Okay, so I was reading this whole Reddit thread about Myles Turner getting booed in his return to Indiana, and honestly, it’s a whole saga. The core of it is this weird, almost yearly tradition where Turner’s name was constantly in trade rumors for like a decade—people are joking that he and Buddy Hield were “Lakers legends” because of how often they were linked to LA. There’s a real sense of eye-rolling fatigue about it; everyone just expected it every offseason. The feeling is that the Pacers front office was constantly shopping him, offering him shorter, discounted contracts because he was a valuable asset, and he’d sign them to avoid injury risk. Some point out that the last short deal was actually to his benefit, to hit free agency after the new TV money, but the overall narrative is that the team never fully committed to him.
So fast forward to him leaving for Milwaukee this past summer, and when he comes back, the home crowd boos him. And this is where the discussion splits into like, three or four camps. A huge chunk of people are baffled and think it’s totally undeserved. They’re saying, look, he gave you ten solid years, was underpaid, developed into a modern 3-and-D center, was part of your Finals run last year, and was never a drama guy. He just took a better offer to get paid—can you blame him? The anger should be directed at the Pacers’ front office for not just matching the offer to keep him.
Then there’s the other side that, while maybe not agreeing with the boos, *understands* them. Their main points are: one, he went to the Bucks, who are a direct and heated division rival—that’s like a Red Sox player going to the Yankees. And two, after he left, he made some comments that, even if taken out of context by clickbait culture, rubbed fans the wrong way. They feel like he kept talking and made it worse. So for them, booing an opponent—especially one who left for a rival—is just part of sports, as long as it’s not hateful.
The third layer is this fascinating meta-discussion about Indy sports fans in general. People are bringing up how Colts fans booed Andrew Luck when he retired due to injuries, or booed a player who was *traded* away. The theory is that there’s a segment of the fanbase in smaller markets that has a kind of delusional, almost desperate need for loyalty, and they take departures really personally. Others push back, saying the real, average fan in Indiana is reasonable, and it’s just the vocal, often casual stadium crowd and the, let’s say, “spirited” online community that acts this way.
It’s interesting because they even start comparing it to other NBA returns—KD in OKC (the ultimate villain), LeBron’s first game back in Cleveland (that whole “The Decision” TV special is brought up as a legendary fumble), Harden in Houston, even older cases like Michael Finley in Dallas. The consensus seems to be that Turner’s situation is milder but follows that same emotional script of a breakup.
In the end, the most upvoted sentiments are a mix of “He didn’t deserve that, he gave us everything” and a shrug of “Well, he’s on the rival now, what did you expect?” with a heavy side of blaming the front office for creating this whole cycle. It’s less about him as a person and more about the messy, decade-long business relationship finally ending, and all the bruised feelings that came with it.
