by Dustin Dopirak
INDIANAPOLIS — Most of the Pacers‘ roster has been back at the Ascension St. Vincent Center for weeks taking part in non-mandatory workouts and pick-up games, but this week is when things get real.
The Pacers will hold their Media Day on Monday at 10 a.m. in their practice facility before formally beginning training camp Tuesday as they lead up to their first preseason game on Oct. 8 at Memphis, then host the Wizards at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in their season opener Oct. 25.
The Pacers haven’t been involved in any moves that would justify use of the term “blockbuster” but they somewhat quietly had one of the best offseasons of any team in the NBA, adding guard Bruce Brown through free agency and forward Obi Toppin in a trade as well as two first-round picks in forward Jarace Walker and guard Ben Sheppard. They also locked up their franchise player, All-Star point guard Tyrese Haliburton, to a max contract. However, they have run into some drama in recent weeks, acknowledging that extension discussions with veteran guard Buddy Hield have “halted.” General manager Chad Buchanan said last week that the Pacers aren’t “looking to move him,” but said the Pacers would be listening to offers.
Here are five storylines we’ll be digging into at Media Day:
How is Buddy Hield processing the state of negotiations?
The news that contract extension talks with Hield have broken down came more than a week ago and Hield hasn’t addressed the situation yet and given a window into his mindset as the 2023-24 season begins. GM Chad Buchanan said Tuesday that the Pacers want Hield to play for them this season and that he expects Hield to handle the situation professionally, and he has reason to believe that he will.
Hield hates missing games and has played at least 80 of 82 in a season five times including last season. The only reason he missed two late last season is he caught a flu bug that forced him to be hospitalized, and even then he fought it until a team doctor told him he couldn’t come to the arena because he might be contagious. He’s been, by all accounts, a great teammate in Indiana and coach Rick Carlisle has constantly praised him as a basketball junkie who cares about the game more than anything else.
That being said, Hield could be mentally affected if he felt he was low-balled with the Pacers’ contract offer and if they indicate they expect him to come off the bench this season to start second-year guard Bennedict Mathurin. Even if he doesn’t react to slights the same way he did in Sacramento, where his time didn’t necessarily end well, he might not be as effective as he was a year ago when he set a franchise record for 3-pointers. Monday’s interviews could give an insight to the state of his psyche.
How is Rick Carlisle looking to balance his rotations?
Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said in July that he’s very much looking forward to the level of competition he expects to see in camp with 15 players on the roster battling for 10 rotation spots and all having a legitimate case to play. Formal practices haven’t even begun yet, but Buchanan said last week that competition in the building is already strong. The Pacers aren’t looking to make any decisions quickly because they want to see players earn it in the crucible of that competition. Tyrese Haliburton and Myles Turner are starters, Buchanan said, but everything else is up for grabs.
Carlisle certainly won’t predict winners of the races for the other starting jobs Monday, but he might give some insight as to how he will want to balance offensive and defensive skill in his rotations.
The Pacers made a point to get better on defense with their offseason moves, signing ace defender Bruce Brown from the Nuggets after a championship run and drafting forward Jarace Walker and guard Ben Sheppard, both of whom had sterling reputations as college defenders. Turner gives them one of the best shot blockers in the league and they return their three best man-to-man defenders on last season’s team — Andrew Nembhard, T.J. McConnell and Aaron Nesmith. So they could put together an excellent defensive lineup of either Nembhard or McConnell at the point, Brown at shooting guard, Nesmith at small forward, Walker at power forward and Turner at center.
But if that’s their best defensive lineup, their best offensive lineup would be almost completely different with Turner the only overlapping player. The best scorers at positions 1-4 would be Haliburton, Hield, Mathurin and Toppin. Along with Turner, they would absolutely fit the bill of the run-and-gun transition style the Pacers are looking to play, but Turner is the only player who Carlisle could trust to guard anyone. Haliburton’s instincts make him one of the best in the game at cheating off his man and gambling for steals, but he’s admittedly overpowered at times when guarding the ball.
So Carlisle has to figure out a way to balance strengths and weaknesses, and he might at least give out a bit of his plan on Monday.
What did Tyrese Haliburton learn on his summer vacation?
In his exit interviews in April with Rick Carlisle, Kevin Pritchard, Chad Buchanan and Lloyd Pierce, Haliburton was told that the Pacers view him as a “partner” in the franchise, and that even though he wouldn’t have final approval over personnel moves, he would at least have an opportunity to have something to say about it. He would also be accorded all the benefits, public and private, that come with being the face of the franchise.
He spent the entire summer living that role. In May, he represented the Pacers at the NBA draft lottery and rode in the pace car at the Indy 500. In May and June, he attended almost every prospect workout before the draft, including Walker’s individual workout. When the league calendar turned over on June 30, he was the first person to call Bruce Brown before he signed as a free agent, and later in July he returned to Indy just to work out with Obi Toppin and brought him to a pro-am game at Kyle Guy’s Dizzy Runs league in Noblesville.
