By Nigel Collins
A JEEP CHEROKEE pulled into the parking lot of the MacDonald’s located at the intersections of Broad and Diamond streets in North Philadelphia, and former WBA cruiserweight champion Nate “Mr” Miller got out. He had suggested we meet there for the interview, but when we asked if he’d like lunch, Miller said, “I don’t eat places like this,” so we decided to do the interview in his car.
Except for a few pounds and a few grays in his beard, Nate didn’t look much different than when he retired in June 2001. As we went back through the years, he proved to be a candid and eccentric interviewee. The first hint of the latter was a voicemail on his phone: “This is Nate ‘Mr’ Miller, Cruiserweight Champion of the Universe.”
“I grew up in foster care,” Miller said. “They put me in the first one from the age of four to 12, and then in the second one from the age of 12 to 18. Both [foster] The families were very nice. I later met my biological parents and discovered that he was related to former light heavyweight champion Harold Johnson and bantamweight champion Jeff Chandler.”
Nate was the class clown at school, an attention-hungry foster kid. He was 17 when he found his calling at the Happy Hollow boxing gym in Philadelphia’s Germantown neighborhood, located in a 100-year-old recreation center that is still in operation. He also met Stan Williams, who became his coach and co-manager throughout his amateur and professional career.
“Stan and I had a father-son relationship. He showed me the positions and how to stand, but he didn’t teach me any particular style. Unlike a lot of trainers who want you to fight how they want, he just let me be free. I guess it was something natural. “I got into boxing to make money, but once I found out I could win a title, I thought I’d better up my game.”
After a brief amateur career, he turned professional on September 30, 1986 at Blue Horizon, scoring a first-round knockout over Tony Jackson. In total, Miller was undefeated in 17 fights at the iconic venue, all but three inside the distance. “The Blue Horizon was a great place,” Miller said. “It was historic and close to home, a lot of people I knew came to see me fight.”
Miller was a long way from home when he suffered his first loss on October 21, 1988. It came in his 13th fight, against Boubakar Sonogo in Bordeaux, France. J Russell Peltz promoted IBF light heavyweight champion “Prince” Charles Williams and Miller, and while Williams defended the title with a third-round knockout of Rufino Angulo, Miller lost an eighth-round decision to Sonogo.
“In addition to stuffing himself with French pastries, which slowed him down in a fight he should have won,” Peltz wrote in his book, Thirty Dollars And A Cut Eye: 50 Years In Boxing, “Miller was also up to his tricks. class clown . During dinner, he put a rubber mouse on the waitress’s shoulder with the expected results. He put one in Linda’s too. [Peltz’s wife] empty wine glass covered with a linen napkin.”
Miller’s antics continued during the flight home. One leg of the trip was in a 12-seat puddle jumper. “There was terrible weather and the turbulence was so bad that I was scared and couldn’t stop sweating.” Peltz said. “The flight attendant was applying cold compresses to my head. Meanwhile, Nate was running up and down the hallway, laughing at me.”
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Miller’s first major bout was against assassin Bert Cooper on February 15, 1989, at Pennsylvania Hall, with the NABF Cruiserweight title on the line. “We had trained together, so I knew his ability and posture,” Miller said. “So, I was pretty prepared when I got in the ring. I just knew I had to stay focused and not take a big hit.” Cooper did not answer the bell for the seventh round.
Nate’s first defense of the regional title was against Andre “Big Daddy” McCall. The Philadelphian suffered a broken jaw in the second or third round (he doesn’t remember which). “I knew he had a broken jaw because I heard it crack after McCall landed a left hook. I told myself, if he hits me like that again, he’ll keep the belt. Believe me, it was painful.” Miller credits adrenaline for keeping him going until he stopped McCall in the seventh round.
The injury kept Nate out of action for eight months. He returned on March 26, 1990 and successfully defended the NABF title with a 12-round unanimous decision over Tyrone Booze in Atlantic City. In December of that year, he made his last successful defense, stopping Michael Greer in the fifth round at the Blue Horizon. Miller lost a 12-round decision and the belt to James Warring on December 2, 1990, in Atlantic City.
“In the final seconds of the first round, after Miller signaled referee Joe Cortez for a headbutt, Warring landed a right hand and Miller went down,” Peltz wrote. “He stood up at nine, staggered back to his corner, managed to last 12 rounds, but lost by scores of 114-113, 116-114 and 116-112.”
“That was tough,” Miller said. “He hit me so hard in the first round that I thought I had been kicked by a horse. I fell on my face and saw stars. People who get hit like that usually don’t get up, but I was in good shape and lasted 12 rounds.”
