- The Pacers recalled center Ike Anigbogu from their G League affiliate in Fort Wayne, the team announced on its website. While the rookie has played sparingly with the big league club, he’s averaged 5.9 point, 6.9 rebounds and 1.9 blocks per game in ten starts with the Mad Ants this season.
12:57pm: The Pacers have officially signed Moore to a two-way contract, the club announced today in a press release.
9:02am: The Pacers will fill their open two-way slot by signing former SMU forward Ben Moore, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN (Twitter link). Moore will slide into the two-way opening created last month when Indiana signed two-way player Alex Poythress to a standard NBA contract.
Moore, 22, initially joined the Pacers as an undrafted rookie last summer, participating in training camp with the club before being waived at the end of the preseason. Moore joined the Fort Wayne Mad Ants, Indiana’s G League team, as an affiliate player, and has appeared in 24 games for the club this season, averaging 11.0 PPG and 6.6 RPG.
On his new two-way deal, Moore figures to continue to spend most of his time with the Mad Ants, but the agreement will also make him eligible to see some action with the NBA team in Indiana. Moore will be a limited to a prorated portion of the standard 45-day NBA limit, which should work out to 23 days.
The Pacers were one of seven teams with an open slot for a two-way player. Those other six clubs will have until January 15 to fill their openings.
- Pacers center Myles Turner, who sat out last night’s game against Miami with a right elbow injury, will also miss Friday’s contest vs. Cleveland, the club announced in a press release.
Damien Wilkins, who was recently waived by the Pacers, envisions a future for himself in the NBA beyond playing for a team, as he tells David Aldridge of NBA.com.
- A source tells Aldridge (same piece) that the Pacers could look to bring back Wilkins after the trade deadline. The soon-to-be 38-year-old averaged 1.7 points during his 19 contests with Indiana.
2:45pm: The Pacers have officially requested release waivers on Wilkins, thus ending his stint with the team, the organization announced in a press release.
12:57pm: The Pacers have decided to waive Damien Wilkins, tweets Shams Charania of The Vertical. The 37-year-old forward had a $2,116,995 guarantee that would have kicked in if he were kept on the roster past today.
Wilkins had been out of the league for four seasons before earning a roster spot with Indiana in the preseason. He was first signed by the SuperSonics in 2004 and played for six NBA teams throughout his career.
Wilkins averaged 1.7 points and 8.0 minutes of playing time in 19 games with the Pacers and made his only start of the season last night.
- The Pacers have assigned rookie center Ike Anigbogu to the G League, the team announced today in a press release. The NBA’s youngest active player, Anigbogu has appeared in seven games so far for the Fort Wayne Mad Ants, Indiana’s G League affiliate, averaging 6.6 PPG and 6.7 RPG.
The Thunder have a pair of Staples Center dates on their schedule this week, with games against the Lakers on Wednesday and the Clippers on Thursday. As a result, Paul George has been prompted by reporters to revisit his reported desire to be dealt to the Lakers this past offseason. Asked about that on Tuesday, George confirmed that he would have “loved to go back home and play for my city,” but called the deal that sent him to Oklahoma City a “win-win.”
Of course, it wasn’t necessarily a “win” for the Lakers, who missed out on George and were subsequently fined $500K for tampering with the Pacers. The NBA’s official announcement on that fine suggested that GM Rob Pelinka had improper contact with George’s agent, but the former Pacers forward suggested today that the penalty stemmed from interactions he had with Lakers associate head coach Brian Shaw.
“There was no tampering at all,” George said of the Lakers and his conversations with Shaw (link via Bill Oram of The Orange County Register). “The only thing me and B-Shaw ever spoke about was fishing, and challenge each other on fishing trips. B-Shaw has way, way, way better class than to try to recruit me.”
Sources confirmed to Ramona Shelburne of ESPN that the league’s investigation did probe the relationship between George and Shaw, but found no evidence of tampering on that front.
Here’s more on the Lakers, including another note on George:
- Russell Westbrook isn’t preparing a sales pitch for George to keep him in Oklahoma City and away from the Lakers, preferring to let the Thunder’s results speak for themselves, tweets Tania Ganguli of The Los Angeles Times. “Sales pitch is when we win a championship,” Westbrook said. “Beat that pitch.”
- Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report explores whether or not it makes sense for the Lakers to try to push to acquire George before the trade deadline. Of course, as Pincus acknowledges, unless the Thunder slump in the coming weeks, George probably won’t be on the block.
- Having been initially ruled questionable for Wednesday night’s game against the Thunder, Lakers center Brook Lopez will be available to play, per Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN (Twitter link). Lonzo Ball will miss tonight’s game and is day-to-day.
