07-01-2025, 12:28 PM
(07-01-2025, 12:24 PM)HoosierDaddyKid Wrote: From John Hollinger. This is why I criticized the Pacers for taking Andrew Nembhard's salary from $2 million to $18 million for 2025-26 when they didn't have to in his extension last summer. It set the Pacers up to be way into the luxury tax, and you know when it came down to it that Indiana would blink rather than pay it.
Keeping Myles Turner on the books for this year at $24 million would have been no sweat if Nembhard was still on his cheap rookie deal, but the Pacers turned the final year of it into a much bigger salary. That extension looked extravagant at the time — $56 million in new money for just two years — and despite Nembhard's playoff heroics, the Pacers are paying the price for it now
I get it. It is a business. On the other hand, for everything he did he earned that contract. And continued to earn it. I get what he is saying but there is a human factor in it as well. You treat your core guys well. Maybe I am off, but just my thoughts. Hopefully if Haliburtan did not get hurt, Indy would have paid the tax like was reported. The injury obviously changed a ton of things.