Big Bet and Redemption: The intertwined moment of the Pacers and Thunder!

When talking about the NBA Finals in the 2024-25 season, Paul George is inevitably mentioned.

Looking back at the beginning of the story, Paul George told the Pacers in advance that he would not execute the player option to stay in the team after the end of the 2017-18 season, and then the Pacers started the trade in the summer of 2017. However, the trading target was not the Lakers, who had been rumored to have a scandal with George at that time, but the Thunder.

Then, in the summer of 2019, in order to recruit Leonard, the Clippers chose to use all resources in exchange for George to join.

Both the Pacers and the Thunder, the team entered a period of lows after George left, but it was also growing steadily. The Pacers changed the chips they got after trading George and led the Pacers to create miracles and enter the finals. As for the Thunder, they won Alexander, Gallinari and seven draft picks.

Alexander eventually grew into the NBA Finals MVP for the 2024-25 season, and one of the seven draft picks won by the Thunder became Jaylen Williams in the 2022 draft. The rise of the Pacers and the Thunder and their encounter on the finals stage made these two deals related to George that year particularly ironic, especially when George and Leonard did not perform as expected in the Clippers. In the end, George joined the Philadelphia 76ers after jumping out of the contract last summer and becoming a free agent.

Looking back on the past, it has now been settled and become a part of history. Every player in this deal finally found his or her own belonging, and from the perspective of the fans, he or she can also re-examine the faces that have been ignored or missed from these fate trajectories.

Thunder sent Oladipo and Sa Sakus in order to get George. From the time of the time, this was already the best operation the Pacers could do now, especially after George was eliminated by the Cavaliers in the first round of the 2016-17 playoffs, he directly expressed his intention to leave the team and join the Lakers through his agent. The Pacers spent 12 days finding a deal, but it was not the Lakers that George expected. After the transaction was completed, many people gave extremely bad comments on the Pacers' operations, but the Pacers overall still have enough confidence in the team's future direction.

Oladipo and Sao have been with the Pacers for almost five seasons and have also grown into All-Stars here, but the Pacers have only advanced to the playoffs twice during this period. Later, the Pacers changed their head coach and Carlisle entered Indiana, and the Pacers ushered in a new beginning of a dynasty change.

There was then in a four-team deal with Harden as the core chip, and Oladipo was traded to the Rockets, and they won Leville and two second-round picks. A second-round pick in this deal later became the 32nd pick in the 2023 draft. The Pacers added this pick to the 29th pick in the same year to trade with the Thunder in exchange for the 2024 first-round pick.

However, the Pacers did not use this 2024 first-round draft pick, because in the mid-2023-24 season, in the three-party transactions involving the Raptors and the Pelicans, the Pacers sent out two first-round drafts, including this draft pick, in exchange for the frontcourt core Siakam.

With Oladipo leaving, no surprise, Sa, together with Justin Holiday, Lamb and a 2023 second round pick, was traded to the Kings by the Pacers, getting the young defender core Halliburton, and two soon-to-play players, Hilde and Tristan Thompson.

As for Leville, the Pacers traded him to the Cavaliers for Rubio, with the addition of the 2022 second-round draft pick, the 2023 first-round draft pick, and the 2027 second-round draft pick. In 2022, the Pacers chose Nembhard in the 31st pick in the second round; in the first round of 2023, Shepard was selected. These pick chips that seemed to be pieced together to complete the deal later turned into key puzzles for the Pacers to rush into the finals.

Summary, in the Pacers' lineup last season, Halliburton, Siakam, Nembhard, Shepard, and Johnny Ferge (later the Pacers got it after trading Hield to go to the 76ers) were all fragments of the trade between George and the Thunder that year. Years later, these fragments played team-first basketball in Indiana, and in the end they were only a little bit able to beat the Bei Thunder to win the championship.

Pacers not only brought a wonderful seven finals, but also the tenacious momentum that can always fight to the last moment no matter what situation they are in. Now it seems that this indomitable spirit was deeply engraved in the soul of this team many years ago when they were forced to trade the core players.

