicks and trash-talking Spike in 2015; it would not only be his signature moment, but a cross-over event that helped his name rise to nationwide sports relevance. It’s not like 1994 was the only time the outspoken Miller made headlines for his overtly contentious approach to competition, either. We’d be granted a clearer lens to that maniacal zeal in 2015 than we were 20 years ago, and he’d be more of a household name as a result.
None of this is to say that Miller underachieved during his 13 playing years. Far from it, actually. But as he celebrates his 50th birthday on Monday, it does the Indiana hero right to wonder if he’d have been more successful in a different time. And as much as he might not like to admit it, today’s is the era in which Miller would have really, really thrived – a reality that speaks as glowingly of his storied career as almost anything else.
[Via DwyaneRudy22]
