'I couldn't do it': Pacers Great Reggie Miller On Why He Never Played For the Celtics (Or Any Other NBA Team)
Charles Barkley is the among the best studio analysts the sports world has ever seen. He's authentically himself and thus brutally honest.
During the NBA Playoffs this week, after the Brooklyn Nets were swept by the Boston Celtics in Round 1, he talked about stars in the league either being bus drivers or bus riders. This was in reference to Kevin Durant.
Bus drivers are not just stars, but leaders and carried a team to a championship. Bus riders were there and contributed, but were not the reason.
Then on Wednesday, Pacers great Reggie Miller was asked by Dan Patrick about this conversation. Miller, who spent his entire 18-year career playing for the Pacers, doesn't do local interviews but he's on weekly with Patrick.
On his morning show, Patrick referenced how Miller only played for one team and was a bus driver.
"But maybe I should have been a bus rider," Miller joked,"because that's what all (everybody talks about). It's funny because we knock Kevin Durant for being a bus rider or bus driver, but the media says 'championships, championships. Reggie didn't win a championship. So we knock him for being a rider versus a driver.
"At the end of the day, media, which one is more important: loyalty or championships? Or both?"
Miller considered coming out of retirement and joining the Boston Celtics, who, by the way, were not the favorites to win a title in the early 2000s.
Patrick, being the great interviewer that he is, followed up by asking if Reggie knew the Celtics would win the title, would he have come out of retirement and played elsewhere?
Miller didn't need to give it much thought.
"I couldn't do it because all the tears I shed in Indiana with that fan base," he said. "We cried together on all those hurtful Knicks losses, Bulls loses, Lakers losses in the finals. It wouldn't be fair for me to be on a podium or a stage popping (bubbly) because I won my one championship.
"In Indiana, we, as a team, grew up together. We had the heartaches together. I can't be sipping champagne and getting a ring and I didn't do it for y'all. That's just my mentality."
To end their show late Tuesday night, there was this segment where the crew went outside and Barkley literally drove a bus. And did you catch who was sitting shotgun?
A big head of Durant.
More Pacers Related Stories
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- Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton invests in wellness performance company. CLICK HERE.
- Pacers assistant coach Ronald Nored attends Ball State practice. CLICK HERE.
- Key offseason dates to know for the Pacers. CLICK HERE.
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