Pacers Notes: Brown, Siakam, Haliburton, Carr, Zubac
Along with acquiring Ivica Zubac from the Clippers earlier this month, the Pacers added guard Kobe Brown in the deal. Brown was only averaging 8.7 minutes per game in L.A. but his playing time has skyrocketed with his new team.
Brown has appeared in five games, including one start, and is averaging 10.2 points and 6.8 rebounds in 26.4 minutes per contest. The 26-year-old had a season-high 15 points and seven rebounds in 19 minutes against Dallas on Sunday.
“This is a great chance for us to figure out as much as we can about him,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said, per Dustin Dopirak of the Indianapolis Star. “I like the things he’s doing. … When you get an opportunity like this, this is where you can really show what you can do.”
It’s a de facto audition for Brown, who will be an unrestricted free agent after the season. The Clippers declined their option on his 2026/27 contract prior to this season.
“For him he’s got to understand what we want him to do and where we need him to be,” forward Pascal Siakam said. “But I think he’s doing a great job of playing within whatever’s happening and not thinking about it. When you’re open, shoot it. Other than that, just play as hard as you can.”
Here’s more on the Pacers:
- Siakam scored 30 points on 12-of-19 shooting, including 2-of-3 from three-point range, for his 11th 30-plus point performance of the season during the loss to the Mavs. He also notched eight rebounds and three assists and the Pacers were +7 in his 29 minutes, Dopirak notes. Siakam is dealing with a left hamstring issue but doesn’t want to be shut down, despite the team’s record and the franchise’s desire to get the best lottery odds possible. “Anyone that knows me knows that I want to play,” Siakam said. “I don’t want to sit around.”
- As if Tyrese Haliburton didn’t have enough to deal with as he worked his way back from an Achilles tendon tear, the star guard has been diagnosed with shingles, according to an ESPN report. He will be away from the team for a few weeks. “It’s a very painful thing,” Carlisle said. “… He will make a full recovery, but this happened over the last few days. He was meeting us in D.C. and had some odd symptoms, and he came back here. That’s what’s happening with him. We certainly wish him a speedy recovery. It’s a unique case and a unique situation, but I talked to him a few times, and he’s always in a good mood, so he’ll get through it.”
- Senior vice president of player personnel Ryan Carr is joining Darian DeVries‘ staff at Indiana University as executive director of basketball, according to Jeff Rabjohns of 247Sports.com. Carr, who will report directly to DeVries, has been with the Pacers organization for 25 years. He has managed the team’s pre-draft preparation for more than a decade as well as its evaluations of all draft prospects. He’s a former IU manager.
- How will Zubac fit in with the Pacers? In a Forbes article, Tony East takes a closer look at Zubac’s potential impact, including his defensive prowess and willingness to set hard screens. Zubac has yet to make his Pacers debut due to an ankle injury.
Wizards Convert Tristan Vukcevic To Three-Year Contract
4:54 pm: The Wizards announced Vukcevic’s multi-year contract and Black’s two-way deal in a press release.
11:52 am: The Wizards are promoting two-way center Tristan Vukcevic on a three-year, $9MM standard contract, ESPN’s Shams Charania tweets. The third year of the deal will be a team option.
Washington had just 13 players on standard contracts, along with Alondes Williams, whose 10-day contract expires on Wednesday. Thus, no corresponding move needs to be made on the 15-man roster.
To fill the two-way spot that will open up when Vukcevic is promoted, the Wizards are signing wing Leaky Black, Charania adds in another tweet.
Vukcevic, a 2023 second-round pick, has appeared in 35 games this season (five starts). He’s averaging 7.9 points, 2.7 rebounds, 1.1 assists and 0.7 blocks in 12.3 minutes per game. He entered the All-Star break with nine games remaining before his NBA eligibility for a two-way player this season reached the 50-game limit.
Vukcevic originally signed a standard contract with the organization as a rookie. Washington held a team option on his 2024/25 contract and declined it, then re-signed him to a two-way deal in the summer of 2024. He remained with the Wizards by signing another two-way contract last offseason.
Black, who went undrafted out of North Carolina in 2023, spent his rookie season on a two-way contract with the Hornets, then played last season for the Capital City Go-Go, Washington’s G League affiliate. He made 26 NBA appearances for Charlotte in 2023/24, averaging 2.7 points and 1.8 rebounds in 10.9 minutes per game.
