2017-18 Record: 48-34 (fifth in the Eastern Conference)
Players Added: Tyreke Evans (free agent), Doug McDermott (free agent), Kyle O’Quinn (free agent), Aaron Holiday (draft), Alize Johnson (draft)
Players Lost: Al Jefferson (waived), Lance Stephenson (free agent), Glenn Robinson (free agent), Trevor Booker (free agent), Ben Moore (free agent), Edmond Sumner (free agent), Joe Young (free agent)
Projected Team MVP: Victor Oladipo
There may not have been a bigger individual surprise in the NBA last season than Oladipo, who was viewed as part of a rather underwhelming return in the trade that sent Paul George to Oklahoma City. Instead, Oladipo’s career was rejuvenated by playing an hour from where he went to college, as he looked like a legitimate two-way star who can be the face of the Pacers’ organization for the foreseeable future.
Oladipo is going to be an All-Star and one of the best players in the East this season, and outside of games where the Pacers play the Celtics, Raptors, Sixers, and Bucks, Indiana can take solace knowing it will have the best player on the floor. While the potential that Oladipo regresses exists, that will almost certainly not be the case, and there are even areas — namely three-point shooting (where he shot a respectable 37.1 percent last season) — where he can take a step forward during his second year as a Pacer.
X-Factor: Myles Turner
The Pacers have a really good team around Oladipo, but lack that second star next to him that can take the squad to the next level. While they have some solid veterans (Evans, Darren Collison, Bojan Bogdanovic, etc.), the player with the potential to become a legitimate No. 2 in the Pacers’ pecking order is Turner, a two-way center who has the ability to block a shot on one end and drill a three on the other.
Turner has shown plenty of flashes of turning his gobs of potential into production. Now 22 and in his fourth year in the league, it’s time for Turner to take a step forward and become the team’s clear-cut, second-best player behind Oladipo, the kind of guy who can consistently take over games when the All-Star guard is having an off night.
To add intrigue to all of this, Turner is in a contract year, and is on the verge of becoming a restricted free agent next summer. If he balls out this year and helps the Pacers become a contender in the Eastern Conference, Indiana will almost certainly match any sum of money he gets on the market. If he doesn’t? Well, then things become way more complicated.
Best Case Scenario:
No longer able to surprise anyone, Indiana builds on the positive momentum it had last season. Oladipo and young guys like Turner and Domantas Sabonis take steps forward, while the team’s bevy of battle-tested veterans fill in the gaps. The biggest of this is Evans, who shows that last season’s big year in Memphis wasn’t a flash in the pan.
With LeBron James now in the Western Conference, Indiana wins their division en route to securing a top-4 seed in the postseason. Winning a title is a stretch, and winning the East likely isn’t in the cards, either. But the Pacers are talented and deep enough to make a run, perhaps even knocking off one of Boston, Philadelphia, or Toronto in the conference semis before falling in the conference finals.
Worst Case Scenario:
The inability to surprise anyone this year catches up to them, and now with a target on their backs, the Pacers aren’t able to ever really build on last year’s performance. They’re still good enough that they’ll comfortably make the playoffs, but an emerging Bucks team wins the division and Indiana finds itself in a similar situation to last year: Heading into the postseason as a bottom-4 seed that needs to take at least one road game to move on.
Unfortunately for Indiana, that means the 2018-19 season ends in a similar manner to the year prior: They’re a solid team that runs into a better team right away, and while they may push their opponents to seven games again, the season ends in the first round of the postseason once more.
