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How Do This Year’s Indiana Pacers Starters Stack Up Against Last Year’s?

By Ryan Eggers

Oct 12, 2016; Evansville, IN, USA; Indiana Pacers forward Paul George (center) shares a laugh from the bench with teammates during a game against the Milwaukee Bucks at Ford Center. Mandatory Credit: James Brosher-USA TODAY Sports
Oct 12, 2016; Evansville, IN, USA; Indiana Pacers forward Paul George (center) shares a laugh from the bench with teammates during a game against the Milwaukee Bucks at Ford Center. Mandatory Credit: James Brosher-USA TODAY Sports /
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Jeff Teague of the Indiana Pacers
Nov 5, 2016; Indianapolis, IN, USA; Indiana Pacers guard Jeff Teague (44) drives to the basket against Chicago Bulls forward Nikola Mirotic (44) at Bankers Life Fieldhouse. Indiana defeats Chicago 111-94. Mandatory Credit: Brian Spurlock-USA TODAY Sports /

Point Guard — Jeff Teague vs George Hill

  • Last Season — George Hill: 12.1 PPG, 4.0 RPG, 3.5 APG, 44.1 FG%, 40.8 3P%
  • This Season — Jeff Teague: 16.0 PPG, 3.5 RPG. 6.6 APG, 42.1 FG%, 30.0 3P%

After years of whining about Hill and pleading for an offensive-oriented point guard like Teague, “that side” of Pacers Twitter finally had their dreams come true in the off-season when Larry Bird made the swap.

Five games into the year and they all said it was an awful trade.

The grief is somewhat understandable; it’s difficult watching Hill average 20 and 5 with his new Utah Jazz when Teague literally put up a donut with us three games into the season.

But things are changing for the better. Since that game, Teague hasn’t scored less than 9 and is averaging 18.2 a game in that span.

The main issue is his shooting, specifically his 3-point shooting. Teague and Hill were about even-par from beyond the arc last season (40%), but while Hill had improved on that mark in his seven healthy games this year (43.2%), Teague has grossly regressed (26.1%).

Part of this can be blamed on the type of 3-point shooters Teague and Hill are. Hill is a lot more passive; he takes what he can get and is bulls-eye from the corner. Last season Hill made 84.6% of his threes off of an assist and 55.6% of his attempts were from the corner, while Teague is making 66.7% of his threes off assists with a mere 4.5% of his attempts coming from the corner.

Teague is aggressive and creates his own shots — he will sometimes slump. We witnessed that early in the season, but he’s been on the come-up ever since. He put up his second 30 point-9 assist game of the year last night against the Oklahoma City Thunder; Hill never had such a game in his five years as a Pacer.

Defensively, the Pacers knew that they would be downgrading. But fret not, Teague is still an offensive asset at point guard that the Pacers rarely saw in Hill. He will be fine, and his 3-point shooting numbers should return to normal as the season wears on.

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