Step 2: Find another offensive star
For this Pacers team to go above and beyond what they’ve been in the past – even with Oladipo – they ideally need to find another offensive star to pair with him.
The most obvious and likely candidate to fill this role is Myles Turner. Turner did make a big leap this year on the defensive end but we are still waiting for that offensive jump that he seems so capable of making. The potential is still there for him to put up numbers in the range of 20 points, 10 rebounds and around 2.5 blocks a night.
Turner is a good shooter and has nice range and excellent touch for a big guy (shot a career-high 39% on 3’s this year). He’s also a very good athlete and is pretty mobile for his size, which showed on defense this year when he led the league in blocked shots (nearly 3 per game). His main problem on offense is not so much his ability, but more so the mental side of things.
At times, he looks hesitant and is not consistently aggressive enough, especially when it comes to posting up, which he doesn’t do nearly enough. If he looks to post up more and just be more aggressive and assertive overall on offense, he has all the makings of a star, two-way big man.
However, if Turner’s offense stagnates, the Pacers do have another potential candidate to become a second star next to Oladipo, and that is Bojan Bogdanovic, who averaged a career-high 18 points this season and his scoring went up and exceeded 20 after Oladipo went down. Even if Turner does step up, if Bojan can sustain his 15-18 point per game production, Indiana might be just fine with their current big three.
But, we’ll just have to see how Bogdanovic re-integrates himself to the offense once he’s no longer the go-to guy next season.
The Pacers’ third (and least likely) option is to try to add another star, either in free agency or via trade. Now, Indiana’s not the most attractive free agent destination so it’s unlikely they’ll manage to land one of the big name guys but I do expect them to make a run at a guy like Kemba Walker, who – on paper – would fit very well on this team, given his shooting ability and playmaking.
Another guy they could look to target is Mike Conley, but this would have to be in a trade and with the Pacers’ expiring deals, they may not have enough to pull that off. They would probably have to offer either Myles Turner or Sabonis in a potential deal and if I were them, I’d offer Sabonis, just given Turner’s defensive impact as well as his offensive upside.
So, to recap, the Pacers have three options when it comes to pairing Oladipo with another star:
- Hope Myles Turner takes a leap offensively
- Hope Bojan Bogdanovic maintains his offense from this season
- Make a trade for a guy like Mike Conley or look to sign a guy like Kemba