I think we’ll look back at the Hali injury as one of the biggest NBA sliding doors of this decade

In hindsight it’s crazy that most people has OKC in 4 for that series. Indy were the 2nd best ITL after the all star break and definitely looked the part in the finals

That would be very sad. He didn’t have enough time to properly solidify his status as the next point god.

Hope he comes back strong and with a top 3 pick in this draft.

Along with the Spurs I think the Pacers were one of the best and most exciting new teams coming up in the league.

Celtics fans spent all year defending the Pacers and how good they were.

Lo and behold, they took the Thunder to 7 games.

They were absolutely the most impressive team we faced in our Finals run and could have took us to the limit had Carlisle not made some dumb mistakes in clutch decision making moments.

They’ll be back. Honestly this injury may be a blessing in disguise for them cause they’re going to get one of these top 3 guys to create a loaded trio with Siakam next season

Pretty sure they had the best net rating in the league after the new year last season. People that acted like they snuck up on everybody in the playoffs weren’t paying attention before that

I don’t think fluke is the right word.

Those if us who watched will know they had black magic on their side

Definitely among the most fun teams to watch in the past 25 years

Tbf they did get lucky with all the game winners hitting

Especially those of us who’s teams they beat

Anyone who watched just knew this was a fucking SQUAD. They were just like when you see this invincible group in the park that doesn’t get off the court but every individual piece is like meh at best, they’re tired, but they execute everything perfectly so they just keep winning.

And then after 5-6 games people are like “why did these guys stay unbeatable for so long??”

Redditors so corny man.

or people will put an asterisk to the one championship run dynastic okc.

it really looked like they were going to lose before haliburton got injured.

We aren’t that different stylistically since Huff does a lot of the same things to a lesser extent. The Myles Turner we’re seeing in Milwaukee is the same Turner we’d be seeing if he was still in Indy without Haliburton

jay huff is literally myles turner lite. he blocks shots and stretches the floor like myles did, so stylistically, the team hasnt changed much there except there isnt the same point guard creating chances for the center.

He’s the modern day Steve Nash

jay huff is 80% of myles for a fraction of the price. the drop off between those two is minimal and jay’s stats would benefit like myles did playing alongside tyrese.

but we still need a starting caliber 5 in front of Jay. you dont want him as your starter in the playoffs.

Anyone who thinks this is just about losing Haliburton never watched the Pacers without Haliburton

Considering our other injuries we’ve had it has been a GLeague team plus Pascal for most of our games.

It feels like 80% of the games so far have been Siakam and the Noblesville Boom.

they don’t watch your games

Have the Pacers had any games yet this year where all of the remaining six from the core of last year’s rotation (Nembhard, Nesmith, Siakam, TJ, Mathurin and Toppin) have been healthy and played?

people keep ignoring they also let their 3rd best player leave, and pretty much everyone knows they’re taking a gap year and don’t plan on winning at all

The league don’t fuck with us like that. We’re getting 3rd at best

Reminder that his fellow players voted him the most overrated player this time last year   Aged like milk. 

and deserved it

He deserved it, and it was a 5-4 vote. If Haliburton’s bad games weren’t super terrible he probably wins it. He was more inconsistent and his lows were lower than Pascal’s.

What do you think the Pacers record would be this year if Haliburton was healthy, and Siakam/Nesmith/Obi/Nembhard/Ben were all injured?

if it were Haliburton + a g-league team? You think they’d be a top 8 seed?

Siakam doesn’t elevated his teammates the way Hali does. He was also arguably their best player through the first 3 rounds. Averaged over 20 and was consistent. Hali was more clutch and had high highs but was not consistent at all

Haliburton made Turner into the player the Bucks want and need. Turner was a Pacer for a decade and looks exactly the same in Milwaukee. Turner ain’t got nothin to do with it.

Yeah there are guys getting minutes every night who are just not NBA players.

I’m more partial to adding Dybantsa to this lineup myself just because theoretically he can play the 3 while Siakam stays at the 4.

Carlisle aside, who has coached plenty of bad teams as well, this roster isn’t too good to not be very bad without Haliburton