Tyrese Haliburton has long been a fan of the WWE so with a major event coming to Indianapolis tonight he had to line up permission to travel separately from the rest of the Indiana Pacers weeks in advance as they head to Memphis for their first preseason game on Sunday.

“He talked with me about this around six weeks ago,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said after practice today. “… I’m very curious to see what they have in store for him. As long as they don’t put him in the sleeper hold, that’ll be good. I’m sure whatever it is it will be entertaining.”

Haliburton will join the team later tonight after his couple hours of approved PTO and be back with the Pacers for shoot-around and the game tomorrow night against the Memphis Grizzlies.

Haliburton said he doesn’t know exactly what he’ll be doing at the event but he looks forward to being backstage and meeting people. He has expressed an interest in getting in the ring previously so we’ll have to wait and see if this is the night.

“I told Triple H I just need one bump, just one bump,” Haliburton said last November when Smackdown was in Indy. “I don’t know when it’s gonna be, but maybe it’s far away from now, but just one. That’s all I need.”

Haliburton explained that his personal fandom with professional wrestling goes back to when he was a kid and bonding with a family member over shared viewings.

“My Uncle Gary is deceased now,” Haliburton explained, “but when I was a kid he used to come over to my house and we always used to watch together … he knew my mom would pay for all the pay-per-views if I cried hard enough for it.”

He shared that his dad always brought him to WWE events when they came to Wisconsin as a kid so now he returns the favor and brings his dad whenever he’s in town.

Haliburton shared his predictions for the various matches scheduled for tonight as well.

The only injury for the team before their first game is Andrew Nembhard, who will miss the first two games after he got a kidney stone removed.