An early rebuttal to the silly Russell Westbrook to Indiana Pacers noise

Trading for Russell Westbrook under the fallback of draft picks will be too risky for the Indiana Pacers

For the Indiana Pacers to even spare the Los Angeles Lakers a glance on an offer around Russell Westbrook, they would have to:

• Be really turned off by the contracts of both Malcolm Brogdon and Buddy Hield,
• Fail on finding a taker for Brogdon and/or Hield, which is very unlikely (more on that later),
• Really like the future-proofing provided by the Lakers’ uncertain draft picks,
• Be really confident about the Lakers being very bad in 2027 and beyond
• Be very willing to absorb the financial repercussions of waiving and stretching Westbrook’s monstrous salary,
• Be really confident that they could find another taker for Westbrook instead, which is severely unlikely, or
• Be very willing to accommodate Westbrook and let him lead a Pacers team which already has a more efficient floor general to begin with in Tyrese Haliburton.

A lack of even one of the foregoing is enough to constitute a massive red flag that the Pacers could use to respond with a resounding “no”.

Also, it is rather puzzling that the Lakers are still packaging Westbrook as a franchise-altering player (in a good way) when his decline this season has clearly been more than a matter of basketball fit. There are numbers to back up the notion that his physical regression has began to hamper him substantially. There is a reason why he has donned four different jerseys in four consecutive years.

Westbrook badly needs a change of scenery for a better ending to his Hall of Fame career, but whether any other team volunteers to take him on and facilitate him with a necessary roster overturn is a massive question mark. And the Indiana Pacers hardly look like a franchise willing to take that on when they have just traded a win-now player in Domantas Sabonis on the deadline to elevate their capped ceiling.