Indiana Pacers: 5 bold predictions for 2017-18 NBA season
2. Bojan Bogdanovic will lose his job to Glenn Robinson III
The Pacers looked at their roster this summer and decided they needed (among other things) a new starting small forward and at least one additional shooter.
Indiana checked both of those boxes by signing former Brooklyn Nets and Washington Wizards forward Bojan Bogdanovic to a two-year, $21 million deal in July.
Nate McMillan has already indicated that Bogdanovic will be the starting small forward when training camp opens, but he’ll have to produce to keep his spot in the lineup.
McMillan on Bogdanovic: "We needed a shooter, and he fills a need and fits our timeline. Just 28 years old and has a lot of potential." pic.twitter.com/TnmL9r2Yn5
— Indiana Pacers (@Pacers) July 11, 2017
Bogdanovic has the reputation of being a deadly 3-point shooter, but his identical 2016-17 and career percentages from behind the arc (37 percent) indicate that he is no more than slightly above-average in this category.
The real eye-opening fact about Bogdanovic is that he is also known as a very poor defensive player, and that theory is confirmed by ESPN‘s Defensive Real Plus-Minus metric, which rated Bogdanovic as the third-worst defender in the NBA last season.
Inconsistent shooting and porous defense will cause Bojan Bogdanovic to lose his job to Glenn Robinson III, who is a much better defender and surprisingly has better 3-point shooting numbers than Bogdanovic as well.