It’s confusing wording, to be sure. The way the phrase is used, a near miss is “a miss that is nearly a hit, but that’s too much of a mouthful, so the phrase was shortened. So you’re not wrong. It would be more technically correct to call it a “near hit”, instead.
In addition to the information regarding a near miss above, it’s also important to realize that a direct hit indicates a hit at the center of a given target.
A direct hit is Luke Skywalker blowing up the Death Star. A near miss is a bunch of Imperial Stormtroopers shooting at a standing target that’s 10 feet away.