Pacers’ TJ McConnell gets $45 million contract extension after stellar performance last season
Indiana Pacers guard TJ McConnell has agreed to a four-year, $45 million contract extension, his agents Mark Bartelstein and Andy Shiffman told Adrian Wojnarowski.
The 32-year-old McConnell was one of the league’s best reserves last season and put on a stellar performance late in the season. Over his last 31 games (since Feb. 6), he is averaging 24.6 points, 5.1 rebounds and 10.1 assists per 36 minutes and shooting 58.2% from the field (in 19.4 minutes per game).
During the Pacers’ playoff run to the Eastern Conference Finals, McConnell performed consistently well: he had 20 points, nine assists and four steals on 7-9 shooting in Indiana’s series-deciding Game 6 win against the Milwaukee Bucks in the first round, recorded two double-doubles against the New York Knicks in the second round, and had 23 points, nine rebounds and six assists in Game 3 of the Conference Finals against the Boston Celtics.
It wasn’t written in stone that McConnell would have a bigger role during the 2023-24 season, nor that the franchise would sign him to a long-term contract next offseason. Before the Pacers’ regular-season opener last October, coach Rick Carlisle told McConnell he wouldn’t be in the rotation. According to the Indianapolis Star, the coach later told reporters that Carlisle was “almost crying” at the time, calling it “one of the toughest conversations I’ve ever had with a player.”
McConnell is kind of an anomaly in today’s NBA. He’s a 6-foot-1 guard who rarely shoots 3-pointers — over his past two seasons, he’s made 44 of 103 shots from deep; per minute, Jonas Valanciunas has attempted 3s more often — and makes up for his lack of size by being a bigger pest defensively. McConnell brings the same kind of speed as Indiana, and his pick-and-roll game works because he’s an excellent passer and a threat to make a pull-up 2 or finish in the paint. McConnell has shot 50% or better from the midrange in three of the past four seasons, according to Cleaning the Glass, and he shot a career-high 69% at the rim last season.
After going undrafted in 2015, McConnell spent the first four seasons of his career with the Philadelphia 76ers. He signed a two-year deal with the Pacers in 2019 and re-signed for four years in 2021. The extension will keep him under contract until the 2028-29 season, at which time he will be 37 years old.