Miller then challenged Al Cole for the IBF USBA cruiserweight title, another regional belt, losing by a 12-round unanimous decision in May 1991. Two of the judges had Cole win by scores of 115-113, which they were much more indicative of the fight. of 118-110 count of the third judge. “Al Cole was tough and relentless,” Miller said. “We had the same style. “It was like fighting a mirror image.”
Miller rebuilt with five straight wins, the two most significant victories being a seventh-round knockout of previously undefeated Jade “The Jewel” Scott and a unanimous 10-round verdict over the former WBC light heavyweight champion and title holder WBA cruiserweight Dwight Muhammad Qawi. . Although Qawi was past his prime, he had won 11 of his 14 most recent bouts prior to the fight against Miller, held at the Blue Horizon on October 13, 1992.
“He was still skilled,” Miller said. “I’ve never fought a guy like that before. He was agile, swaying and moving. “It was hard to hit him and I was trying to rip his head off.”
Cole was the IBF cruiserweight champion when he fought a rematch against Miller on July 23, 1994, in Bismarck, North Dakota. The result was another unanimous decision in Cole’s favor. It was starting to feel like Miller was good, but not good enough. Nate didn’t think so and neither did Stan Williams.
“My manager wrote a letter to Don King, who was my promoter at the time, asking him to give me a second chance to win the cruiserweight title,” Miller said. “Don must have liked the card because in my third fight after the second fight with Cole, I fought Orlin Norris for the WBA world cruiserweight title on July 22, 1994, in London. We plan to hit [Norris] with a straight right, and in the eighth round I hit him twice in a row and he fell. I knew he wasn’t going to get up. There is nothing like winning a world title. Man, the feeling was incredible. It was like he was in heaven.”
Miller made four successful defenses, fending off challenges from Reinaldo Gimenez, Brian LaSpaza, James Heath and Alexander Gurov, all within range. The Philadelphia slugger lost the belt to Fabrice Tiozzo on November 8, 1998, in Las Vegas, by unanimous decision in 12 rounds.
“I had a lot on my mind,” Miller said. “I had two women there, my wife and a friend. He didn’t know one of them was coming and she was trying to keep them apart. I guess he wasn’t concentrating. If he wasn’t going through those things, I think I would have knocked him out.”
Nate won only one of his last four fights and retired after losing a 10-round decision to Vincenzo Rossitto in Italy on June 23, 2001.
“When I didn’t get any more wins, I knew it was time to call it quits. I think if I didn’t have hitting power, my career might have been different. I wasn’t fast. If I didn’t knock you out, I’d probably lose,” said Miller, who won four bouts by decision. His final record was 31-9 with 27 wins at the distance. Miller was never stopped and four of those losses came in his last five fights.
Nate Miller with Don King
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Miller, 60, is not like many boxers who become lost souls once their career is over. Nate worked for the Philadelphia Housing Authority throughout his career and now receives a good pension. Nate is no longer the class clown, but he certainly has some unconventional notions. The one I like the most is his belief that science has discovered a way to make everyone 30 years old.
Before we separated, he told me that he knew how to play the keyboard, harmonica, saxophone, flute, guitar and violin. At the time it seemed like just one of Nate’s riffs, but just two days later he rang the phone early in the morning. It was Mr. Miller. He asked me if I wanted to hear him play guitar, right then and there. I was still sleepy but I agreed to listen. How could I not? This was the first and probably the last time a boxer asked me to listen to him play an instrument, over the phone no less. Maybe I’ve just been lucky.
It was kind of acid jazz, but not that much. Ornette Coleman maybe? No, that goes too far. The best thing I could come up with was a horror movie soundtrack. “Play some blues,” I said. It sounded more or less the same. A few days later I received a flood of emails containing dozens of links to conspiracy theories, from the United Nations’ plan to rid the planet of undesirables to the World Economic Forum’s plot to collapse the financial structure.
Miller plans to publish his autobiography, Nate “Mr” Miller: The Quiet Champion, and while boxing books are a tough sell, it might be a better bet than the money he’s invested in African currency, but what do I know? Nate’s calm demeanor makes his stories of conspiracies, shady politics, and dastardly plans to end the world seem plausible. He’s not ranting. He is sincere. Same as when he said the judges never scammed him, admitting that the decisions he lost were all fair verdicts.
Miller is well known for carrying his WBA and NABF belts with him whenever he attends a boxing function and sometimes just strolls around the neighborhood with them. “It’s to inspire, to show young people what can be done.” Miller said. “The neighborhood kids like to touch the belts and sometimes they want to put them on.”
“I live right across from Happy Hollow Gym,” Miller told Peltz. “I had fun. I loved it and the people I met. I loved every aspect of boxing.”