- Speaking of Ball, Jonathan Wasserman of Bleacher Report revisits the 2017 NBA draft and suggests that if teams were to re-draft today, Ball would slip to No. 4 instead of going second overall to the Lakers. Wasserman has Markelle Fultz going to the Lakers at No. 2, with the Sixers using the top pick on Jayson Tatum. Kyle Kuzma also soars into the lottery in Wasserman’s hypothetical re-draft, going fifth overall to Sacramento.
With Isaiah Thomas having returned to the Cavaliers on Tuesday, and the Cavs now poised to square off against the Celtics on Wednesday, it only makes sense to revisit one of the 2017 offseason’s biggest trades. ESPN’s Jackie MacMullan has done just that, taking a deep dive into the factors that led to Kyrie Irving heading from Cleveland to Boston.
Along the way, MacMullan passes along several noteworthy tidbits — while the whole piece is worth checking out, especially for Cavs and Celtics fans, we’ve rounded up some of the most interesting details below:
- While Irving made his trade request in July, the Cavaliers explored the possibility of moving the point guard in June, which MacMullan suggests contributed to Irving’s decision to ask out of Cleveland. “They didn’t want me there,” Irving said of the Cavs. Former teammate LeBron James disputes that notion, which he says “makes absolutely no sense.”
- One deal the Cavs explored in June would have sent Irving and Channing Frye to the Suns and resulted in both Paul George and Eric Bledsoe landing in Cleveland. However, Phoenix balked at that deal, since the club was unwilling to give up the No. 4 overall pick, says MacMullan. A few days later, the Pacers dealt George to the Thunder instead.
- Although no formal offer was made during those negotiations, Irving caught wind of the talks and believed they were orchestrated by James’ camp, since LeBron shares an agent with Bledsoe. Team and league sources suggest otherwise, telling MacMullan that former Cavs GM David Griffin sensed that an Irving trade request may be coming and initiated talks with the Suns.
- When Irving and his agent met with the Cavaliers on July 9, they pressed owner Dan Gilbert about the team’s direction, and mentioned the Spurs, Knicks, and Timberwolves as preferred landing spots for Irving. Boston didn’t come up during that meeting, but Gilbert coveted the Nets‘ 2018 first-round pick that was held by the Celtics, and Irving’s camp didn’t oppose a deal to the C’s.
- When the Celtics emerged as a viable trade partner for Irving and the Cavs, Gilbert went to James and attempted to secure a promise that he’d stay in Cleveland beyond the 2017/18 season, but LeBron declined to commit, sources tell MacMullan.
Victor Oladipo will remain out of the lineup for Wednesday’s game against Milwaukee. The Pacers haven’t won a game since the shooting guard injured his knee against the Pistons last week and coach Nate McMillan understands why the team has struggled.
“He was doing a lot for us, as far as scoring and leading transition and bringing a kind of leadership role and energy that our guys feed off of,” McMillan said of Oladipo (via Jim Ayello of the Indianapolis Star. “You know, it’s not only the fans [he engerizes] with his playmaking.”
Oladipo, who’s in the first year of a four-year, $84MM deal, came to Indiana via the Paul George trade and he’s played at an All-Star level, helping the Pacers become playoff contenders. Despite losing the last four games, the franchise remains in the mix, entering the day with sole possession of the eighth seed in the conference with a record of 19-18.
Here’s more from the Central Division:
- Isaiah Thomas will be a free agent at the end of the season and a front office executive tells Kevin O’Connor of The Ringer that his potential earnings are hard to predict. Some teams may overlook his hip injury while others will scratch him off their list entirely because of it. O’Connor notes that a Kyle Lowry-level three-year, $100MM deal may be Thomas’ best case scenario while the worst case would be a lucrative one-year, prove it deal.
- Another executive tells O’Connor (same piece) that Thomas’ best offer could come from a team looking to use the Washington product as a short-term bridge option at the point. The executive adds that the Bulls and Mavs are franchises that fit the mold.
- The Cavaliers are planning on an initial 20-to-22 minute restriction for Thomas and the “flow of his comeback” will determine the amount of court time he will receive going forward, Shams Charania of The Vertical tweets. Thomas will make his debut for Cleveland tonight against Portland.
The Pacers have signed second-year forward Alex Poythress to an NBA contract, the team announced in a press release on Thursday. Poythress was a two-way player splitting time between the Pacers and the G League affiliate, Fort Wayne Mad Ants. Poythress will now be with the Pacers moving forward.
Poythress, 24, has played in 11 games with Indiana this season but has averaged less than five minutes in his appearances. With the Mad Ants, Poythress averaged 20.0 PPG, 9.0 RPG and 2.7 APG.
After a productive season with the Mad Ants last year, including a G League All-Star appearance, Poythress averaged 10.7 PPG and 4.8 RPG in six games with the Sixers.
With the signing, Edmond Sumner becomes the lone two-way player on the Pacers’ roster.