In 44 games last season for the Go-Go, Black averaged 7.9 points, 4.8 rebounds, 2.2 assists, and 1.2 steals in 26.7 minutes per contest. He participated in Wizards training camp but was waived in mid-October. He returned to the Go-Go and has averaged 10.4 points, 7.5 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 1.8 steals in 35.2 minutes per game over 35 contests.
The Wizards will use a portion of their mid-level exception to sign Vukcevic to a three-year deal. Black, meanwhile, will be eligible to be active for up to 15 regular season games on his new two-way contract.
Bulls Shut Down Zach Collins; Ivey Out At Least Two Weeks
The Bulls are shutting down big man Zach Collins for the remainder of the season, the team announced (via Twitter).
Collins, who has been out with a right toe sprain, underwent further evaluation from training and medical professionals. They decided that Collins needed surgery to fix the problem.
Chicago coach Billy Donovan said earlier this month that Collins, who injured his toe on Dec. 27, might not return.
‘‘That could happen,” Donovan said. “As they put him two more weeks into the boot, I think how he comes out of that is going to tell a lot. He’s going to need a ramp-up period in order to run. . . . . The whole thing right now has been trying to prevent surgery.’
Prior to that injury, Collins missed the first six weeks of the season with a wrist injury. He wound up appearing in just 10 games this season, averaging 9.7 points and 5.6 rebounds. The veeteran forward/center appeared in a total of 64 games with San Antonio and Chicago last season.
Collins will be an unrestricted free agent this summer and will likely need to take a big pay cut to stay in the league. He signed a two-year, $34.8MM extension with San Antonio during the fall of 2023.
Additionally, the Bulls announced that guard Jaden Ivey will be reevaluated in two weeks.
Ivey, who was traded by the Pistons earlier this month, is experiencing left knee soreness. He has appeared in four games since the trade, including three starts, and is averaging 11.5 points, 4.8 rebounds, 4.0 assists and 2.0 steals in 28 minutes per game with Chicago.
Ivey suffered a fractured left leg midway through the 2024/25 season with Detroit and missed some time early this season due soreness in his right knee. He underwent surgery on that knee in mid-October and mentioned after receiving a DNP-CD this week that he’s still feeling some soreness.
Ivey will be a restricted free agent after the season if the Bulls issue an $8.77MM qualifying offer. If the team passes on that QO, he would be an unrestricted free agent.
Blazers Notes: Adelman, Poor Outing, Hansen, Henderson
David Adelman, the Nuggets’ head coach, grew up in the Portland area. He’s irked by the speculation that the Trail Blazers might be moved to another state, Ryan Clarke of The Oregonian writes.
“This was the best place to grow up,” Adelman said. “I loved it here. Still do. They’ve got to keep the team here. They’ve got to find a way to do that. This is a basketball city. The Northwest deserves two teams. (The team leaving) would be crushing for this community.”
The Trail Blazers are appealing to Oregon state legislators for $600MM in public funding to upgrade the Moda Center with the team in the process of being sold to Tom Dundon.
“I know there’s a lot to that, I know there’s financial things to it,” Adelman said. “That’s not my department. Emotionally, I just know what this place is and what it means to have a professional basketball team here. It’s not just something to go hang out at. It’s something go and be a part of. I hope this team maintains what’s going on here.”
Here’s more on the Trail Blazers:
- In their first game since the All-Star break, the Blazers were embarrassed by the Nuggets. Denver scored at will in a 157-103 thumping of Portland. The 157 points is the most scored in a road game in Nuggets history and the most by any NBA team this season. It was also the highest point total Denver had ever registered in regulation. “One of our worst games of the season,” Blazers acting head coach Tiago Splitter said, per Clarke. “The Nuggets had a sense of urgency to win this game. They lost last night, I think three of their last five games. And coming off the break, we were just not ready.” The Blazers will try to redeem themselves at Phoenix on Sunday. “I think we’ve got to bounce back on this,” Splitter said. “Go to Phoenix, bounce back same way (Denver) did. Lost last night, came here with that sense of urgency to win and do the right things. Effort, defense, talk, communicate, no putting your head down when you make a mistake, not running back, forget your matchup. So, all those little things are important in basketball games, and they were not there tonight.”
- Rookie center Yang Hansen got some advice from Nuggets superstar Nikola Jokic, Hansen’s idol, according to Clarke. “He told me don’t get nervous all the time,” Hansen said via a translator. “He’s like, you’re a great player. Just go play.” The 16th pick of last year’s draft has appeared in 35 games but is averaging just 7.5 minutes in those outings.
