Pacers, Tyrese Haliburton, Magic, Hawks, N’Faly Dante

Pacers

Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton gave a small but encouraging update on his recovery from a torn Achilles tendon, the injury he suffered in Game 7 of the NBA Finals.

“I’m walking now in my boot,” Haliburton told reporters, via Field Level Media. “Getting closer to walking full time in my shoe. So, that’s exciting for me. It’s kind of like a new benchmark, a new achievement for me. Just being able to walk, it’s like the small wins right now. Just taking it a day at a time. I have good days, bad days.”

The two-time All-Star has already been ruled out for the entire 2025-26 season, and he admitted the process requires patience.

“I obviously want to be good tomorrow but I know it takes time,” Haliburton said. “The team has already ruled me out for the year, so I’m in no rush. It’s just about getting 100 percent, not necessarily as fast as I can, but getting 100 percent is important. I don’t want to come back and be 85, 90 percent. I want to be able to come back at 100.”

Haliburton, 25, isn’t going through the grind alone. He said he’s been leaning on Indiana Fever guard Caitlin Clark, who has been sidelined with a groin injury and has dealt with soft-tissue issues throughout her rookie season.

“It sucks that she’s been hurt for as long as she has,” Haliburton said. “But just for us to be able to communicate even in our recovery, we lift at the same time, so it’s just us two in the weight room. We spend a lot of time together. It’s good to have each other to lean on in a time like right now.”

For now, Haliburton is chasing small wins. The Pacers, meanwhile, are left to imagine what next season could have looked like if their floor leader were still running the show.

Magic

The Magic are bringing in free agent center Colin Castleton on an Exhibit 10 contract, according to the league’s official transaction log.

For Castleton, it’s another stop in what has already been a winding NBA journey. The 25-year-old Florida native went undrafted in 2023 after finishing his college career at UF and spent his rookie year on a two-way with the Lakers.

From there it was a quick run through Memphis, Toronto and Philadelphia, plus several G League stints, before landing back in Florida.

Castleton’s Exhibit 10 deal with Orlando is non-guaranteed, per Jason Beede of The Orlando Sentinel. The structure means he could earn up to an $85,000 bonus if waived and then spends time with the Magic’s G League affiliate in Osceola.

Last season, Castleton appeared in 26 total NBA games split between the Grizzlies, Raptors and Sixers, averaging 4.7 points and 4.7 rebounds in 16.6 minutes per night. Toronto signed him to a standard two-year deal on the final day of the regular season, but the second year was non-guaranteed and he was cut in July.

Orlando now holds his G League rights, and Castleton will enter camp looking to prove he belongs on a roster spot that sticks.

Hawks

The Hawks’ signing of center N’Faly Dante looks even friendlier on their books than first reported. According to ESPN’s Bobby Marks for Sports Business Classroom, Atlanta’s two-year, $4.4 million offer sheet only carries a partial guarantee of $85,300 in year one — the same figure Dante would have received had he accepted his two-way qualifying offer from Houston.

That structure made the deal essentially no-risk for the Rockets, who could have matched and still walked away owing just the partial guarantee if they later waived Dante before the season. But Houston didn’t have enough space below its first-apron hard cap to bring him back without moving money off the roster.

Atlanta, meanwhile, fills a two-way spot with a 24-year-old big who has already shown flashes in the G League and will now get a longer look in the Hawks’ system.