8p9s Roundtable: Nate McMillan Is The New Boss
By Ben Gibson
True or False: The Indiana Pacers will be a better team in 2016-17.
Furr: False. The Pacers overachieved to get 40+ wins under Vogel this season. It’s certainly possible the Pacers will sign someone with offensive firepower and improve, but I would be surprised to see next year’s Pacers exceed this year’s win total.
Comstock: False, but I don’t think the transition from Frank to Nate will be the root of the decline. I think Bird will aggressively try to improve the roster but will have little luck doing so through the FA market. If he swings and misses on a George Hill trade, PG and Myles Turner are only good enough to carry this team to 35 or so wins.
Donahue: I don’t know. More depends on the roster moves than this coaching hire, but my belief is that moving from Vogel to McMillan is at best lateral, and more likely a downgrade. If Bird can add talent — specifically shooting – through the draft and free agency, they’ll be better. If he picks up ill-fitting scraps, then the countdown starts to the Paul George trade demands.
Eggers: The Pacers performance next year will likely have less to do with coaching and more to do with the roster that Bird puts out, although any and all consequences from a bad year will be put on McMillan’s shoulders. If we can hit on one of the free agents that the Pacers fandom have been discussing for the latter half of the year and draft a nice complimentary piece in June, then the team will be better. If not, then either Paul George needs to become a consistently top 3 player or Myles Turner needs to make a huge jump in his game for the Pacers to finish better than they did last year. That likely doesn’t happen, though, and the team will probably regress without roster improvement.
Next: Myles Turner Joins USA Basketball Select Team
Ochoa: True. I think PG will continue to play at God levels and Myles Turner is going to have a great summer. Pending some roster changes here and there, I think the Pacers can go out and win another 40+ games and make the playoffs as a 6-8 seed. Coaching is super important, I get that, but let’s not forget how important it is to have good players. We have enough good players to keep treading water, at the very least.