Pacers News: Rival Exec Calls Out Tyrese Haliburton For Slow Start

Haliburton and the Pacers have had a disappointing start to the season.

Stephen Lew-Imagn Images

The Indiana Pacers have surprisingly started the 2024 NBA season just 2-4, losing four of their last five games. Coming off a resurgent 2023-24 season in which the Pacers went to the Eastern Conference Finals, they have failed to see the same success early on in 2024.

A major reason for their early season slump has been the slow start of star point guard Tyrese Haliburton, who has not looked like the same player through the first six games of the season. Haliburton broke out over the last two seasons, becoming one of the faces of the NBA as he led the league in assists per game.

To start this season, Haliburton is averaging 14.0 points, 4.5 rebounds, and 7.3 assists per game. None of these numbers are awful, but they are a step down from Haliburton's averages over the last two seasons. His rough start was summed up by one of the worst outings of his career against the New York Knicks when Haliburton failed to score a single point.

One NBA executive believes that Haliburton is lacking the "pop" he played with for the majority of last season,

"Last year, he'd pull up from just inside half court and bury shots. He just isn't playing with that same pop this year," the executive said, via Tim Bontemps and Brian Windhorst of ESPN.

Per Windhorst, Haliburton thrived last season when he was one of the 10 fastest players in the NBA. Haliburton is moving half a mile per hour slower at the start of this season.

Haliburton did deal with injuries to his leg and hamstring this year, including toward the end of his run with Team USA during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. It's unclear if this has impacted Haliburton's movement and performance to start this season.

Of course, there is still plenty of time for Haliburton and the Pacers to turn their performance around this season. They did show life in a 135-132 win over the Boston Celtics, the defending NBA champions, but have yet to win back-to-back games this season after they dropped their next game to the New Orleans Pelicans.

Haliburton and the Pacers play next when they take on the Dallas Mavericks on Monday.

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