The Indiana Pacers pulled off a few big moves ahead of the NBA trade deadline. It began with sending Caris LeVert to the Cleveland Cavaliers and was followed up by acquiring Tyrese Haliburton and Buddy Hield from the Sacramento Kings in exchange for Domantas Sabonis.
The future of the Pacers’ backcourt now consists of Haliburton paired up with Chris Duarte, who was selected with the No. 13 overall pick in the 2021 NBA Draft. Indiana still has Malcolm Brogdon in the fold and now has Buddy Hield to account for, both of whom are still on substantial contracts.
According to Michael Scotto of HoopsHype, the Pacers are expected to wait until the offseason to entertain trade talks involving Malcolm Brogdon (because he’s ineligible to be moved midseason after his extension), but are ‘open’ to flipping Buddy Hield at the deadline.
While Indiana has to wait until the offseason to entertain any Brogdon trade talks, the Pacers could move another guard by Thursday. The Pacers are open to flipping Buddy Hield to another team before the deadline Thursday, HoopsHype has learned.
Hield has been viewed as having negative trade value rather quickly after signing his four-year, $94 million contract extension. One factor that does help Hield’s trade value is that his deal does descend in value annually but is still set to earn $20.5 million in 2022-23 and $18.6 million in 2023-24.
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The Pacers would only be able to send out Hield by himself in a trade due to the recently traded player restriction—preventing him from being aggregated in a deal with another player. His near $22.5 million salary presents challenges for some teams to acquire but is more than enough for a team to package a few players together.
It has been a down season for Buddy Hield as he’s averaged 14.4 points per game but is shooting just 38.2% from the floor and 36.8% from beyond the arc. The optimism surrounding his situation is that perhaps if he remains with the Pacers through the NBA trade deadline, he could fill a role emblematic of Tim Hardaway Jr. was deployed in under Rick Carlisle with the Dallas Mavericks.
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Any team that is willing to invest a significant share of salary on a sharpshooter should certainly give consideration to giving the Indiana Pacers a call about a potential Buddy Hield trade. Teams like the Detroit Pistons or Los Angeles Lakers that have struggled with spot-up shooting are teams to watch.
