(000′s $)

The Pacers are committed to paying those contracts in full – with one exception. The $870 thousand for Lance Stephenson is fully unguaranteed until July 15th. If he is waived before then, then that money goes away. You’ll also note that the salary for Dahntay Jones is in green. That indicates a player option. Jones could elect to terminate his contract and explore free agency, but that seems unlikely.

For reference, I have included the projected salary cap – $58.044 million. This is flat to this year. The revenue for the lockout-shortened season will probably be down, but the CBA guaranteed that the cap would not drop below this level. Based on this figure, the Pacers would have $21.767 million left between their contracts and the salary cap. That number would go to $22.637 million, should the Pacers waive Stephenson prior to July 15th.

However, while that’s the most money they’d have available, it is not what they actually have free to start the summer spending.

Cap Holds – The Hibbert and Hill Effect

Technically, the Pacers will open the summer with no available cap space.

In order to prevent teams from letting all of their contract expire, signing other free agents, then re-signing their own players with “Bird Rights” to go over the cap, the CBA places “cap holds” on a team’s free agents, draft picks, and retired players.

(000′s $)

The Pacers will enter July with over $32 million in cap holds, putting their total cap figure at close to $70 million. However, only a few of those holds really matter.

The biggest cap hold is on Leandro Barbosa’s contract, at $11.4 million (150% of his 2012 salary). As he helped late in the regular season and early in the playoffs, it was worth considering keeping him around. After the Miami series, that seems less appealing. Regardless, if you wanted to keep him, then the Pacers would need to sign him quickly for a figure much lower than his hold. However, the base expectation is that the Pacers will renounce their Bird Rights to Barbosa, thus removing all of the cap hold. (The decision to be made about Barbosa is likely low on the front office’s offseason priority list.)

I didn’t list all of the holds here, because the ones for Jeff Foster, A.J. Price, and Kyrylo Fesenko are probably moot. Indiana will renounce all of them for various reasons. However, I did include Lou Amundson. Amundson is a player that the Pacers would probably like to re-sign at the right price. However, his price probably won’t be materially different from his hold. As you’ll see later, how Indiana can or will deal with Lou will greatly depend on what direction they want to go with their other moves. (And as with Barbosa, it is not a primary concern.)

That leaves the three holds that matter – Roy Hibbert, George Hill, and the 1st Round Draft Pick. They total $11.217 million.

So what can the Pacers do? Well, a lot of things, but it’s probably easiest to look at it in two separate scenarios.

Keeping the Core Together

If you operate under the assumption that the Pacers will want to re-sign Roy Hibbert and George Hill, then that limits the money available pretty drastically. Both players are sure to command contracts greater than their cap holds, so the way to maximize the cap space would be to wait to re-sign these two until after the Pacers made their free agent acquisitions.

Under that approach, Indiana would most likely have the $10.550 million identified in red above available to sign free agents (this assumes renouncing Barbosa, Amundson, etc.). From there they would have three avenues to create more cap space – one entirely under their control, and two that would need trading partners.

Waive Lance Stephenson – This would add $870 thousand of cap space, bringing them to $11.420 million available. Making this move has the virtue of being entirely at the discretion of the Pacers. I think this is possible, but don’t consider it likely. Nor am I making a judgment on whether or not Lance should  be waived. However, it’s worth noting that Lance could be waived, then re-signed later to the minimum … which happens to be $854 thousand next year. It could be a painless option for both parties, but it also doesn’t move the needle very much.

Trade, Sell or Renounce the Draft Pick -  The Pacers hold the 26th pick in the NBA Draft this June, and it carries with it a cap hold of $894 thousand. The Pacers could elect to trade that pick without taking back salary, sell it for up to $3 million, or renounce their rights to the pick (probably after making the pick). The first two are possible, the third extremely unlikely. The last example of renouncing the rights to a draft pick I can recall is Chicago doing it with Travis Knight in 1996. The Pacers also lost the rights to Greg Minor — whose rights they’d acquired in the Mark Jackson trade — but that was for reasons surrounding failing to file the right paperwork in time that I can’t quite recall, and in any case, was four CBAs ago. The Pacers may trade or sell the pick, but the need would have to be very specific. This path also seems unlikely to me, simply because first round draft picks are cheap players with potential, and teams don’t like to give them away.

