For Master P's son Hercy Miller, Louisville basketball offers return to 'a second home'

There was a day when Percy Miller’s job was to bring the pain to Kenny Payne. 

This was the early 1980s, when Miller – you know him better now as rapper/activist Master P – and Payne were high school basketball stars from Louisiana and Mississippi, respectively. As Miller recalls, they met in an AAU tournament with a trip to a national event on the line. 

The teams were stacked. Among Miller’s teammates was Ledell Eackles, who played seven seasons in the NBA. Miller played some pro ball himself, including a couple of NBA preseason games. Payne played 144 games for the Philadelphia 76ers. 

"Kenny Payne was so good back then in our time," Master P told The Courier Journal. "The only way we could beat them was, I had to physically try to hurt him."

He was laughing when he said it, and despite that summer-ball strategy, the two were "always cool," Master P said, though they lost touch over the years. 

Now their relationship is taking a new turn, with Master P’s son Hercy Miller transferring to Louisville to play as a walk-on for Payne, the Cardinals’ first-year head coach. 

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Miller, a 6-foot-3 guard, is a Card in part because of a bond he built with the coaching staff this offseason. 

But he has Louisville ties beyond the Cardinals’ new coaches.

After Hurricane Katrina, some displaced members of Master P’s family were relocated to Louisville. Hercy Miller was about 7 years old the first time he visited the city with his father, who connected with community activist Christopher 2X and began working with young people in the city, an effort that continues still. 

Last week, Master P, Miller and Christopher 2X helped host a birthday party at the Louisville Zoo for Ocean Robertson, a 2-year-old girl who was shot at 5 months old in a shooting that killed her mother. 

It’s the sort of community event Hercy Miller has joined in for years, many of them in his new hometown.

"Louisville is a second home to me," Miller told The Louisville Courier Journal, part of the Paste BN Network. "I love the environment and everything around here. And I felt like this is just a place where I could come and it's a good opportunity for me. So I'm back home.”

And though Louisville was one of the first recruiting visits Miller took as a high school prospect, his road here took some turns. 

How did Hercy Miller land at Louisville?

Miller wasn’t a big name in high school. But he played with some. 

Though his famous father now lives in Los Angeles, Miller played high school basketball at Minnehaha Academy in Minneapolis. Among his teammates were future Gonzaga stars who went on to be lottery picks in the past two NBA drafts, point guard Jalen Suggs and center Chet Holmgren. 

Miller was the No. 3 option as a senior at Minnehaha in 2021, when it won the Minnesota Class AAA state title. His brother Mercy, who has since transferred to Oak Hill Academy, was a freshman on that team. 

Mercy Miller is a four-star prospect in the class of 2024 who is committed to Houston. 

Hercy Miller was a less-heralded recruit, unranked in the 247Sports Composite Top 100. 

"I don’t look at rankings," he said. "I look at it as, 'You’re a normal person. You got a number on your jersey, I got a number on my jersey, we’ll go at it.' "

And he still drew recruiting attention, including from Louisville, which hosted him for a visit when Chris Mack was the head coach. 

Miller ultimately signed with Tennessee State but played only six games there, his freshman season cut short due to a hip injury. He averaged two points in 10.2 minutes per game.

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After the season, Miller transferred to Xavier, then entered the transfer portal again after the school fired coach Travis Steele. 

This spring, as Master P was watching his younger son on the AAU circuit, he struck up a conversation with Louisville assistant Nolan Smith that ultimately led to another U of L visit. 

Until then, Master P didn’t know that Payne, his old AAU rival, was the Cardinals’ new coach. 

And though his son initially planned to transfer out west, closer to his father’s Los Angeles home, a meeting with Payne made the recruitment change course. 

"Kenny’s personality, man, is infectious," Master P said. "He’s just a straight shooter: 'Look, you come here, you're gonna have to work for it. You ain't get nothing but opportunity. If you work hard, you're gonna get a chance to fulfill your dreams if you want to get to the NBA. I ain't giving nobody nothing, but I'm gonna teach you everything I got.' " 

The message resonated with Hercy Miller, too.

"Coach Payne, he's a great dude," Miller said. "I feel like he's, he's a person who's gonna push me to my best and I feel like he's a good role model for me."

Will Hercy Miller get playing time at Louisville?

Master P describes his son as "like a Patrick Beverley, but can shoot the ball,” and a comparison to one of the NBA’s best perimeter defenders is lofty. 

And maybe there’s a father’s bias there, but Master P knows basketball. And he insists that in his son, Louisville has landed “a diamond in the rough.” 

But even if Miller isn’t a Beverley level defender, Louisville has minutes available for a capable guard who commits to defense. The Cardinals lost their best perimeter defender in senior transfer Jarrod West and even with him struggled to contain the dribble most of last season, when they finished 13-19. 

Miller said he only wants a chance to prove he belongs. 

"That's the thing with (Payne) – like anywhere you go – you have to earn your spot," Miller said. "And I feel like it’s a place where you definitely can do that. And with the hard work I'm putting in, it’s gonna be rewarded."

That was part of Payne’s pitch, and it connected with the Millers. 

"My son a dog, man," Master P said. "He don’t want nothing handed to him. He’s gonna earn his. And he don't mind."

Miller has fully recovered from his injury, Master P said, and his summer focus is on getting in “super shape.”

Payne is known for a grueling conditioning regimen that Master P calls "country boy workouts, like on the farm or something."

But there’s skill development, too, both in group and individual settings. Miller was on the court last week when Utah Jazz star and ex-Card Donovan Mitchell visited, saying Mitchell was “pushing us, showing us what we can add to our game.”

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Louisville guard Mike James, who sat out last season with an Achilles injury, said Miller has looked "really good" early in summer workouts. 

"He's very serviceable. He's crafty," James said. "He's shooting very good. He can play D for sure. He can step up and play." 

That’s the plan. 

Master P insists his son is no ordinary walk-on, that Louisville fans are in for a surprise this fall. And part of his excitement stems from the help Miller will get from a guy Master P once tried to hurt. 

"My son, he’s a winner, man, but he's been under the radar since he had got hurt," Master P said. "And that's the thing that I like about Kenny. Kenny can see the dog in people that nobody else can see."