Aaron Nesmith discusses the Pacers’ progress in preseason
Aaron Nesmith averaged 11.0 points per game on 61.1% shooting including 63.6% 3-point shooting in preseason play.
INDIANAPOLIS — The Pacers have signed forward Aaron Nesmith to a two-year, $40.4 million contract extension which will keep him under contract through the 2028-29 season, a league source confirmed to IndyStar on Monday night just a few hours before the deadline to complete the extension. The deal also includes a trade kicker, which would trade him a bonus if he is traded to another team.
The extension is on to a deal that pays Nesmith $33 million over three years. He is in the second year of that deal so the extension that will average $20.2 million per year will kick in in 2027-28. This is the most lucrative extension Nesmith could sign over a two-year deal, but it is still a team-friendly deal considering his production as a starter and one of the Pacers‘ most important role players.
Nesmith missed 35 games last season with an ankle sprain, but he averaged 12.0 points and 4.0 rebounds per game and shot 50.7% from the floor, 43.1% from 3-point range and 91.3% from the foul line. He was sensational in the postseason averaging 12.7 points per game on 47.2% shooting, including 49.2% from 3-point range. His 60 3-pointers were the most of any player in the playoffs and he scored 30 points on 8-of-9 3-point shooting in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals against the Knicks to key the Pacers’ remarkable comeback win.
Nesmith was drafted by the Celtics out of Vanderbilt with the No. 14 pick in the 2020 draft and had a hard time earning playing time in Boston behind All-NBA wings Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. However, the Pacers acquired him in the summer of 2022 in a trade that sent Malcolm Brogdon to Boston.
Since then, he’s averaging 11.3 points per game for the Pacers and shooting 40.2% from 3-point range and he’s established himself as one of the Pacers’ best and most versatile defenders. He’s started 144 of his 190 games with the Pacers and he will enter the 2025-26 season as the team’s starting small forward.
The Pacers signed Nesmith’s extension on the same day the deadline passed for the Pacers to extend Bennedict Mathurin another one of their key wings. Nesmith beat Mathurin out for the starting job at small forward last season after Mathurin started during his absence for injury. This season with All-Star point guard Tyrese Haliburton out for the season with an Achilles tendon tear, Mathurin and Nesmith will start next to each other with Mathurin at shooting guard as Andrew Nembhard moves from shooting guard to point guard.
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