Brandon Miller Has Topped 65 Games Once in Three Seasons. Charlotte Just Gave Him $209 Million.
Brandon Miller agreed to a five-year, $209 million rookie-scale extension with the Charlotte Hornets on Monday, ESPN’s Shams Charania reported, hours ahead of the deadline for the 2023 draft class.
It is the second-largest extension in that class, behind only Victor Wembanyama’s $252 million and $1 million clear of Amen Thompson’s $208 million. It kicks in for 2027-28. Miller plays this season on an already-exercised $15.1 million option.
Charlotte paid for the ceiling. Nobody should pretend it paid for the track record.
Three Seasons, One Healthy One
Miller is 23, the No. 2 pick out of Alabama, and he has played 166 NBA games. He averaged 20.2 points, 4.9 rebounds and 3.3 assists last season on 43.5 percent shooting and 38.3 percent from three, across 65 games.
That 65 is his high-water mark for availability. He played 74 as a rookie, then 27 in 2024-25 before a torn scapholunate ligament in his right wrist ended that season with January surgery. Last season a left shoulder subluxation in the second quarter of Charlotte’s second game cost him 13 straight games and 17 overall, and he had shoulder surgery in May.
He was not cleared for full basketball activity until late in the summer and missed the Oct. 8 preseason opener with a shin contusion.
ESPN’s Bobby Marks recommended before the deadline that Charlotte offer five years and $175 million, arguing Thompson had the better case on durability and defense. Miller beat that recommendation by $34 million.
The Bet Still Makes Sense
Here is the case for paying it. Miller’s representatives pointed at Franz Wagner’s five-year, $224 million deal and OG Anunoby’s $212.5 million as comparables, and a 6-foot-7 wing who scores 20 a night while shooting 38 percent from three in his fourth season is an asset that gets more expensive every summer.
Marc Stein reported on Oct. 11 that league personnel expected Miller to clear Thompson’s number on offensive ceiling, with health and defense the open questions. Charlotte had no leverage to wait. Letting a No. 2 pick walk toward free agency in a rising cap environment is how bad franchises stay bad.
This Is Now Charlotte’s Team
The roster around Miller barely resembles last season’s. LaMelo Ball went to Minnesota on June 25 for Naz Reid, a 2033 unprotected first and three second-rounders. Miles Bridges went to Phoenix three days later for Grayson Allen, Royce O’Neale and another 2033 first.
What remains: Miller, Kon Knueppel coming off an 18.5-point rookie season, Coby White on a new three-year, $74 million deal, Reid, Allen, O’Neale and Moussa Diabate, who led the team in rebounding at 8.7 a game.
Charlotte went 44-38 last season, a 25-win jump from 19-63, beat Miami 127-126 in overtime in the play-in and then got run off the floor by Orlando 121-90. The Hornets have not reached the playoffs since 2016, a drought now 10 seasons long.
What Has to Happen
Head coach Charles Lee is 63-101 across two seasons and signed an extension in May. Jeff Peterson, who runs basketball operations, has now tied the franchise to Miller as its best player through 2032.
The math is not complicated. Miller has to play 70 games. He has never done it. Everything about this contract works if he gets there, and nothing about it works if he does not.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
