The Indiana Pacers had one of the best benches in the NBA. As you know, they were the highest-scoring bench in the league in both the regular season and the postseason. The play of the second unit is what made them so hard to beat and was a big reason why they made the Eastern Conference Finals.
Obi Toppin became part of that unit midway through the season once Pascal Siakam came to town. Toppin played as strongly on the bench as he did as a starter. He finished the season with career highs in almost every statistic after the year was over.
Toppin is a free agent now and he could look to cash in on his career-year. The Pacers would like to keep him if the price is right. Still, there are pros and cons to deciding to keep them if that is the route that they decide they want to pursue when free agency starts on Sunday.
The pros and cons of the Pacers keeping Obi Toppin
A pro of keeping Toppin is that they get a guy who just had his best year and he's just now approaching his prime. He's still just 26 years old. He's a rim-runner, which is a valuable skill with how fast Indiana likes to play on offense. Keeping him also allows the Pacers to play Siakam at small-ball center.
Another pro of keeping him is his shooting. It doesn't look like his three-point shooting is going to regress. His stroke is confident and consistent. He shot it at 40% from deep in the regular season and 36% in the postseason. Despite that drop-off, that is still a high enough percentage to make him dangerous.
There are cons to keeping him though. One con is his defense. He might be the single worst defensive player that is in the rotation for the Pacers. He gets beaten easily on back-cuts and is lazy moving his feet side-to-side. Toppin has never been a good defender and kind of is what he is at this point.
Another con is keeping him would keep Jarace Walker from seeing proper playing time. Walker was a lottery pick a year ago and hardly saw the court as a rookie. With Toppin still on the roster, Walker would likely be riding the bench yet again, despite showing some high-level potential on both ends of the court.
It's a tough balancing act that the Pacers must figure out. It'll be interesting to see what they decide to do.