INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA – NOVEMBER 24: Daniss Jenkins #24 of the Detroit Pistons dribbles the ball while being guarded by Garrison Mathews #24 of the Indiana Pacers in the second quarter at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on November 24, 2025 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Dylan Buell/Getty Images)
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INDIANAPOLIS – The Indiana Pacers have been among the most injured teams in the NBA this season. Per Spotrac injury tracking, they’ve had the second-most players miss time due to injury this year (only the Chicago Bulls have had more players miss time) and have lost the most cumulative salary so far this season – they’ve paid nearly $22 million to players out for game action already.
To this point, the Pacers have done what they can to combat those injuries. On the court, they’ve tried to rely on their play style and have attempted to be creative with lineups when possible. The sheer number of injuries have made some of those measures ineffective, though, and the Pacers are 6-18 so far this season.
Off the court, the team has signed multiple players to keep up with their health reality. Hardly a week into their season, the Pacers waived James Wiseman and acquired Mac McClung as they needed a healthy guard more than they needed center depth. That was just the start of a string of moves Indiana has made to field a healthy roster.
At one point or another, 13 different players have missed time for the Pacers this year. Many of them have been simultaneous, and it’s led to change after change. The blue and gold have already started 16 different lineups and fielded 22 different players despite their season being just seven weeks young.
To make all of those lineup shifts and active players into a cohesive team, the Pacers front office has been busy. They’ve signed McClung, Jeremiah Robinson-Earl, Cody Martin, Monte Morris, Garrison Mathews, and Ethan Thompson to contracts since the regular season started – and that doesn’t even count moves made during training camp. James Wiseman and RayJ Dennis were waived to facilitate all of these transactions. Someone new is playing every four games, on average, for the Pacers this year.
“We’re messing up plays sometimes because of people not knowing stuff,” Pacers point guard Andrew Nembhard said. “It’s hard. You got signed two or three days ago, now you’ve got to play in the game. We’re figuring out how to play with guys, their tendencies, their feel (for the game), [and] what we’re trying to do as a team. It’s a tough situation.”
Having new talent coming in and out has been a necessity. McClung joined when the Pacers needed a guard – all of Tyrese Haliburton, T.J. McConnell, Nembhard, Taelon Peter, Bennedict Mathurin, and Kam Jones were injured at the time. Morris came on board when they needed a point guard, specifically. Robinson-Earl, Martin, and Mathews all originally signed with the team via hardship contracts, and Robinson-Earl later signed a standard contract. He actually took Morris’ spot – by that point, McConnell, Mathurin, and Nembhard had healed but Obi Toppin, Johnny Furphy, Quenton Jackson, and Aaron Nesmith all were sidelined.
It’s always been something for the Pacers this year, and all of their transactions made sense at the time they took place. The decision makers in Indiana have done what they can to salvage a difficult situation, but it took a while for the team to find a groove. Indiana started 2-16 and has now won four of their last six games.
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA – NOV 9: Cody Martin of Pacers warms up before the NBA game 5 between Indiana Pacers and Golden State Warriors at Chase Center on November 9, 2025 in San Francisco, California, United States. (Photo by Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images)
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How have the Pacers injuries impacted their salary cap outlook?
The other hurdle the Pacers have faced in signing all of these players comes from the salary cap. Hardship players carry a cap hit, and multiple signings and waivers have caused a few minimum-salary cap hits to either rise or overlap in a way that has slightly eaten into the Pacers flexibility.
Indiana was about $6 million dollars shy of the NBA’s luxury tax line when the season started. Since then, that distance has gotten smaller. Their first move was the most damaging in this way – waiving Wiseman early in the campaign came at a cost. The young center had $1 million of his contract guaranteed for the ongoing season, but he had only been on the team for 11 days by the time he cleared waivers. His prorated minimum salary would have come with a cap hit of about $168k for the 11-day period, but instead his number on the Pacers books for the rest of the regular season is that aforementioned $1 million. The team will pay out the other $831k and get no production for it.
McClung, Morris, and Robinson-Earl (in order) have filled Wiseman’s roster spot during the season. All three players were on a minimum salary agreement of varying values, and they also had overlapping cap hits for a few days while the player previously occupying their roster spot cleared waivers, which takes 48 hours. McClung’s cap hit on the Pacers’ books is $178k while Morris holds a spot for $224k. Robinson-Earl is still under contract.
Then there’s the hardship contracts. The Pacers have signed five 10-day hardship deals this season spread out among three players. Each of those 10-day pacts comes with a cap change of about $132k. Five of them combined put about $660k into the salary mix for the Pacers.
Individually, none of the moves that the Pacers made to battle injuries were expensive. Altogether, they’ve started to add up. Between the Wiseman waiver, hardship contracts, and minimum-salary juggling, the Pacers have added more than $1.5 million to their salary books already this season. They’re now just under $4.5 million shy of the luxury tax line and $12 million under the first salary cap apron, which is a hard cap for the team this year.
For a team that has big salary cap exceptions available (via their unused Non Taxpayer Mid-Level Exception and their Disabled Player Exception for Haliburton), every dollar counts. The Pacers needed to use some of their flexibility to field a balanced team early in the season while they dealt with injuries. But those moves put the team closer to various spending thresholds and will be a factor in what they do going forward.
