"I might want to punch him" - Reggie Miller admits he might want to swing on Michael Jordan if they met face-to-face today

Yahoo

21-07-2025

"I might want to punch him" - Reggie Miller admits he might want to swing on Michael Jordan if they met face-to-face today originally appeared on Basketball Network.
It's been more than two decades since Reggie Miller last exchanged words, let alone elbows, with Michael Jordan. But the fire that fueled one of the NBA's grittiest rivalries hasn't burned out.
Time may mellow the body, but it rarely erases the memory of missed opportunities, bitter defeats and those who stood in the way.
For Miller, that person was Jordan, not just the icon or face of basketball's golden era but the six-time champion who turned Eastern Conference dreams into mere dreams for other opponents in the 1990s.
Seeing Jordan today
MJ might have been one of the main reasons Miller never won a championship. That feeling hasn't left him after many years, and he doesn't know how he would react if he met the Chicago Bulls icon face-to-face today.
"I might want to punch him," Miller said. "I might hug him or punch him."
Miller's career spanned from 1987 to 2005, a run marked by three-point wizardry and a trademark edge that turned him into a villain in enemy arenas and a hero in Indiana. But what it didn't include was a championship ring and the barrier standing between him. That elusive title was often clad in red and black.
Throughout the 1990s, as the Bulls dominated the NBA, the Indiana Pacers emerged as one of the few teams that could look them in the eye without flinching. And at the center of that resistance was Miller. Still, each time the two titans clashed, it was Jordan's Bulls who walked off the battlefield with the win.
Their most memorable clash came in the 1998 Eastern Conference finals.
The series went the distance, seven games of bad blood, clutch shots and suffocating defense. Miller had his moment in Game 4, drilling a last-second 3-pointer after shaking Jordan with a textbook push-off. It was the kind of highlight that should have defined a turning point. But as always, Mike responded. And in Game 7, the Bulls edged out the Pacers in an 88–83 war of attrition.
That was the closest Reggie ever came to the Finals during the Bulls dynasty. In that series alone, Miller averaged 17.4 points, while Jordan poured in 31.7. Those numbers tell the story. Reggie brought the fire, but Mike brought the inferno. And when the last whistle blew, Chicago moved on to win its sixth title of the decade.Lingering feelings
The 1990s were cruel to Eastern Conference greats who weren't named Jordan. Players like Patrick Ewing, Charles Barkley and Miller often found themselves on the wrong end of history. But few wore the grudge as openly as Miller. Where Ewing stayed quiet and Barkley joked it off, Miller simmered. He was never just another star; he was a showman, a provocateur. And he wanted his own ending.
Miller was in his prime years then. Between 1994 and 2000, he was operating at full tilt. During that stretch, he made five NBA All-Star appearances and cemented his reputation as the NBA's deadliest shooter under pressure. His performances in the postseason were electric, and it seemed it was just a matter of time for him to hoist a championship.
At his peak, Miller averaged over 21 points per game, shooting better than 40 percent from beyond the arc in multiple seasons. He retired with 2,560 made threes, an NBA record at the time. But statistics were never what separated him from the rest; it was his attitude and absolute refusal to bow to anyone, even Jordan.
And yet, for all his defiance, the championship never came. Even when Jordan retired for the second time in 1998, Miller's window barely cracked open. The Pacers finally made the Finals in 2000. Still, Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant's Los Angeles Lakers were building their own dynasty by then. Indiana fell in six games.This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Jul 15, 2025, where it first appeared.