On Pascal Siakam and the end of the beginning (Patreon)

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By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper 

The date is November 19, 2021, and the Pacers are on the road playing the Charlotte Hornets, about to lose their third-straight game in the wake of trailing by as many as 25 points. The trade deadline, in which the front office fundamentally altered the direction of the franchise by acquiring young, upstart guard Tyrese Haliburton was still three months away; but, in many ways, this game and, more specifically, this possession felt like the beginning of the end to the prior era. In providing a flashbulb moment of a core that appeared to be bumping its head on a limited ceiling, despite never really getting off the ground, while also quite literally bumping into each other, Myles Turner and Domantas Sabonis could be seen trying to post-up in the same spot at the same time. To refer to it as a turf war would be too harsh, but it was certainly a sign of the awkwardness that can ensue from two players trying to jockey for usage while sharing the same position without the requisite elbow room, nor the agency, to fully make it their own.  

At this point, Sabonis was averaging 3.5 post-ups per game, which was less than half his average volume from the prior season (7.6) and also below what Kristaps Porzingis was fed during Rick Carlisle's final season in Dallas (5.2), in which the 7-foot-3 big man more often spaced beyond the three-point line. It was a strange dynamic, seemingly revealing the push-and-pull of trying to accommodate the push-and-pull of a double-big lineup while also being resistant to playing out of the triangle concepts that the Sacramento Kings would later embrace -- albeit with the necessary movement shooting to actually facilitate doing so.

Now, two seasons later, Turner is back in Charlotte, with his team coming off a loss to that very same Kings team that he sat out against due to injury. Once again, he can be seen trying to establish himself in the same spot at the same time as a teammate, but the circumstances arguably couldn't be more different. This isn't a squad lacking in identity and passively scanning through options in the half-court as though they got to the bottom of a paragraph and can't recall what they just read. It's two frontcourt players sticking to the plot, putting in early work as an extension of the team's fast-paced style of play with one vacating the area in recognition of the obvious advantage that wasn't always previously or readily had by Sabonis.

In that regard, not only does Turner relocate to the top of the key, clearing space for Siakam to stretch his legs against the mismatch, he also screens for Nesmith, occupying the potential dig down to turn what might've been a double-team into an isolation for the lanky forward to continue making good on what was the best play from the quarter: give the ball to Siakam.

And, here's the thing: that's something that Turner actively recognized and called for, motioning for Nesmith to funnel the ball into the post when Siakam was being checked by Ish Smith following an offensive rebound. Then, when the defense made the adjustment to turn the isolation into a double-team, while disregarding the off-ball screening action for Nesmith, Turner got his own chance to stretch his legs, putting the ball on the deck from outside the three-point line to gather into a running floater while avoiding the potential offensive foul.

For the frame, with one or the other of them consistently either being quicker or bigger than their defender, Siakam and Turner combined for 18 points and four assists on 61 percent shooting. Granted, this was against a depleted Hornets team that has the same number of wins through 47 games (10) as that past Hornets team had notched by Game 17 in defeating the Pacers (also, 10). Still, it doesn't take a deep dive into two seasons of Pacers history to note the change at the four-spot, particularly as it relates to Turner. That's apparent even by comparison to the most recent attempt to play two centers at once. Just think back to when the Pacers played the Bucks at the start of January. In the first of the two match-ups, Brook Lopez started the game cross-matched against Jalen Smith, with Giannis Antetokounmpo guarding Turner. On screens involving Turner, the Bucks would switch Antetokounmpo onto the ball, allowing Turner to dive to the block. The only problem is, Jalen didn't feed the ball to Turner or maintain a live dribble, which allowed Lopez to negate the mismatch.

For the game, Turner and Smith were -19 in 11 minutes played and only logged two minutes of action together after halftime. By comparison, look at the difference in Boston, when the Celtics cross-matched Kristaps Porzingis onto Siakam, with Jrue Holiday defending Turner at the five. Even when Turner attempts to duck-in, Siakam keeps his dribble, attacking into the conceded to create space with contact against Porzingis' contest with his step-back. 

Meanwhile, he also circumvented the length of Porzingis at the rim, as the Pacers leveraged the initial set-up of stack and contorted the action, bringing Buddy Hield out of the roll to approach with an empty-side touch screen for Siakam to twist and twirl his way to the rim. 

Or, how about when he retreated to attack with a head of steam, collapsing the defense as opposed to merely being dared to shoot or requiring an offensive reset. 

Likewise, against Philadelphia, he went from snatching back and getting around the edge of the Embiid with his preferred left to dribbling at Embiid and preying on the tendencies of big men to help on drives in prying him away from Turner.

Tellingly, by the second half, Turner was a five defended by the five, which has rarely happened to him against Embiid with any consistency over the course of his career without sacrificing size. To be fair, Embiid has a tendency to play a one-man zone, point switching in order to stay in the paint, but he also didn't have reason to leave the paint against Thaddeus Young, and Jalen Smith certainly wasn't going to test the MVP's ability to chop his feet, changing direction in space. As for Sabonis, most teams weren't going to intentionally assign small defenders onto his physicality. Put simply, whether going at mismatches in the post with bully drives or probing and maintaining a live-dribble in the middle of the floor against centers, Siakam gives the Pacers a dynamic they've never, specifically, had against frontcourt cross-matches in the Turner-era, particularly when also taking into account his passing ability.

Plus, even if Turner gets relegated to the perimeter more often, they've certainly never had someone who can do all of that at the four, while also defending ball-screens like this at the five, nudging the opposing big to actually set the screen before engaging in a late-switch and  swallowing up both the initial attack and the re-attack from the ball-handler. 

Again, this is a 10-win Hornets team. It won't always go this swimmingly, and it hasn't. Siakam's teammates haven't always executed the whole "get Siakam the ball" thing to this extent, including in critical end-of-game situations. Moreover, it was less than a week ago that Turner finished the game against the Knicks on the bench, with Siakam unable to finish as finisher while being defended by old teammate, Precious Achiuwa. That said, by the numbers, he's averaging fewer post-ups (2.0) than Sabonis did through those first 17 games (3.5), but that's in part because Siakam's game, from putting in early work to dribbling into mismatches, so often blurs the lines between what gets catalogued as a post-up, drive, or isolation -- which also reflects the shift in the willingness of the team to tap into these type of amoeba-like back-to-the-basket plays as well as the shift in how the player who is playing with his back to basket arrives more organically to those plays. 

All of which is to say that, as far as this being the first win with Tyrese Haliburton available amid yet another starting lineup change, Turner bumping into his teammate no longer seems like the symbolic beginning of what was once an end. Instead, depending upon how the change to the starting lineup fares, with Andrew Nembhard relieving some of the pressure on Aaron Nesmith at the point of attack, perhaps this latest run-in between the four and the five, with them running and moving both inside and out while organizing in response to each other, will eventually mark the end of what has been this quasi-beginning, when Haliburton is finally able to play fully as himself in combination with Turner and, more pressingly, the team's second star in Siakam. Or, in looking ahead, the start of the actual start.