- Scoot Henderson is no longer under a minutes restriction, Sean Highkin of the Rose Garden Report tweets. However, in the first game after the break Henderson played 21 minutes, about the same amount in his four prior games. Henderson missed the first 51 games due to a hamstring injury.
L.A. Notes: Doncic, James, Reaves, Garland, Collins, Rosen
The Lakers had their big three — Luka Doncic, LeBron James and Austin Reaves — in the starting lineup on Friday in a 125-122 victory over the Clippers. Doncic erupted for 38 points with 11 assists, while Reaves poured in 29 points. James supplied 13 points and 11 assists despite some knee soreness. The Lakers’ success the rest of the way is predicated on that trio developing chemistry.
“I mean, every game, every second, every minute that we’re on the floor together, it helps,” James said, per Broderick Turner of the Los Angeles Times. “Like I said, when was that, All-Star weekend? We don’t know what we’re going to be until we get fully healthy and tonight was one of the first games where JJ (Redick) and the coaching staff can look down and know everybody was available. So, we just got to keep pushing. We got to keep pushing. We got a tough team coming in on Sunday (against the Celtics). Obviously, a lifetime NBA rivalry, so we got to be ready for them. They’re playing great basketball, too.”
Here’s more on the Los Angeles teams:
- Clippers head coach Tyronn Lue says his team isn’t anywhere near tank mode despite the roster upheaval prior to the trade deadline. The Clippers are sitting ninth in the Western Conference standings and are likely to make the play-in tournament. “I just feel confident. I just feel confident in our players. I feel confident in our coaching staff and I just feel confident in the environment, like the culture we’ve set,” he said, per Dave McMenamin of ESPN. “And why wouldn’t you want to play to win. That’s our mindset. That’s my mindset every single night. And as tough as it may be or you start 6-21 or whatever it may be, you’re playing to win. And so, we make the playoffs and then anything can happen. So, our goal is to make the playoffs and so I don’t know why somebody would scoff at that.”
- Initially, Darius Garland wasn’t thrilled about getting traded from Cleveland to the Clippers. Now he says he’s “super excited” about joining forces with Kawhi Leonard and playing in Los Angeles. “I’m good with the change,” Garland told Marc J. Spears of Andscape. “When it first happened, I was kind of skeptical. But I couldn’t turn down this opportunity to play with another Hall of Famer (Leonard) and having a ball in my hands damn near 99 percent of the time.” Garland has yet to make his Clippers debut. He has not played since Jan. 14 due to a toe injury and is reportedly unlikely to return until March but told Spears he plans to play “really, really soon.”
- Clippers forward John Collins took a shot to the face on Friday and required some stitches along his left eye, Mark Medina tweets. He finished the game with 12 points in 16 minutes.
- Longtime Dodgers executive Lon Rosen is moving into the Lakers‘ front office as president of business operations, according to The Associated Press. He replaces Tim Harris, who is stepping down after 35 years with the organization. Rosen has been the Dodgers’ executive vice president and chief marketing officer since 2012, the same year new Lakers majority owner Mark Walter purchased the MLB team. Rosen began his sports career with the 1980s Showtime Lakers as an intern and a front office executive. He went on to become an agent and a business partner of Magic Johnson.
Spurs Add Mason Plumlee On 10-Day Contract
10:00 pm: The Spurs officially completed the signing on Tuesday, per NBA.com’s transaction log. The deal will cover San Antonio’s next five games and will expire after next Thursday’s contest in Brooklyn.
6:54 pm: The Spurs are signing veteran big man Mason Plumlee on a 10-day contract, agent Mark Bartelstein tells ESPN’s Shams Charania (Twitter link).
San Antonio has an opening on its 15-man roster and won’t have to make a corresponding move to make room for Plumlee. The Spurs opened up a roster spot when they waived Jeremy Sochan, who later signed with the Knicks.
Plumlee became a free agent earlier this month when he was cut by the Thunder shortly after they acquired him from the Hornets. The big man, who turns 36 next month, fits the description of journeyman. He has played for Brooklyn, Portland, Denver, Detroit, the Clippers, and Phoenix, as well as two stints with the Hornets.
Plumlee has appeared in 874 regular season games, averaging 7.9 points, 6.6 rebounds and 2.4 assists in 21.7 minutes per contest. He played regularly for the Suns in 2024/25 but had a modest role in Charlotte this season, seeing action in just 14 games (two starts) while averaging 1.9 points, 2.9 rebounds and 1.1 assists in 8.9 minutes per night.
