The Indiana Pacers have an open avenue to sign a natural scorer in free agency.
The Pacers are an interesting team. They made it to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2024. Yet, they aren’t talked about alongside the Boston Celtics, Cleveland Cavaliers or even the New York Knicks as a team to beat in the East. Indiana runs a show-stopping offense. Though they have balance in their depth chart, bringing a bucket-getter at forward on board to their bench could help them immensely.
Therefore, the Pacers should consider acquiring free agent forward Bojan Bogdanovic. They could do so immediately, given that he was released from the Brooklyn Nets on Feb. 19.
Indiana’s high-scoring second unit could be bolstered with a player in Bogdanovic who averaged 20.2 points and 3.1 three-pointers on 41.5% shooting from distance across 28 games for the Detroit Pistons to begin last season. His 15.2 PPG for that campaign is an accurate reflection of what he could give the Pacers in a hypothetical bench role.
The Pacers lack volume scorers. Their franchise players in Tyrese Haliburton (18.4 PPG) and All-Star Pascal Siakam (20.3 PPG) lead their charge. Rarely do teams without at least one 25 PPG vanguard win a championship. They get scoring from many different contributors, but late in the postseason, they’ll need proven veterans who can naturally find their own offense in highly-pressurized situations.
The Bosnian forward would bring exceptional outside marksmanship and a great ability to get into the lane and use his size and savvy to finish in traffic to their unit. Indiana could buy low on him as he’ll be coming off of foot surgery. He’d give the Pacers a nice boost next season.
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