Pacers president apologizes as Draft Lottery gambit backfires, but he has nothing to be sorry about

Kevin Pritchard said sorry to Pacers fans for 'taking this risk' after Indy lost its draft pick to the Clippers on Sunday

Sam Quinn

May 10, 2026

8:32 pm ET

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6 min read

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The NBA Draft Lottery is ultimately a game of chance, and the Indiana Pacers entered the proceedings with reasonably strong odds. They had a 52.1% chance of walking away with a top-four pick in the 2026 NBA Draft. The remaining 47.9%, their odds of landing at No. 5 or No. 6, meant sending their pick to the Clippers thanks to their February trade for Ivica Zubac.

That's ultimately how Sunday played out. The Pacers missed out on the top four, meaning their No. 5 overall pick went to Los Angeles. Rarely will a team directly acknowledge the negative consequences of their decisions, but after Sunday's lottery drawing, Pacers president of basketball operations Kevin Pritchard did just that by apologizing for the risk he took in dealing the pick.

"I'm really sorry to all our fans," Pritchard wrote on Twitter. "I own taking this risk. Surprised it came up 5th after this year. I thought we were due some luck. But please remember - this team deserved a starting center to compete with the best teams next year. We have always been resilient."

It was an admirable display of accountability from a top basketball executive. It was also, frankly, unnecessary. The Pacers took a calculated risk. Just because that risk backfired doesn't mean it was the wrong decision.

The Pacers lost Myles Turner to free agency last offseason. Right now, the NBA is experiencing a bit of a supply-side crisis at the center position. We're in the middle of an offensive rebounding boom, and with many of the NBA's best teams like the Thunder and Spurs loading up in the front court, other teams have needed to follow in their footsteps. The days of Golden State's shooting rendering centers helpless are long gone. You need size to compete in the modern NBA. There are far fewer desirable centers than there are teams that need them.

A number of big-name centers moved at this year's deadline. All of them presented some meaningful flaw that made them unpalatable to Indiana, specifically. The Pacers are paying Tyrese Haliburton and Pascal Siakam max contracts. Therefore, adding a third max contract like Anthony Davis or Jaren Jackson Jr. just wouldn't have made sense for them financially in the apron era. Davis and Kristaps Porziņģis were simply too injury-prone to bet on. The next tier of available centers down, like Daniel Gafford, would have represented a meaningful downgrade on Turner. The Pacers reached Game 7 of the Finals in 2025. They weren't looking for a compromise candidate.

Zubac checks virtually every box they were looking for besides matching Turner's 3-point shooting. He was an All-Defense selection in 2025, an elite screener and rebounder that also passes and finishes at a high level who will change the way the Pacers function in the half-court offensively, and perhaps most importantly, he's cheap. He'll earn around $42 million over the next two seasons, allowing Indiana to acquire him without giving up any other core players.

The Clippers weren't going to move him for pocket change. He's only 29. They could have simply kept him and built around him moving forward. They needed a high-upside asset to even consider a deal. The Pacers conveniently had one in their 2025 pick. The protection they conceived made handing over the pick essentially a 50-50 proposition, but the true rationale behind it was a bit more complicated.

The gap between No. 4 and No. 5 in this, specific draft was enormous. There are four prospects -- AJ Dybantsa, Dylan Peterson, Cameron Boozer and Caleb Wilson -- who are widely treated as future stars. Each of them are so valuable that Indiana would have been crazy to sacrifice the chance to draft one. That player could have become Tyrese Haliburton's long-term co-star.

NBA Mock Draft: Fits for all 30 picks with 2026 lottery set; Dybantsa No. 1 to Wizards, Peterson No. 2 to Jazz

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But for the Pacers, specifically, there was a cliff at No. 5. The next batch of prospects -- Darius Acuff, Keaton Wagler, Mikel Brown Jr., Kingston Flemings and Brayden Burries -- are all guards, and they're not such obvious stars like Peterson that fit is no longer a consideration. Indiana already has Haliburton, Andrew Nembhard and T.J. McConnell in its back court.

Considering how demanding Rick Carlisle is of his guards, it's not clear what sort of role any of those prospects would have played for Indiana. After all, the Pacers had a very similar pick in the 2022 NBA Draft, No. 6, and they spent it on a scoring guard in Bennedict Mathurin. He wasn't even a starter by Indiana's 2025 Finals run. Of course, the Pacers would rather have had the No. 5 pick than not. This year's prospects may wind up better than Mathurin. B