Pacers star fined for making 'obscene gesture' during loss

Indiana Pacers swingman Buddy Hield has been fined $25K by the NBA, the league announced in a press release.

The 6-foot-4 small forward is being penalized for “making an obscene [hand] gesture on the playing court,” made early in the second quarter of an eventual 115-109 loss to the Hornets on March 20, the press release states. Tony East of Sports Illustrated pinpointed the moment of the incident. If East is correct, this transpired while Hield was taking a breather on Indiana’s bench.

Fines aside, Hield has been enjoying another solid year for an Indiana team that remains very much in the thick of the play-in tournament race as of this writing. Despite that loss to a lowly Charlotte team on Monday, the 33-40 Pacers are currently 1.5 games behind the Bulls for the East’s No. 10 seed.

Through 73 starts this year, Hield is averaging 17.1 points per game on .459/.424/.819 shooting splits for Indiana. He’s also contributing 5.0 rebounds, 2.7 assists and 1.2 steals per game. The 30-year-old sharpshooter is currently in the third season of a four-year, $94M contract he signed with the Kings in 2020.