Make an unbalanced trade, where they send out more salary than they take back – This seems unlikely to me, because Indiana would need a trading partner with either cap space or a Traded Player Exception (TPE) who would also be interested in taking a player that the Pacers didn’t want. However, since Danny Granger has the only contract on the Pacers that is guaranteed beyond the 2012-13 season, there are candidates. Seems to me that the most likely scenario of a collection of long shots would be to get some team to take back the final year of either Dahntay Jones ($2.900 million) or Tyler Hansbrough ($3.055 million), in exchange for some future considerations — second round picks, highly protected firsts. This, along with waiving Lance Stephenson, could create just under $15.400 million in cap room, while retaining the holds for Hibbert and Hill. This is close to, but not quite, big enough to make a 30% max offer. However, there’s a lot of risk in that. The Pacers would have to make that deal, before they had an agreement – or even spoken to — a free agent. Very good chance that they could come out of the exchange with more money to spend, but not be able to spend it on who they want.

Those are opportunities to get clever. However, if the Pacers prioritize re-signing Hibbert and Hill, it likely indicates a more conservative approach. Therefore, the best assumption to follow is that they’ll have just a little over $10 million available to add talent.

In this scenario, there are two players that I would put at the top of the shopping list.

First, Steve Nash. Nash would do wonders for the Pacer offense, and — I have to believe — Roy Hibbert. He reportedly has winning as a high priority, and perhaps he could be brought in on a David West-type deal…maybe even less in the right circumstances. I’m not great at predicting what his actual price tag will be, but I have to believe it would within the Pacer budget. I think it would just be a question of mutual interest.

Second, Irsan Elyasova. Again, not entirely sure of his price, but a very good, active upgrade on the Pacer reserve bigs who also could provide some sorely needed shooting ability.

In my more delusional moments, I think of getting both, but one or the other would be fine.

Other factors could derail this plan pretty quickly, though. Both Hibbert and Hill are restricted free agents, which is both a blessing and a curse for the Pacers. The blessing comes in the fact that the Pacers can match any offer made. The curse comes in that the new CBA only allows three days to match, instead of seven.

If Roy Hibbert and/or George Hill sign offer sheets very early in the process, it significantly alters the math here. In fact, if both sign on July 1st (or whenever the first day), the Pacers will be forced to make all of their major offseason decisions in a three-day time frame. This is especially concerning when you consider that the Pacers’ normal M.O. is to allow things to unfold.

In any case, I expect the Pacers to seek to keep the core together, so I think they will prioritize re-signing their two restricted free agents. Then look to add more talent. Nash and Ilyasova may or may not be on their wish list.

However, they could go another way.

Go Big Game Hunting

Really, what this amounts to is going after Deron Williams. However, the first thing I need to do here is address Eric Gordon. The Pacers have been linked repeatedly to Eric Gordon, and while the match is perfect in theory, it is fraught with practical problems.

First is the very real concern over whether Gordon will be worth the amount of money it will take to sign him. The most damning argument against is the fact that he’s missed 20, 26, and 57 games over the last three seasons. That’s not a warning sign. That’s somebody walking beside you 24 hours a day, slapping you upside the head, and saying, “He’s injury prone. He’s injury prone. He’s injury prone.”

Also, Gordon went from being considered a promising, possible All-Star one day to the future best shooting guard in the league, all without ever actually showing any sustained reason for that jump. He has played at a very high level for relatively short periods of time in the context of a career and a contract worth upwards of $60 million.

But the biggest practical obstacle is his restricted free agent status.

Though I wouldn’t do it, New Orleans seems committed to matching any offer, up to and including a max deal. This fact closes the window on this opportunity for all but the tiniest sliver. So, I don’t consider Gordon a practical option, but the good news for those who do is: the steps needed to put the Pacers in a position to make a run at Williams will also allow them to make a run at Gordon.

Now, the math.

(000′s $)

The table above outlines the max contracts. While the overall cap will not change, the CBA has guaranteed that the cap used for establishing player max salaries will increase, driving up the max salaries available.

The two columns of importance to the Pacers are the 25% column and the 30% column. Eric Gordon (and Roy Hibbert) can be paid up to the amount in the 25% column, with a starting salary of $13.669 million. Deron Williams’ maximum is in the 30% column, with a starting salary of $16.403 million.

