NBA Trade Update: Indiana Pacers’ Tyrese Haliburton Gets New 39-Year-Old Teammate on Exhibit-9 Deal

James Johnson is heading back to Indiana. The 39-year-old forward has agreed to an Exhibit-9 training camp contract with the Pacers, according to NBA insider Jake Fischer, putting him in the same locker room as Tyrese Haliburton once again before camp opens.

His path onto the regular-season roster is questionable. But for Haliburton, Johnson's value was never about box scores. It comes from a bond built the moment the veteran walked through the Pacers' doors years ago, and one that has outlasted every roster shuffle since.

Pacers Deliver Good News to Tyrese Haliburton With Latest Move

Fischer broke the news on September 22, confirming that Johnson is signing an Exhibit-9 deal and will report to Indiana's training camp. He had already spent time with the team in Nashville during players-only workouts over the summer, a sign this reunion had been building quietly for weeks.

The camp opens September 29, and Indiana is still filling out its roster ahead of the 2026-27 season. Johnson will need to earn his way through those decisions like everyone else fighting for a spot.

What The Exhibit-9 Deal Really Means for Johnson's Future

An Exhibit-9 contract is built for exactly this kind of situation. It lets a player join training camp on a non-guaranteed basis, mostly to provide competition and depth, without committing a roster spot or real cap space. Indiana's current financial picture makes it unlikely Johnson survives final cuts and sticks around once the season tips off.

That would not be a first for him. The Pacers brought Johnson back during the 2023-24 season after initially leaving him off the roster, and he returned again for 2024-25 on a one-year, $3.3 million deal that carried him through Indiana's run to the NBA Finals. In that Finals season, he appeared in just 12 regular-season games and five playoff contests, playing around three minutes a night. The numbers were never the point.

Why Haliburton Keeps Calling Him Back

Johnson has bounced through 10 teams since Indiana selected him with the No. 16 pick in the 2009 draft, and his most productive stretch came in Miami, where he averaged 10.3 points, 4.3 rebounds and 3.2 assists across four seasons. His career averages sit at 7.4 points and 3.5 rebounds, modest numbers for a 16-year veteran.

What Johnson brings instead is presence. Draymond Green once called him "the most feared man in the NBA," and that reputation, paired with his martial arts background, has followed him through every stop. When Haliburton first arrived in Indiana, Johnson made him a promise: "I got your back. Don't worry about anything."

Head coach Rick Carlisle has leaned on that same steadying influence, once saying, "We don't have locker room problems, because we have him sitting over there." Johnson even traveled back to Indianapolis during Haliburton's Achilles rehab to help run the star's youth camp, long after his own roster spot had disappeared.