He’ll add a little frontcourt depth for San Antonio coming out of the All-Star break but it remains to be seen how long he’ll stick with his latest NBA franchise.
Central Notes: Mitchell, Harden, Bickerstaff, Dillingham, Brown
Donovan Mitchell doesn’t have any concerns about how he and James Harden will mesh in the Cavaliers’ new starting backcourt, he told Marc J. Spears of Andscape.
“I’ve never played with a guy like James Harden. I never had a guy like that on my team,” Mitchell said. “And we’re not here to figure out like who’s bigger, better or whatever. How are we going to win? And I think having that relationship helps. But it also speaks to the type of people that he and I are. We’re trying to figure what’s right. For him to go out there and say he’s trying to help me, that’s huge. That’s huge for everything. … Winning is the end-all, right? I’m not worried about how we’ll fit and how we’ll coexist because we have the same goal in mind, and it doesn’t matter how we get there. We just want to get there.”
Mitchell also touched on a number of other topics in a monthly diary, including his feelings on the sad way Chris Paul‘s career ended.
Here’s more from the Central Division:
- Following J.B. Bickerstaff‘s dismissal as head coach of the Cavaliers after the 2023/24 season, he wasn’t sure if he’d ever get another opportunity, he told Steve Bulpett of Heavy.com. “I didn’t think I was going to get a job,” he said. “There weren’t jobs available at that point. So I was just sitting at home and hanging out with my family back in Cleveland trying to figure out what was next.” New Pistons president of basketball operations Trajan Langdon soon offered him a head coaching job within the division. He learned from his days in Cleveland how to improve in his next stop. “That month that I had off gave me an opportunity to, like, evaluate myself and think about what I was going to be at the next opportunity and just understanding that the focus should always be on the process and not just focused on the results,” he said. “In my last year in Cleveland, I let that get the best of me, where it was like results, results, results. And we skipped some of the process stuff.”
- Rob Dillingham, a 2024 lottery selection, had trouble cracking the Timberwolves’ rotation and earning sustained minutes. After getting traded to the Bulls, Dillingham is getting a longer look from coach Billy Donovan, though he’ll still likely have to fight for playing time when the team’s backcourt gets healthy, notes Joe Cowley of the Chicago Sun-Times. Dillingham has averaged 11.0 points, 4.0 assists, 3.7 assists, 2.0 steals and 2.3 turnovers in 24.7 minutes per game over three appearances. “His job and responsibility is to generate shots for guys when he gets (inside) and understand the shots where he has angles and can shoot a high percentage on and the shots he can’t,” Donovan said. “It’s not like I’m giving him free rein, we need him downhill, but he also can’t be jumping off two feet, getting caught in the air, trying to shoot over guys, trying to throw passes that aren’t there. He’s got to clean that up and we’ve got to help him do it. What I don’t want him to do is not be aggressive or be afraid to attack. He has to attack. He just has to make better decisions, and I think that will come in time.”
- Along with acquiring Ivica Zubac from the Clippers, the Pacers added guard Kobe Brown in the deal. Brown was only averaging 8.7 minutes in L.A. but could see his minutes jump the remainder of the season with Indiana. “I’m grateful, for sure. Grateful to be in this position,” he told Tony East of CircleCitySpin.com. “I feel like this team is a great team. Obviously, they were just in the Finals last year and were so close to winning it. And for them to want me here is big. So I’m happy and excited to be here and be a part of it.” Brown has played in two games with Indiana thus far, including a start against Brooklyn on Wednesday.
Nets Notes: Tanking, Rookies, Marks, Schedule
The NBA may be taking a harder stance on tanking but that can’t deter the Nets from getting the best possible position in the loaded lottery, Brian Lewis of the New York Post opines (subscription required).
Lewis notes the Nets are more talent-deficient than other teams who are elbowing for lottery positions. Getting one of those high picks is crucial to accelerating their rebuild. They come out of the All-Star break just a game out of the No. 2 lottery spot and need to keep the wins for the remainder of the season at a minimum, Lewis writes.
Here’s more on the Nets:
- In his evaluation of the team’s performance prior to the break, Lewis points out that most of their rookies remain question marks. In particular, Drake Powell, Ben Saraf and Danny Wolf still have a lot to prove, though lottery pick Egor Demin has shown that he can be a steady factor — he’s had 34 straight games with a three-pointer, an NBA rookie record. Nolan Traore has also developed into a more reliable threat, posting averages of 13.1 points and 5.6 assists since Jan. 23 on 51.1 percent shooting, including 39.3 percent from distance.