If the Pacers are willing to make some hard choices, they would have enough space to offer a 25% max, and they could come close to a 30% max. But, those choices would be hard, and they’d begin with renouncing the Bird Rights to George Hill.  That alone would create enough space to offer Eric Gordon the max.

From there, if the Pacers were to waive Lance Stephenson and unload their first round pick, they could offer a starting salary of just over $16.1 million to Deron Williams. This would be just below the max, and cost Williams about $1.1 million over the course of a four-year contract that any team besides the Nets could offer. Of course, the Nets max offer is worth over $20 million more due to the extra year.

Sidebar – What does renouncing a player mean?
You’re basically giving up your ability to go over the salary cap to sign that player. If the Pacers were to renounce George Hill, then they would only be able to sign him with available cap space, or to a minimum level contract. While there are scenarios where Indiana could renounce Hill (or Hibbert), then still find a way to keep him, their chances are very remote. One should assume renouncing a player would end the team’s relationship with that player. There is only one instance in which a player can be “un-renounced.” That is if he was renounced in order to make an offer on another team’s restricted free agent, and that team matched the offer. However, there are still limitations even then, so it’s safest to consider renunciation final, and be surprised if it isn’t. (As always, Larry Coon’s NBA CBA FAQ is the best source for information like this.)

Correction – Roster Charges

As wintermute notes below, there is something called a roster charge. Per Larry Coon:

“A roster charge if the team has fewer than 12 players (players under contract, free agents included in team salary, players given offer sheets, and first round draft picks). The roster charge is equal to the rookie minimum salary for each player fewer than 12.”

This changes the math enough to change a couple conclusions:

In the “Keep the core together” section, a roster charge ($0.494 million) should be added, lowering the beginning available to just over $10 million. Then both Lance and the pick would be replaced w/ roster charges, meaning those two moves would only create about $0.4 million additional space, each.

It has a bigger effect on the “Big Game” calculations, as the Pacers would not be able to get to $16.1mm. At that point, they’d have four roster charges. That would take away $1.9 million of available space. As wintermute notes, to chase Deron Williams, the Pacers will have to find someone to take on salary – probably Dahntay Jones or Tyler Hansbrough – in order to create room to make a max offer to Williams.

If that wasn’t enough, the Pacers would either have to decide to renounce Roy Hibbert’s Bird Rights (won’t happen), or try to find a team willing to take on some salary. In that case, they’d love for it to be Dahntay or Tyler, but they might have to dangle Darren Collison and his remaining $2.3 million.

No question, this is a risky, risky path, but there are ways to get there. Again, this is just about the math of creating the space to sign Deron Williams. It’s not a discussion of whether or not he would come to Indiana.

Which Way?

It’s tough to tell. I’d say it depends on whether or not Bird returns. If Bird returns, then I’d bet heavily on the Pacers re-signing Hibbert and Hill, while trying to make another David West-level acquisition. This could come in free agency, or they could look to make a trade. If Bird leaves, then it depends on his replacement, and I don’t know who that might be. I will say this, however. If it ends up being Kevin Pritchard, then I’d expect the Pacers to make a run at Deron Williams.

To me, if you can get Williams, you have to get him. However, while I think he’d come to Indy, I don’t think Indy will be his first choice. New Jersey and – reportedly – Dallas, will likely look more attractive to Williams. So, while I’d explore the Williams opportunity, I’d plan on moves in the vein of Nash/Ilyasova, or other opportunities that may not be readily apparent to the casual observer. Of course, there is always the possibility of trading any of the players on the roster – Danny, Roy, David, DC. While that makes it hard on us prognosticators, the amount of flexibility the Pacers have leaves them in a position to be envied by pretty much everybody else in the NBA.

Plenty of questions about what will happen this summer, but this post should provide the framework for the financial options and limitations the Pacers face. Stay tuned.

Related posts:

1. Jazz Steal the Pacers’ Lunch Money, Take Their Girlfriends to the Semi-Formal
2. How the Pacers Players Rank Among Their Peers, According to My Peers
3. Pacers Players Are Not Running the Floor Properly

Yes, the Pacers’ season is over. But what a season it has been. We get a last look at how true fans were to the team. This one right here used a flamingo to taunt LeBron James after he missed an easy dunk.

