Larry Miller | |
|---|---|
 Miller in 2023 | |
| Born | |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Sports executive |
| Known for | President of the Portland Trail Blazers |
Larry G. Miller is an American business executive for Nike, Inc. He spent five years as the team president of the Portland Trail Blazers in the National Basketball Association (NBA). In his memoir, Jump: My Secret Journey From the Streets to the Boardroom, Miller writes that he was involved in a gang when he was 16, committing the murder of another teenager.
Miller earned a bachelor's degree in accounting from Temple University in 1982, and an MBA from La Salle University in 1985. He graduated from the Urban League Leadership Institute in 1987. [1]
Miller served as president, Executive Vice President and Controller for Jantzen, Inc. and was a Manager for Kraft Foods, Assistant Controller at Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc. and held various positions with Campbell Soup Company. In 1997, he was hired by Nike Inc., serving as vice president and general manager of Nike Basketball, where he was responsible for managing day-to-day operations of Jordan Brand, Nike Basketball and Converse. From 1999 to 2006, he served as the President of Jordan Brand.
In 2007, Miller was hired as President of the Portland Trail Blazers, replacing interim president Tod Leiweke. [2] Under Miller's management, the Trail Blazers have positioned themselves to make a respectable run at an NBA title. Portland has recorded three consecutive trips to the postseason while riding a streak of 159 consecutive sellouts dating back to December 21, 2007.
Also during his tenure, the Trail Blazers have made significant strides to becoming a leader in sustainability among professional sports franchises. The team's home arena, the Rose Garden, became the first existing arena in the world to attain LEED Gold Certification. [3] The Trail Blazers are one of the six founding members of the Green Sports Alliance, [4] which now boasts over 80 teams, leagues and venues. [5] Portland hosted the inaugural Green Sports Summit in August, 2011. Larry Miller resigned on July 7, 2012, as President of the Portland Trail Blazers to return to his previous role as President of the Jordan Brand. [6]
Miller lives in Portland, Oregon, and also serves on the board of directors for Self Enhancement Inc. ("SEI"), the Oregon Business Council, Oregon Sports Authority, is a member of the Portland Mayor's Economic Development Cabinet, the NBA's Team Advisory Committee, and the NBA's Labor Relations Committee.
In an October 2021 interview with Sports Illustrated Miller admitted to the September 1965 murder of Edward White. [7] Miller was 16 years old and in a West Philadelphia gang called Cedar Avenue. A friend who he considered "an innocent" was stabbed to death in a gang fight in September 1965. Later that month, Miller and others went out looking for anyone affiliated with 53rd and Pine and shot the first person they encountered. That person was Edward White. [8]
Miller pleaded guilty to second degree murder and served four and a half years in a prison for young offenders. [8] He spent most of his teens and 20s in prison or juvenile detention facilities. While in prison, he studied for an accounting degree at Temple University. [9]
The Portland Trail Blazers are an American professional basketball team based in Portland, Oregon. The Trail Blazers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Northwest Division of the Western Conference. The team played its home games in the Memorial Coliseum before moving to the Moda Center in 1995. The franchise entered the league as an expansion team in 1970, and has enjoyed a strong following: from 1977 through 1995, the team sold out 814 consecutive home games, the longest such streak in American major professional sports at the time, and which has only since been surpassed by the Boston Red Sox and the Dallas Mavericks. The Trail Blazers are the only NBA team based in the Pacific Northwest, after the Vancouver Grizzlies relocated to Memphis and became the Memphis Grizzlies in 2001 and the Seattle SuperSonics relocated to Oklahoma City and became the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2008.
Moda Center, formerly known as the Rose Garden, is the primary indoor sports arena in Portland, Oregon, United States. It is used for basketball, rodeos, circuses, conventions, ice shows, concerts, and dramatic productions. The arena has a capacity of 20,500 spectators when configured for basketball. It is equipped with state-of-the-art acoustics and other amenities.
Clyde Austin Drexler is an American former professional basketball player who currently works as the commissioner of the Big3 3-on-3 basketball league. Nicknamed "Clyde the Glide", he played 15 seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA), spending a majority of his career with the Portland Trail Blazers before finishing with the Houston Rockets. He was a ten-time NBA All-Star and named to the NBA's 50th and 75th anniversary teams. Drexler won an NBA championship with Houston in 1995, and earned a gold medal on the 1992 United States Olympic team known as "The Dream Team". He was inducted twice into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, in 2004 for his individual career and in 2010 as a member of the "Dream Team". Drexler is widely considered one of the greatest basketball players and greatest shooting guards of all time.
