FORT WORTH, Texas — When Mike Miles was a kid his nickname was “Mike-Mike,” but Jerry Jones calls him something else.
“He doesn’t call me Mike,” Miles said, “he always calls me ‘Mikey.’”
(The TCU junior point guard made no attempt to do the “Jerry accent”).
An obscure detail about Miles’ career before he came to TCU was that he played on the same AAU team, the Titans, with one of Jerry’s grandsons.
Mike’s AAU career is long over. He’s 20, and he is now a young man with his career ahead of him, but in the odd spot of being nearly in the same spot as he was this time one year ago.
As TCU prepares for its most anticipated postseason in the history of its program, there is the curiosity regarding center Eddie Lampkin, whose future with the team is uncertain.
He is not with the team and is not expected to play when No. 22 TCU plays No. 9 Kansas State on Thursday night in the quarterfinals of the Big 12 tournament in Kansas City.
Then there is the curiosity regarding the team’s best player, Miles; how well he will play, and what he will do next?
“Turn pro or come back; those are the only two options I have,” he said in a recent interview. “I don’t think I would transfer. There is nothing wrong with transferring. Our whole team transferred. Me personally, I like to stick where I am. Pro or coming back are my two options.”
TCU is a team loaded with upperclassmen, and all of them are eligible to return for another season. While no one should, or does, expect that to happen the concentration is on Miles, the preseason Big 12 player of the year.
The year has not gone according to plan. He suffered a knee injury midway through the Big 12 schedule, and finished second team all conference rather than first.
Miles isn’t sure what he’s going to do.
It will likely depend how things go for TCU in both the Big 12, and NCAA, tournaments.
According to most 2023 NBA mock drafts, Miles would not be selected. According to a few NBA scouts who have attended TCU games this season, they think Miles is currently a late round pick, if he comes out.
It depends on who else is available. What teams need what. How he plays in these tourney games.
They like him. They like his upside, specifically his speed, ball handling and as a scorer in transition.
There are concerns.
He’s 6-foot-2. Maybe 6-1. He’s had a few injuries. He shoots 33 percent from 3-point. Consistency has eluded him.
He is well aware of pretty much all of this; that he’s not on a lot of draft boards.
“I feel like every player who knows he has chance (to play in the NBA) thinks about it. I am not going to lie, I think about it,” he said. “I take it day by day, and when that time comes I’ll prepare for it. It’s hard not to think about it because it’s not that far away.”
After TCU lost in the round of 32 in overtime against top-seed Arizona last season in the NCAA tournament, Miles announced his intentions to turn pro while retaining his college eligibility.
Weeks later he announced he would return to TCU, which prompted considerable speculation that someone in the NBA told him he would likely not be drafted.
Didn’t happen.
“I never went through any process and never had any interviews or workouts,” he said. “I never had any feedback. The decision to come back was my decision. I felt like I was ready to leave, and my decision to come back was just I thought needed more (time).”
Had Miles not suffered a hyper extended knee on Jan. 28 in an overtime loss at Mississippi State this all looks different.
TCU lost five of six games in that stretch, which ended his chances of winning the conference player of the year award, and TCU’s chances to win the conference.
“I felt like I was playing the best basketball I’ve ever played before the injury,” he said. “It happened. Nothing I can do about it, and I am back playing.”
Miles says he has no regrets about returning. He says he’s a better player, at a minimum from a maturity standpoint. TCU coach Jamie Dixon said Miles’ practice habits have improved dramatically, too.
Last year, if Miles had looked at a mock draft board and not seen his name it would have nagged at him for days. When he didn’t score a point in a win over Texas on March 1, such production would have wrecked his week.
“If that Texas game had happened last year, it would have been the worst day of my life,” he said. “Now, I don’t let it get to me. We won the game. Being in college for these three years has been the best thing for me.”
He is not sure if there will be a fourth college season.
That will be determined how these next two to three weeks go.
