Pacers trade away No. 23 pick in NBA draft to Pelicans to recover 1st-rounder in 2026. Here's why
For the second straight season, the Indiana Pacers will not have a pick in the first round in the NBA draft.
The Pacers traded this year's first-round pick, the No. 23 selection in the draft, and the draft rights to guard Mojave King to the New Orleans Pelicans to recover the 2026 first-round pick they originally sent to the Raptors in the trade for Pascal Siakam, league sources confirmed to IndyStar. ESPN's Shams Charania originally reported the trade.
The Pacers still have a pick in the second round at No. 54.
The deal would seem to avoid further tightening a roster crunch that has made it difficult for the Pacers to find playing time for young players over the past two seasons. Almost all of their key rotation players on this year's Eastern Conference championship team are under contract to return next season with center Myles Turner being the only player in their top eight set to be a free agent, and it is reportedly likely that he will re-sign.
Second-year wings Ben Sheppard and Jarace Walker are also still on their rookie scale contracts as is rookie wing Johnny Furphy and the Pacers have already found some difficulty finding steady rotational minutes for all three. Furphy appeared in just 50 games this season and averaged 7.6 minutes per game, mostly appearing in mop-up duty after getting some meaningful minutes in November and December when the Pacers were missing several players with injuries.
The Pacers could have used the pick to address the backup center position, but they also have several options there. Isaiah Jackson, who missed almost all of the season with an Achilles tendon tear, is set to be a restricted free agent, but the Pacers could also re-sign him for a reasonable price. Backup center Thomas Bryant is set to be an unrestricted free agent and the Pacers have a club option on third-string center Tony Bradley. They also maintained a relationship with James Wiseman, who tore his Achilles tendon in the season's first game as he was traded at the deadline and then released. The Pacers would only be able to keep two of those players, but would have reason to be interested in doing so.
King, a New Zealand native who played high school basketball in Australia, was taken with the No. 40 pick in the 2023 draft and has mostly been stashed overseas since. He played professionally in both Australia and New Zealand this season. The Raptors traded the Pacers' 2026 first-round pick along with Bruce Brown and Kelly Olynyk at the deadline to New Orleans to acquire Brandon Ingram. The Pacers also traded their 2024 pick to Toronto in the Siakam trade.
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