Then after all that was over, he got his first USA men’s senior national team experience, helping the Americans to a fourth-place finish in the FIBA World Cup, averaging 8.6 points and a team-high 5.6 assists per game in eight games while shooting 47.2% from 3-point range and 7 of 11 (63.6%) from inside the arc.
And, of course, he got paid. Hours after Brown signed, he and the Pacers worked out a five-year max contract extension that will kick in next year and could pay him up to $260 million if he makes an All-NBA team this season.
So it will be interesting to learn what Haliburton took from the experience in the spotlight and all the time spent in Vegas, Spain, Abu Dhabi and the Philippines with his fellow Team USA stars. He had a lot of time to consider his place on the Pacers and in the NBA, work on his own game, and evaluate the landscape as he tries to lead the Pacers back to playoff contention and beyond. It will be interesting to learn what he took from the experience.
How important is it for Bennedict Mathurin to start?
Carlisle spent most of last season downplaying the importance of whether Mathurin was part of the starting lineup, including when it became clear that he was on his way to one of the most productive rookie seasons in Pacers history. He averaged 16.7 points per game, which put him fourth behind Haliburton, Turner and Hield, who was just ahead of him at 16.8 points per game. He finished second in scoring among all NBA rookies behind Orlando’s Paolo Banchero and his 1,302 total points but him third all-time behind Pacers rookies behind only Clark Kellogg in 1982-83 and Chuck Person in 1986-87.
He put up those numbers despite starting just 17 games all season. He didn’t start at all until Dec. 5 when Tyrese Haliburton, T.J. McConnell and Myles Turner were all out with injuries. He didn’t start again until Dec. 23 when Aaron Nesmith was out, and not again after that until Haliburton sprained his elbow.
However, Mathurin started the season’s final 11 games when the Pacers had entered a developmental mode and were holding out Haliburton and Turner. Carlisle said it was important then that Mathurin experience “the responsibility” of starting. Not just being on the floor to start the game, but operating with the first unit, defending and being defended by the opponent’s starters. He said that was an important next step in his development after spending most of the season saying that bringing him off the bench was setting him up for success.
So the question now becomes, after his experience as a starter at the end of last year, how important is it that he continue on that path?
Buchanan was asked Tuesday whether Mathurin would be a starter and hedged, saying it might start out that way but that he would have to earn it. That said, his development is arguably more important to the Pacers than that of any other player on their roster. It generally requires two All-Star caliber players to be able to compete for a conference title, much less an NBA championship. All 10 of the teams who finished ahead of the Pacers in the Eastern Conference standings last season had at least two players who have been All-Stars if you include the Nets, who had Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving before trading both players at the February deadline.
The Pacers have one in Haliburton, and it would be the most cost-efficient option for Mathurin to develop into the second rather than the Pacers having to acquire one via trade or free agency or by tanking a season to get one more lottery pick. Mathurin was the highest Pacer drafted since Rik Smits went No. 2 in 1988 and the first top-nine pick since George McCloud in 1989 so it would make sense that he would produce that kind of return. Ideally, Haliburton and Mathurin would hit their primes at about the same time and combine to make the Pacers a force in the East. The Pacers have to decide how important it is to make sure they maximize their time on the floor together now, especially because neither is an outstanding on-ball defender.
Who gets left out?
Again, Carlisle isn’t going to say now who is going to be part of his rotations and who isn’t, but several players will enter camp knowing their status is different than it was a season ago because of what the Pacers added in the offseason.
The addition of Brown and the likelihood that he’ll be the team’s best perimeter defender and a better-than-adequate secondary ball-handler likely means Nembhard will be part of the second unit, which means T.J. McConnell could lose his position as second-unit point guard after posting the most efficient offensive season of his career. Forward Jordan Nwora averaged 13.0 points per game with the Pacers after his acquisition from the Bucks in February, finally getting a chance after over 2 1/2 seasons stuck behind Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton among others in Milwaukee. However, now he has to fight with Toppin and Walker for minutes at power forward or hope to find time at small forward with an even more crowded competition.
And, of course, the battle for the backup center position will leave at least one and possibly two viable contenders without minutes as Daniel Theis, Isaiah Jackson and Jalen Smith are all still around to fight for the backup job behind Turner. With all those experienced players in danger of being stuck at the end of the bench, it’s hard to imagine a scenario that doesn’t involve injuries in which first-round pick Ben Sheppard gets much on-floor time to develop.
Having too many viable players is a much better problem to have than having too few, but there is still a challenge involved in keeping players locked in when their minutes are infrequent for the occasions when they will still be called upon. That could be one of Carlisle’s most difficult challenges in 2023-24.
Originally appeared on Indianapolis Star