Handing out early-season grades for Pacers’ Bruce Brown, Obi Toppin

The Indiana Pacers offseason was not your typical Pacers offseason. Instead of taking a back seat, re-signing some players, and drafting a few here and there as they usually do, the Pacers were one of the most active teams in the NBA when it came to making moves.

The reason for this may have been that the Pacers cannot afford to coast through the offseason as they were in recent years. Due to the team actually having a direction going forward now, changes and improvements are needed more often than ever now, and the Pacers delivered on that.

By far, the two headline offseason moves for the Pacers were the signing of Bruce Brown and the trade for Obi Toppin.

Bruce Brown surprised the league, especially the Nuggets, as he left the team that just won a championship to accept a deal with the upstart Pacers. Now, while playing with Tyrese Haliburton is certainly a perk, nobody expected Brown to leave the Nuggets and perhaps another championship. Nevertheless, Brown was on board, signing a two-year $45 million contract with a team option after the first year.

One day later, the Pacers completed their offseason, trading two second-round picks to the Knicks for Obi Toppin, a player that Pacers fans have had their eyes on for years.

The Toppin trade excited Pacers fans quite a bit, as the Pacers imagined the lob opportunities with him and Tyrese Haliburton and envisioned a world where Toppin improved tenfold on his Knicks stint where it seemed like he was being misused under Julius Randle and broke out as a star.

That said, both Brown and Toppin have played five games since coming on board to Indiana, and now seems like a good time to see how they have performed so far and give them an early-season grade.

Just a heads up, while Jarace Walker and Ben Sheppard are also two of the Pacers’ most important additions, they have barely played this season, with both of them logging about 38 minutes combined in five games, including three DNPs.

With this small sample size, it is basically impossible to grade their performances so far, as they have barely shown anything due to them not being given the chance to.

Bruce Brown

After a decent preseason where he showed why the Pacers forked up $45 million for him, expectations were relatively high going into the regular season for Bruce Brown, as to some, his contract was seen as an overpay, and his offseason activities in Denver also raised an eyebrow or two among Pacers fans.

Those eyebrows were subsequently dropped in the season opener, as Brown silenced all doubters for the moment with a fantastic debut performance, putting up a team-high 24 points on six three-pointers to help lead Indiana to a blowout win over Washington.

While Brown did cool off the next game, only putting up six points on 3/8 shooting in the first Cleveland matchup, he bounced back with 15 points on three 3-pointers against Chicago, despite the loss.

The next game was, unfortunately, the dreaded Boston game, as the team was more or less doomed without Tyrese Haliburton, and that would include Bruce Brown as well. Brown struggled with the Celtics’ tough defense, putting up three points on 1/6 shooting on a night everyone on the Pacers would like to forget, including himself.

A bounce-back game was necessary, and that is exactly what Pacers fans got in the next outing.

In a rematch with the now-healthy Cavaliers in the opening game of the NBA In-Season Tournament, Brown showed out, putting up 19 points with three 3-pointers, including some big shots down the stretch to help the Pacers win a close game against a very talented Cavaliers team.

In the first five games of the season, Brown has done quite well for himself, averaging a career-high 13.4 points on 50/50/75 efficiency and grabbing 4.4 rebounds in about 31 minutes of playing time.

While these stats don’t exactly jump out to you on paper, this is what the Pacers were looking for when they signed Brown to that $45 million contract: A 3-and-D wing who can guard the opposing team’s best perimeter scorer while also being capable of hitting some shots of his own on the other end.

He has fit seamlessly into the Pacers offense so far, sometimes being their only source of offense during some rough stretches. With that being said, $45 million is still a lot of money, but I think Brown is doing a decent job of living up to the hype so far.

Final Grade: B (Not exactly an All-Star, but exactly what Indy needs so far)

Obi Toppin

While the Pacers paid top dollar to get Bruce Brown, they essentially got Obi Toppin for pennies on the dollar. After three potentially-filled but relatively uneventful seasons in New York, Toppin was traded to the Pacers for a 2028 and 2029 second-round pick, basically nothing.

Expectations coming into the season for Toppin were all over the place, as some projected him to flop on his new team, while others projected him to be in the Most Improved Player running, showing New York what exactly they missed out on.

Following the preseason, the verdict was still unsure on Obi, as he did have one fantastic game, but the rest were okay performances. One thing was for sure, though: Obi Toppin showed exactly what he can do for the Pacers in terms of highlights, as he busted out a between-the-legs dunk in the open court against Cleveland in the final preseason game.

So far in the season, Toppin has yet to put on an awe-inspiring performance, as his contributions have been pretty mediocre, considering the hype some people put into him before the season started.

Through the first five games of the season, Toppin has averaged 7.6 points on 51/20/80 splits and 4.4 rebounds. These are pretty middling stats when you consider his starting role and the trust Rick Carlisle seems to have in him this early.

However, it is worth noting that Toppin is putting up these stats in fewer minutes than Brown, with 21 per game. This is, of course, followed by the fact that Toppin was putting up the same, if not better, numbers than this in New York in even fewer minutes per game.

Of course, it is too early in the season to fully judge Toppin’s performance as a Pacer and label him a failed experiment. In my opinion, the trade can never be viewed as a dud, considering the small price Indiana had to pay to acquire Toppin in the first place.

However, I would be lying if I said I am satisfied with his performance so far, with some aspects of his play, particularly his defense and shooting, leaving much to be desired, with the former being why I wanted Jarace Walker to start over him before the season began.

Obi Toppin is an interesting case. While he will most likely not be the Most Improved Player lock that some had him projected as, and he will probably not fall out of the rotation as some people are saying, he still leaves a lot to be desired so far.

Only time will tell how the trade looks in the future but for now, while it wasn’t exactly a failed trade, it’s not exactly looking like a “fleece” either.

One thing’s for sure: The guy knows how to make a highlight play.

Final Grade: C (Hasn’t done much in five games; MIP might be a reach)