Wednesday Where Are They Now?: Miles Simon

Ever wonder what happened to those college stars that couldn't catch on in the NBA? The guys that put up the great numbers or the guys that left early, and were never heard from again? Every Wednesday, we at BIAH will take a look at a former college star that never made it in the NBA, and we will update you on where he is playing or what he is doing. We're guessing the results will surprise you. To request a player, leave a comment in the comments section.

Miles Simon, Arizona

After a standout career at Southern California powerhouse Mater Dei High School, Miles Simon enrolled at Arizona at the ripe age of 17 with moderate expectations. He had solid freshman (8.9 ppg, 3.7 rpg, 2.6 apg) and sophomore (13.2 ppg, 4.0 rpg, 4.1 apg) years, but it was during his junior and senior seasons that he solidified his standing as an Arizona Wildcat legend.

Simon had a trying, up-and-down junior year. It started in the spring of 1996, during Simon's sophomore year. There was some sort of mix-up regarding Simon dropping an algebra class, with the end result being that the class was never officially struck from his record. This caused Simon, who was a mediocre student at best, to become academically ineligible for the fall semester. During that fall semester, Simon passed all of his classes, but it still did not get his GPA up to eligibility standards. His last chance was to take a three-week Family Studies mini-course during the Christmas break and get an A, which would get him eligible. He succeeded (although there were some in depth investigations into whether or not his grades were tampered with), and joined the team after missing the first 11 games.

But that wasn't the end of Simon's troubles that year. He also battled a serious case of pneumonia, which put him in the hospital with a fever of 103 just three games into his return. In mid-February of that year, the car he was driving was struck on the driver's door in an impact strong enough to fling him into the passenger's seat. Despite all of that, Simon managed to average 18.4 ppg, 4.1 rpg, and 4.2 apg in the 23 games he played, which is all the more impressive when you consider that team also had Mike Bibby, Jason Terry, and Michael Dickerson, among others. Arizona went 6-5 without Simon, which is part of the reason they were a #4 seed heading into the NCAA tournament. Arizona had one of the greatest NCAA tourney runs of all-time, knocking off three #1 seeds (UNC, Kansas, and Kentucky in the final, who just so happened to be, at the time, the three winningest programs of all-time) en route to the title. Simon was named the most outstanding player after scoring 30 in the Championship Game Catfight.

Simon decided to return to school and was named a 1st team all-american his senior year, posting averages of 17.2 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 4.7 apg. He was a second round pick (42nd overall) by the Orlando Magic, but only managed to see time in five games in 1998-1999 before being cut. Simon would bounce around for the next five years, playing in leagues in Israel, Italy, and Venezuela, as well minor leagues in the US (random fact - playing for the CBA's Dakota Wizards in 2001-2002, he was named League MVP, Playoffs MVP, and Newcomer of the Year). He had some tryouts with NBA teams (the Clippers in 2001, the Sonics in 2002), but was unable to latch on with them. After the 2002-2003 season, Simon suffered a horrific knee injury playing pick-up basketball - he tore his ACL, MCL, and meniscus, forcing him to be sidelined for more than 12 months. He attempted a comeback in 2004, playing in Turkey before joining on with the Nuggets, but he didn't make it past their summer league team.

In 2005, Simon joined the Arizona program as an assistant. He was there until May of this year, when he was a casualty of Lute Olson cleaning house. He is currently coaching the senior team of LA's Pump 'N' Run Elite, which had Solomon Hill (Rivals # 28, '09), Tyler Honeycutt (#29, '09), Kendall Williams (#47, '10), and Tyler Lamb (#99, '10), among many others, on the roster at some point this year. As Gary Parrish details in this article, with the connections and relationships to talented high schoolers that Simon has, don't expect him to be out of the college ranks for long.