Unlike the league’s four most recent champions, Boston, Denver, Golden State and Milwaukee, who drafted and developed their franchise cornerstones, or the 2020 Los Angeles Lakers, who signed LeBron James as a free agent and whose glamour status made them the preferred trade destination for its other star, Anthony Davis, Indiana’s front office has struck gold by trading its way up.
Of the 10 players Indiana has typically leaned on during this postseason, half were acquired via trades, including three of the top four scorers in Pascal Siakam, Tyrese Haliburton and Aaron Nesmith. Since the Miami Heat built a superteam through free agent signings and won consecutive championships in 2012 and 2013, the only NBA champion to have relied that much on trades were the 2019 Toronto Raptors, who traded for four of their top five leading scorers.
“There’s no one right way to do it,” Pacers general manager Chad Buchanan told NBC News.
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