Sports
There are three jerseys hanging from the rafters of Conseco Fieldhouse: Mel Daniels, Roger Brown, and a hideous polyester blazer for Slick Leonard (well, okay, there really is a jersey for him, but there should be a polyester blazer). You could site Freddie Lewis, Billie Keller, Bob Netolicky (who, incidentally, was an important original Spur, notwithstanding his service with the Pacers), George McGinnis, and Billy Knight . . . but that’s all ABA, when the Pacers ruled supreme. As far as the NBA is concerned, besides Buse’s defensive team honors, there was nothing. Nada. Zilch.
Robinson always stood as a symbol of “doing things the right way”. Miller, too, did things the right way; but, more than that, Miller did his damage when the most damage was to be done . . . Miller is one of the premier prime-time players in the history of the NBA. He was about doing things the right way, but, even more, he was about doing it when the shit was on the line.
The Spurs have moved on from the Robinson era to the Duncan era, and managed to get even better, winning two titles, one with Robinson, and one without. Now it’s the Pacers’s turn: within the next five years, the Pacers will win a title. Miller has passed the team on to notorious Jekyll/Hyde on-court leadership (O’Neal and Artest; and yes, I believe that Artest will emerge as a leader, if a somewhat . . . ah, mercurial . . . leader). Expect to see the Spurs and the Pacers in the finals against each other with alarming regularity (by the way, that rustling sound you here is nothing more than the scrambling of sports TV executives trying to book American Idol winners for half-time concerts designed to boost TV ratings). There is no question that, sometime soon, Reggie will be awarded the ring that eluded him during his playing career.
We will all remember the Reggie Miller who destroyed the Knicks as a matter of course. We remember the joy that radiated from him as the Madison Square Garden crowd booed, and how he drank their abuse like rocket fuel and shot the flames back in their faces. We will remember the Reggie Miller who just had to find somebody, anybody, to piss off whenever he stepped on the court. We will remember the Reggie Miller who responded with glee to the comeback of the greatest, Michael Jordan, wearing number 45 at Market Square Arena. We will also remember that Miller got the best of him that game, after Jordan’s return from baseball. We will remember that no one got further inside Jordan’s head than the skinny loudmouth from UCLA who ended up with the Indiana Pacers. And finally, we will remember this season, when Reggie put the Pacers on his back one last time, and in so doing, finally got the respect that he deserved.
But, ultimately, what I will remember about Reggie is this: normally, when a shot goes up, your breath catches as you hang on a thread, waiting to see if the ball is going in. When Reggie went up for a shot with the game on the line, you just assumed it was going in.