Isaiah Jackson's hot week opens up opportunity in second half of season

Isaiah Jackson is playing the best basketball of his rookie season for the Indiana Pacers over the last 11 days. An infrequent contributor through much of the first half of the 2021-22 season, a window of playing time finally opened up when both of Indiana’s big men went down with injuries.

Indy’s starting center Myles Turner has missed two weeks with a stress reaction in his foot while starting power forward Domantas Sabonis returned from an ankle injury for one game before heading out of the lineup and into COVID-19 health and safety protocols.

The absences forced Coach Rick Carlisle to insert Isaiah Jackson into the lineup, and he’s excelling for the depleted Pacers. Over his last six games, Jackson is averaging 13.7 points, 5.7 rebounds, 1.0 steal and 1.7 blocks per game. Behind Caris LeVert, the former Kentucky Wildcat is Indiana’s second-leading scorer over that span. He’s also playing 19.2 minutes a game after not hitting 19 in any of the Pacers’ first 40 games.

Jackson has popped with scoring outputs of 15, 17, 12 and 26 last night (which Kassidy Stumbo covered into Tuesday’s BBNBA recap) — shooting the ball at a 55.4% clip from the field while even knocking down three of his seven three-point attempts (for reference, he went 0-2 from deep during his 2020-21 campaign with the ‘Cats). He’s no Myles Turner when it comes to shooting like a guard in a center’s frame, but the willingness to take threes and the mere ability to make a few does help spread the court. Jackson is a much more valuable piece going forward if he continues to develop from deep.

Shooting isn’t the main reason for his recent success. Jackson is a tremendous athlete above all else. He can jump like a pogo-stick, which is a cliche, but I don’t mean in how high he can jump, but how quickly he can jump a second and third time. Whether when contesting shots near the rim or battling for putbacks. He also runs the floor with the pace of a point guard, making him a lob threat in offensive transition and a mistake-eraser the other way.

My lord, Isaiah Jackson pic.twitter.com/0zDGP1RLAN

— Matt Brooks (@MattBrooksNBA) January 24, 2022

Jackson’s increase in playing time is in large part due to the injuries to Turner and Sabonis. But the rest of the roster is falling apart too. Typical starters TJ Warren and Malcolm Brogdon missed extended time this season. Warren hasn’t played in over a year. Brogdon has no expectation for a near return with an Achilles issue.

Recently, Indiana is rolling out lineups comprised mostly of journeymen veterans and young guys. This is the list of Pacers averaging more than 15 minutes per game since Brodgon and Sabonis went down:

Caris LeVert, Isaiah Jackson, Lance Stephenson, Torrey Craig, Oshae Brissett, Jeremy Lamb, Duane Washington, Chris Duarte, Goga Bitadze and Justin Holiday.

No wonder they’re one spot ahead of the Pistons and 13th in the East. 52 games into the season, Indiana is six back from Atlanta for the final play-in spot. Not worth competing for a playoff spot given the injury circumstances and the pitiful record so far.

So you’d think Indiana would decide to retract expectations, possibly trade Turner, LeVert or Sabonis to contenders ahead of the trade deadline, and tank while giving 2021 first-round picks Isaiah Jackson and Chris Duarte room to grow.

Indiana is stingy to commit to losing. So am I. I can’t stand what Oklahoma City is doing to Shai Gilgeous Alexander’s career. However, in this case, it would be silly to try and compete for the playoffs given the deficit in the standings and the absurd number of injuries.

Which, of course, would mean a continued heavy minutes load for Isaiah Jackson. That’s all we’re really hoping for.