If Nate McMillan’s plans and inklings are correct, Indiana Pacers fans have nothing to worry about: Paul George will be back next season.
As the head coach said, per Nate Taylor of the Indianapolis Star:
McMillan didn’t share much of what George told him and Bird during their meeting. Yet McMillan, at several points Thursday, said he believes the Pacers will continue to contend in the Eastern Conference. When asked if he expects George to remain with the team for next year, McMillan smiled and answered with one word: Absolutely.
“I had a good conversation with Paul,” McMillan said. “He wants the same thing that I want and the organization wants and that’s to win. My plans are that he will be back with us and we’ll be building to be successful next year.”
It’s encouraging that McMillan is assuming this stance after having an exit interview with George. But it’s much too early for anyone to expect anything at this point.
The Pacers must first see whether George makes an All-NBA team. If he does, he’ll be eligible to sign a five-year extension worth more than $200 million. Even if he desperately wants to play for his hometown Los Angeles Lakers, he’ll be hard-pressed to turn that money down.
If George doesn’t make one of those three year-end squads, things take a turn for the complicated. He is still eligible to sign an extension, but it’ll be worth substantially less, and he’d be able to sign the same deal with his next team if he’s traded. The DPE is huge because it can only be offered by the team that drafted you (or if your current squad acquired you while you were still on a rookie deal). A George trade seems more likely if he doesn’t qualify, since the financial incentive for staying in Indy won’t be as great.
Then again, the Pacers may not care. They can let this roll in to next season and hope George, who will be in a player-option contract year, secures an All-NBA bid in 2018. That would still allow them to offer the mammoth five-year extension. It’s a huge gamble, one a small-market team isn’t going to make lightly. Even if George qualifies for the DPE, there’s no guarantee they’ll want to pay him that much money. They probably will, because getting a top-15 player is the hardest part of any rebuild and they cannot afford to bottom out, but it’s not some no-brainer.
Nothing about this situation is a no-brainer—not for George, not for the Pacers. No matter the All-NBA results, both sides are in for some serious self-reflection this offseason.