- In an in-depth subscriber-only story, Lewis takes a look at Sean Marks’ roller-coaster decade as GM. One anonymous assistant GM praised Marks for a couple of his biggest deals. “Yeah, he’s had some big wins. The (Kevin) Durant trade (to Phoenix) was a big win. The Mikal Bridges trade (to the Knicks) was a big win,” the assistant GM said. “Other executives that were less good negotiators than Sean might have accepted the deal at a lower price point and not gotten as much. And his willingness to stick to his guns on those got him some big wins.”
- The schedule after the break could facilitate the Nets’ desire to pile up the losses. Their next dozen games include a pair against Eastern Conference leader Detroit as well as two games apiece against Cleveland and Miami. They also have to play Oklahoma City, San Antonio and Boston during that stretch.
Celtics Notes: Tatum, Brown, Film Study
There has been increased speculation that Jayson Tatum might play this season but the Celtics superstar isn’t sure about that, ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne reported during an NBA Today segment (Twitter video link).
Tatum informed Shelburne, “I still have not made a decision on whether or not I’m coming back this year.” Shelburne added that there’s no pressure from the organization on Tatum to make a comeback before next season and that the star forward has numerous hurdles to clear before he’s ready to play after tearing his Achilles during last season’s playoffs.
According to Steve Bulpett on Heavy.com, a seemingly innocuous post on social media set off a firestorm of speculation. The post on Twitter/X and Bluesky noted that the Celtics home game against Philadelphia on March 1 had been flexed from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. and would now be televised by NBC. That led many people to conclude that Tatum and the Celtics were targeting that game for his comeback.
Here’s more on the Celtics:
- What do medical experts say about Tatum potentially coming back less than a year after suffering the injury and undergoing surgery? They’re generally wary of a swift return, according to Souichi Terada of MassLive.com. “The Achilles tendon injury is still a poorly recognized injury in terms of why it happens,” said Dr. George Theodore, a specialist at Mass General Hospital. “Although we’re always looking for reasons as to why this might have occurred to an athlete, we really don’t know. It is a devastating injury and it has an excessive recovery time. In some players, it affects both their performance and their career longevity.” Terada also interviews athletes who have suffered Achilles injuries, noting that many struggled with the mental aspects of trusting their bodies after such a long recovery time.
- Jaylen Brown is proud of how the team has come together despite the front office’s efforts to reduce salary during the offseason and prior to the trade deadline, he told Noa Dalzell of CelticsBlog.com. “I believed that we were going to be fine, but even to me, it’s like, ‘Damn, we’re the second seed – one of the five best records in the whole league,” Brown said. “Only a few teams have a better record than us in the entire league. We’re a top-five team in the league, coming from the start of the season, when it was [supposed to be] a gap year.” Exceeding expectations is something that has Brown beaming with pride. “Everybody was calling it a gap year,” Brown said. “How do you go from a gap year to top five in the East? That’s a big jump. That’s not a small jump. People want to skip over that. I’m not gonna let you skip over it. That is a big deal.”
- One of the keys to the Celtics’ success has been preparation. In an extensive piece, Jack Simone of the Boston Sports Journal talks to coaches and players about their devotion to film study and how it gives them an edge.
Warriors Sign Nate Williams To Two-Way Deal
February 17: The Warriors have officially signed Williams to a two-way contract, according to the NBA.com transaction log.
February 16: The Warriors are signing Nate Williams to a two-way contract, Jake Fischer of The Stein Line tweets.
Also known as Jeenathan Williams, the 6’5” shooting guard has been playing for the NBA G League’s Long Island Nets while awaiting another NBA opportunity. He was on a training camp contract with the Lakers last fall but was waived in October.
Williams, who turned 27 last Thursday, spent last season with the Rockets, first on a two-way deal and eventually on a standard contract. He got into 20 games, averaging 3.3 PPG and 0.7 RPG in 7.4 MPG, then was waived by Houston over the summer.
After the Lakers let him go, Williams hooked on with the Nets’ G League affiliate. He has averaged 18.4 points, 6.0 rebounds, 2.5 assists and 1.8 steals in 34 minutes per game over 35 appearances. He’s made 47.2% of his field goal attempts, including 36.5% from long range.
Williams also appeared in 22 games with Houston in 2023/24 and five games with Portland the previous season. He went undrafted out of Buffalo in 2022.
Golden State had a two-way opening and won’t need to make a corresponding move. The Warriors created a two-way opening by promoting Pat Spencer right after the trade deadline.