Arvydas Romas Sabonis is a Lithuanian former professional basketball player and businessman. Sabonis won the Euroscar six times and the Mr. Europa Award twice. He played in a variety of leagues, including the Spanish ACB League, and spent seven seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Playing the center position, Sabonis won a gold medal at the 1988 Summer Olympics, in South Korea, for the Soviet Union, and later earned bronze medals at the 1992 Olympic Games and 1996 Olympic Games representing Lithuania. He retired from professional basketball in 2005. Sabonis was selected by the Portland Trail Blazers in the first round of the 1986 NBA draft, but he did not play his first NBA game until 1995, at the age of 30.
Geoffrey Michael Petrie is an American former professional basketball player. A native of Pennsylvania, he played professional basketball in the National Basketball Association (NBA) for the Portland Trail Blazers where he won NBA Rookie of the Year in 1971. After retirement as a player he entered management, and was the President of Basketball Operations for the Sacramento Kings in the NBA until June 2013.
Morris B. "Bucky" Buckwalter is an American former professional basketball coach and executive. He played college basketball for the Utah Utes. Buckwalter served as an assistant coach and executive in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as well as a head coach in the American Basketball Association.
Root Sports Northwest, sometimes branded simply as Root Sports, is an American regional sports network owned by the Seattle Mariners. Headquartered near Seattle in the city of Bellevue, Washington, the channel broadcasts regional coverage of sports events throughout the Pacific Northwest, with a focus on professional sports teams based in Seattle and Portland. It is available on cable providers throughout Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, and Alaska and nationwide on satellite via DirecTV.
NBC Sports Northwest was an American regional sports network owned by the NBC Sports Group unit of NBCUniversal, as an affiliate of NBC Sports Regional Networks. The network broadcast regional coverage of professional sports events throughout the Pacific Northwest, focusing primarily on the NBA's Portland Trail Blazers and college sports events involving the Oregon Ducks. It also covered other sports events involving teams within the northwestern United States, including those featuring college and high school teams.
Harry Glickman was an American journalist, promoter, and sports executive. He was one of the founders of the Portland Trail Blazers, and the team's president from 1987 to 1994.
Larry Weinberg was an American real estate developer. He was well-known as being one of the founders of the NBA's Portland Trail Blazers.
The Rose Garden bankruptcy occurred in 2004 when the Rose Garden in Portland, Oregon was the subject and primary asset in a bankruptcy filing, shifting ownership of the arena from billionaire Paul Allen to a consortium of creditors.
The Portland Trail Blazers are an American professional basketball team based in Portland, Oregon. The Trail Blazers play in the Northwest Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The franchise entered the NBA in 1970, and is one of two major league franchise in Oregon. The Trail Blazers sold out 814 consecutive home games from 1977 through 1995, the second longest such streak for American professional sports teams which was broken July 9, 2011, by the Dayton Dragons. The team has played their home games at the Moda Center, since the 1995–96 NBA season. The Trail Blazers are owned by the Paul G. Allen Trust chaired by Jody Allen, since the passing of owner Paul Allen in 2018. Since the team joined the NBA in 1970, it has won one NBA championship, three conference championships, six division championships, and has appeared in the NBA playoffs 34 times.
Al-Farouq Ajiede Aminu is a Nigerian-American former professional basketball player who played for 11 seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Internationally he represented the Nigeria national basketball team. Aminu was selected by the Los Angeles Clippers in the 2010 NBA draft with the eighth overall pick, and has also played for the New Orleans Pelicans, Dallas Mavericks, Portland Trail Blazers, Orlando Magic, and Chicago Bulls.
Nike Blazer is a sneaker manufactured by Nike. It was originally released in 1973 as a basketball shoe.
Neil Olshey is an American basketball executive who most recently served as the general manager of the Portland Trail Blazers of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Prior to that, he was general manager and vice president of basketball operations of the Los Angeles Clippers.
The 1978–79 Portland Trail Blazers season was the ninth season of the Portland Trail Blazers in the National Basketball Association (NBA).
Harney Park is a 7.13-acre (2.89 ha) park at the intersection of Southeast 67th Avenue and Harney Street, in Portland, Oregon's Brentwood-Darlington neighborhood, in the United States.
Marcos Henrique Louzada Silva, commonly known as Didi Louzada, is a Brazilian professional basketball player for Flamengo of the Novo Basquete Brasil (NBB). At the 2019 NBA draft, he was drafted by the Atlanta Hawks, before being traded to the New Orleans Pelicans.
Shaedon Sharpe is a Canadian professional basketball player for the Portland Trail Blazers of the National Basketball Association (NBA). A consensus five-star recruit out of high school, Sharpe signed to play college basketball with the Kentucky Wildcats, but did not play a game before leaving for the NBA. He was selected seventh overall in the 2022 NBA draft.