The Los Angeles Lakers traded away D'Angelo Russell to the Brooklyn Nets to dump the salary of Timofey Mozgov.

Jonathan Givony suggested the Indiana Pacers may have made a mistake in not taking a chance on the upside of Russell as they discuss a Paul George trade with the Lakers.

"The Pacers have not shown much enthusiasm for the Lakers' young guys," said Adrian Wojnarowski. "I think they think they can get better. The market is interesting on George. There's a lot of action with him. There's a lot of teams trying to get involved. I think Kevin Pritchard has done a pretty good job of working to manufacture a market for him after Sunday when it felt like teams were (expecting the Pacers) to get a mid to late first and maybe an okay expiring contract. They're going to get more than that.

"I think there's a few teams who think maybe we can flip him over the course of the year. If he gets traded to a good team and they think can win. If the  team achieves in some of the bigger markets, even some of the midsize markets, they're willing to take a flier on Paul George.

"The Pacers aren't dying to help the Lakers here. They're not trying to do right by Paul George and give him what he wants, which is a move to L.A. They're going to take what they think is the best deal out there for them and move him, and if that turned out to be the Lakers, they would do it.

"The Lakers are walking a line of 'we don't want to give up too much because we know we can get him in free agency next summer, but we need to be involved and try to do it now because you never know what will happen.'"

According to Nate Taylor of the Indy Star, the Pacers have also held trade talks with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Houston Rockets. The Los Angeles Clippers and Washington Wizards have also expressed interest.