Lakers Trade Rumors: Pacers aren’t taking offers for Paul George yet

Whether the Los Angeles Lakers ultimately make a deal or not, everyone who has even tangentially been keeping up with NBA news knows they’ll be heavily involved in rumors about potentially trading for Paul George this off-season.

But while the Indiana Pacers star has reportedly made it clear around the league that he wants to go home to Los Angeles — potentially cooling teams’ trade interest — even teams that would want to take a gamble they could convince George to stay if they traded for him sound like they’re being rebuffed anyway.

According to Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report, “the Pacers have not yet solicited offers [or] trade talks for Paul George.” That would presumably include the Lakers, who are reportedly “confident” they can sign George in the summer of 2018 whether or not Indiana deals him elsewhere.

All that said, very, very few NBA players are truly “untouchable” if the right trade comes along. The Pacers very well may have zero interest in trading George, or they could just be trying to drive up their own leverage. We can’t know for sure which it is, and all that means is we’re likely in for a long summer — and possibly season — of George being speculated about and photoshopped into purple and gold.

Harrison Faigen is co-host of the Locked on Lakers podcast (subscribe here), and you can follow him on Twitter at @hmfaigen.