Pacers' penny-pinching led to draft lottery disaster

The Indiana Pacers got the worst lottery result possible on Sunday. After finishing with the NBA's second-worst record, they fell to No. 5 in the lottery and lost their pick to the Los Angeles Clippers.

This deal was motivated by the Pacers' need for a center after Myles Turner left and Ivica Zubac's availability on a reasonable contract. But in trying to save money, the Pacers missed a chance to add a transformative player in the draft.

Indiana Pacers haven't paid luxury tax in two decades

Not since the 2004-05 season has the Pacers organization spent enough on player salaries to exceed the luxury tax line, despite having teams good enough to reach four Eastern Conference Finals and the NBA Finals last season. During the Finals last season, ESPN's Shams Charania reported the Pacers were "prepared and expecting" to go into the tax to resign Turner. They did not.

Turner left for a four-year, $107M deal with the Milwaukee Bucks after the Pacers refused to offer him more than $23M per year. Maybe they weren't expecting any rival suitors, but the team had ample chances to hammer out a deal in their exclusive negotiating window. Instead, they did not pay the luxury tax and muddled through the season with stopgap big men Jay Huff and Isaiah Jackson.

The acquisition of Zubac was similarly motivated by cost. The center makes $42.1M for the next two seasons compared to Turner's $54.3M (plus a $29.1M player option for 2028-29). It's a good deal for a defensive-minded center, but it remains to be seen if Zubac is as good next to Tyrese Haliburton as Turner was.

Indiana Pacers paid stiff price for Ivica Zubac

While Zubac made the All-Defensive second team in 2025, he's not the kind of player a team would normally give up the No. 5 pick in the draft to obtain. Not to mention the Pacers also sent their 2029 first-round pick to the Clippers, a 2028 second-rounder and 23-year-old swingman Bennedict Mathurin. Including Mathurin was also a cost-conscious move, as he'll likely get a raise in restricted free agency this summer.

That's a huge price to pay for a center who might be worse than the one they let go, and is only a year younger. Yes, signing Turner would have put the Pacers into the tax, but they wouldn't have exceeded the first apron. They also had easier ways to get under the tax line, like moving backup big man Obi Toppin.

The result is that the Pacers missed a chance to reload their surprise Finals team with an elite young talent. Instead, they made what amounted to a lateral move at center at the cost of two first-round picks and a former No. 6 overall pick in Mathurin.

The Pacers got unlucky in the lottery. But it was their frugality that put their future in the hands of the lottery ping pong balls to begin with.