With the injury bug continuing to spread like a wildfire through the Indiana Pacers‘ locker room, the team’s big men availability continues to be slim pickings. Thankfully, the Indiana Pacers have recently signed former Mad Ant Amida Brimah to a two-way contract.
I’m not sure we’ll see the same day one impact as Oshae Brissett, which netted him a three-year deal, but Amida Brimah has the skills to be an impactful rotation guy.
What kind of help can Amida Brimah bring the Indiana Pacers?
Offense: Rim running and okay touch.
Amida Brimah is just a different human being, physically, as he’s standing at 6-foot-10 with an absolutely unfathomable 7-foot-6 wingspan. Brimah utilizes these measurables to be a reliable lob threat with his court-ranging catch radius. He’s also an alright athlete, and he moves with real effort and authority.
Speaking of authority, the former Mad Ant is quite the putback threat with his solid second jump, touch, and rebounding timing. His 8.6 rebounds a game as a Mad Ant this season show us he has a knack for crashing the glass, and he uses this ability to get buckets of his own on second-chance points.
Brimah is nothing of a shooter, but his paint dwelling has a bit of nuance, as he knows how to utilize a strong lead shoulder for space creation, has a solid post hook, and can rip through surprisingly quickly when guarded by heavy-footed big men.
Defense: Shot-blocking fiend
I couldn’t find it anywhere, but it’s become quite evident that Amida Brimah has to have some sort of volleyball experience. I say this because he has blocked so many shots with two hands instead of one, and this makes it so much harder to score as an offensive player when driving.
Rim protection is the obvious sellable attribute for Amida, and his 2.8 blocks a game as a career average in the G-league only slightly tells the full story of his true defensive abilities.
Sure he may not be the switch-able guy Myles Turner is by any stretch of the imagination, but his ability to rotate to the low post for contest or blocks, erase players even after rotating his entire body, and his innate contest discipline and timing give us a very solid and potentially impactful rim protector with a high motor.
How much will we even see Amida Brimah on the floor?
I think his minutes will depend pretty heavily on the health of the established guys – the usual suspects like Myles Turner and Domantas Sabonis, as well as the emerging Goga Bitadze. If we see the Pacers “shut down” Sabonis for a portion of this meaningless season, I’d love to see a longer deal to see what we have in Brimah.
Regardless of Brimah’s long-term future with the team, it is still a luxury to be able to call up a rim-running shot blocker on such an injured team at the big man spot. Let’s hope Amida can make the most of it.