Basketball, She Wrote

Obi Toppin is perfectly additive

Added 2025-04-11 13:00:25 +0000 UTC

The written work at Basketball, She Wrote is typically paywalled. This article from monthly contributor Samson Folk, on how Obi Toppin tops off the Pacers, is available as a free trial. If you're new here and want to support independent writing about actual basketball, please consider subscribing and/or sharing it around. Alright, on to his words about the Pacers.

By: Samson Folk I @samfolkk

While Pascal Siakam canned the late triple over the Sacramento Kings to put them up 103-98, Obi Toppin stood in the corner to provide spacing, and pushed toward the basket for an offensive rebound that never came. Timeout called, Kings reeling, Toppin joins Siakam to dance together and celebrate the bucket. Why? Because Toppin is the bellwether of hot girl basketball, and he is often involved in anything good that’s happening when the Pacers are pouring it in. He is as limitless bounding around the court as a gazelle would be, and that ease of movement and explosiveness allows him to be the punch at the end of great creation.

As a Pacer, as a cog in Tyrese Haliburton’s Offense of Elite Decision Making™, Toppin is ranked in the 99th-percentile of forwards in effective field goal percentage this season, after he was 90th percentile among bigs last season. Cleaning the Glass has Toppin shooting a whopping 79-percent at the rim. You watch the Nuggets cheat to overload the side of the Haliburton/Turner pick n’ roll – they send Michael Porter Jr. as the low man, using four to guard three – and the ball goes to Andrew Nembhard on the wing, who throws the ball around the rim and Toppin simply plucks it out of the air for a layup. Michael Porter Jr. the low man, Aaron Gordon tracking back towards Toppin (leaving Aaron Nesmith wide open for three) but Toppin is uniquely springy, bouncy, energetic – whatever descriptor you want – and it’s a bucket.

Note: my computer keeps trying to autocorrect Toppin to Topping, which is funny because he is so often the final add to a possession. He is the finisher.

The Pacers are 9-2 this season when Toppin scores more than 16 points in a game. Last season? 8-2. Oftentimes these kinds of plucked stats can lack any value at all, but I do think it’s worth pointing out largely because Toppin never commands the offense to bend to him. He is, to my eye, almost perfectly additive on offense. As long as you don’t ask him to do too much. As long as you allow him to work off of good players, he’s going to provide so much in terms of play finishing.

Siakam buries Desmond Bane in the paint and calls for the ball, Haliburton finds him, and Toppin’s check (Santi Aldama) floats over to double. Toppin sprints straight toward the rim, collects the pass, and gathers when Aldama makes the dig. After an early pickup, a lot of players have to decide whether they stretch for the layup or hit a touch shot, but Toppin simply organizes himself in air and stretches - for a reverse dunk. A piece of cake. Run at the rim and dunk it.

Siakam has Tristan Da Silva on the block, Ben Sheppard wants to clear out of the side so he points at Toppin to set a flare screen for him, only Topping ghosts it and cuts directly underneath Siakam who drops it off to him for a layup.

Haliburton gets a step up screen from Myles Turner and re-routes downhill when Derrick Jones Jr. weaks him. Haliburton gets stuck with a dead dribble in the middle of the paint. Toppin simply lifts out of the corner, takes the shovel pass from Haliburton and turns the corner with one gather dribble before punching a prime LeBron James cock-back transition dunk, in the half court, with his weak hand. Haliburton expectantly skips with Toppin as he watches him rise, and then his hands rise in disbelief. Madness.

Toppin is above the 85th-percentile (for synergy) in transition, as a cutter, as a roll man, out of post ups, off of screens (very small sample), and even as a pick n’ roll ball handler because when he and Haliburton run the inverted pick-and-roll, teams freak the hell out about where Haliburton is, and award Toppin the lane after he turns the corner. The post ups? They aren’t laborious and overextended attempts at getting someone a touch, they are aggressive flashes to the paint against weak defenders, and Toppin is making a killing.

I cover a team, the Toronto Raptors, that takes valuable shots and makes very few of them. From my last piece: “So, how does a team that is bottom 6 in catch-and-shoot jumper efficiency, dead last in pull-up jumper efficiency, third worst at the rim (all per synergy), even begin to think about being good?”. I have an almost religious appreciation for Toppin’s ability to make shots, and demand so little of the ball while doing it. Yes, the Pacers create good looks, but Toppin’s ability to convert those amazes me, and he converts mediocre looks and hard ones as well.

As the playoffs creep closer, and the Pacers continue to profile as an adaptable giant killer, Toppin’s hyper-efficient finishing and ability to punish soft spots in defenses looms large for his team. Teams will play aggressive schemes, they will overload, and they’ll expect to overwhelm the stars. However, they’ll often forget about the 4th or 5th man on the floor, and that’s where Topping will continue to elevate everything.

And if he’s not doing that? Chances are the Pacers are struggling mightily to create their comfortable looks. Maybe they’ll rely more on Siakam as a post-up hub – last playoffs the Siakam post up was the most efficient play – maybe they’ll need audacious jump shooting from Haliburton. Those things are Pacer basketball, but not Hot Girl Basketball. Because, Hot Girl Basketball has to include Toppin.

Have a blessed day.