Even if you lose your core combat power and sink, you can still find new directions and hopes. This is the tenacious force that Pacers have worked tirelessly.

Time comes in the summer of 2019. Alexander, who is preparing for the second season of his career, was traded by the Clippers to the Thunder. The Clippers sent Alexander and Garlinari, with five first-round picks and two swapped first-round draft picks for George, and then successfully recruited Leonard.

Clippers got their ideal championship combination, and the Thunder received the chip returns they expected when they came to George from the Pacers' trade, especially when George and the Pacers had only one year left at that time.

From the Thunder's perspective, Presti made a key decision that influenced the team's future. Although it is a small city team and is likely to face the situation where George left the team after only one year of playing, Presti still took decisive action. Later, George and the Thunder signed a four-year contract of 137 million, but the Thunder still stopped in the first round of the playoffs during George's playoffs. When George proposed the idea of leaving the team, Presti once again cut the mess, and took advantage of the situation to send him to the Clippers, which also exchanged a lot of rebuilding chips for the Thunder..

But in the end, Alexander was the one who was willing to make the decision.

Compared to when the Pacers traded George, this time the Thunder had more negotiating capital in trading George, because Leonard actively recruited George to play with the Clippers, and if the Clippers wanted to get Leonard, they had to bring George to the Clippers first. Among the five first-round draft picks obtained by the Thunder, the ones that have been fulfilled are Treman in 2021, Jewish in 2022, Daren Jones in 2024 and Thomas Sauber this year. As for the draft pick exchange with the Clippers in 2025, the Thunder traded it to the Kings at the 24th pick in exchange for the first round of the Spurs in 2027. In addition to not choosing to swap draft picks with the Clippers in 2023, among the remaining chips, the Clippers' first-round draft picks in 2026 are still among the remaining chips.

Treman played in the Thunder for more than two years, and later, with Bertans and Micic, plus the second round picks and some cash in 2024 and 2025, he was traded to the Hornets for Hayward. Then the Thunder traded Daren Jones with the 2029 second round draft pick to the Wizards for Colby Jones, and later chose to lay off.

The most important thing in the entire George deal was Alexander and Jewish, who quickly grew into All-Stars and were the absolute core of the Thunder's championship last season. Among them, Alexander won the regular season MVP and the finals MVP in the sixth year after leaving the Clippers.

Looking back now, with the help of George's trade and subsequent training, the Thunder completed the cornerstone combination of the championship; and ironically, during the time of George's playing for George, the highest achievement was only to reach the Western Conference Finals in the 2020-21 season. What's more, George also broke out of the contract last summer and signed a four-year, 212 million contract with the 76ers, ending his Clippers chapter.

Now, Alexander, Jewish and Chet have successfully renewed their contract with the Thunder. With the young three giants as the core, the Thunder's domination of the league has just begun. As for the Pacers involved in George's other side, Halliburton and Siakam are still at the core position and the future is still worth looking forward to.

But in the future, fans will inevitably discuss the impact of the George deal on these two teams. Whether it is the Pacers or the Thunder, George's deal seems to have caused them to lose their star, but unexpectedly opens a path of reconstruction full of infinite possibilities.

It’s just that we cannot ignore the value behind these trading, as well as the vision of the two teams in selecting players and cultivating young newcomers, giving the head coach and potential new stars enough patience, and finally gradually completing the era alternation after the transaction, and playing on the finals stage with a new young lineup.

Looking at the history of the NBA, there are many big deals involving core players, and there is also a bet trading of a superstar for the draft pick assets in the next few years. However, for the Pacers and the Thunder, what these two teams convey is a relatively safe and stable team building model.

The road to the top of a team is not only a superposition of countless transactions, but also a simple accumulation of players' strength. Behind this, there is also a wider and more profound layout wisdom.

When we look back on this history after many years, we no longer see who wins or loses, but how the two teams found their own path of transformation through an earth-shaking transaction and jointly wrote the most exciting story in NBA history.