Enjoy the rest of the playoffs.

Related posts:

1. Paul George Thought the Dunk Contest Was a Joke
2. Larry Bird Would Have Declined to Return as Pacers Top Exec if His Team Missed the Playoffs
3. Roy Hibbert Monster Dunk on Miami in Game 3

• The Heat came into a potential series clinching game with three players suited up that can be considered either a power forward or center: Ronny Turiaf, Juwan Howard and Joel Anthony.

• It absolutely seemed like Ronny Turiaf should have gotten a technical for bumping George in the first quarter.

• Jeff Van Gundy clearly has never had a small soft ball for an ankle…

• I usually tend to get tired of hearing people question Lebron’s heart. BUT if Lebron James had the mentality and heart of David West how man NBA Championships would he already have? I’ll set the over/under at seven.

• I believe that it is the job of Tyler Hansbrough and Louis Admunson to be hated by their opponents’ fans. I don’t think we have to poll South Beach to find out if they are succeeding. Unfortunately they just weren’t competent enough to get heavy minutes.

• The Tyler Hansbrough/Leandro Barbosa/Paul George/Dahntay Jones/Darren Collison lineup doesn’t seem to really fly in an elimination game .

• If I have had one consistent sentiment all season concerning the Pacers it’s FEED THE BIG MAN. Hibbet has flaws, but what he’s good at and what he opens up for his teammates is enough for him to be a center piece of the offense.

• Every time a Heat player not named Lebron James or Dwyane Wade shot the ball it felt like Christmas.

• “…Wanted to dunk it, but he was too far away!” I’ll take quotes about Joel Anthony’s offensive skills for 500.

• “I don’t know how they drive so fast without crashing.” Good point about NASCAR Jeff Van Gundy. I sometimes wonder how basketball players jump so high without tripping.

• In the 2006 NBA Finals a legend was created and Dwyane Wade reached another level. That Dwyane Wade showed up to Game 6.

• Double teaming Dwyane Wade is crucial. Mike Miller runners are ideal. And when Lebron James forgets to cut then he becomes a jump shooter out of Wade’s double team. When executed well it minimized the effectiveness of both Wade and James. (Pretty much just agreeing with JVG and the rest of the Twitter universe).

• Dwyane Wade hits the kind of daggers that make a team want to give up.

• How in the world did Wade score only five points in Game 3?

• All season Pacer fans have been criticized for their poor attendance. Two nights ago Larry Bird criticized the team for being S-O-F-T. Both criticisms were fair, but the crowd and the team came out for Game 6 and didn’t leave anything on the table. Despite the outcome, both responded in my mind.

• The Miami Heat had one more Lebron James and one more Dwyane Wade than the Pacers did and that is why they won. Those two men have a demeanor that may make them difficult to cheer for, but they are truly amazing basketball players.

• Is having George Hill and Darren Collison like having two quarters when you really need a dollar? I really like both of them as point guards, but does Indiana really get as much out of Darren Collison as they should. Is that going to be the most obvious roster change?

• Was that the last time we see Roy Hibbert in a Pacer uniform?

• A great season. A truly great season. I’ve been known to be able to think of a poetic sentiment or two when I really put my mind to it, but I’m just going to wrap this one up with a quote from the crowd at Bankers Life Fieldhouse: “Thank you, Pacers.”

Related posts:

1. Sweatin’ Bullets: Pacers Beat Heat in Game 2
2. Sweatin’ Bullets
3. Sweatin’ Bullets: Love isn’t in the Air (or on the floor)

At halftime, it was hard to tell how to feel about the game. The Pacers had weathered the storm, leading 53-51, despite 12 turnovers, Mike Miller hitting three three-points, and Dwyane Wade being, well…Dwyane Wade.  However, they’d shot almost 59% and still couldn’t maintain separation.

Not sanguine, as it turns out.

It was a late third quarter fizzle – leading to a 10-point Miami margin heading into the fourth – that doomed the Pacers. Larry Bird’s players didn’t roll over this time, and they fought it back to 5 at one point and 6 at another. But, much to their chagrin, Wade and LeBron James always had an answer. The pair scored 19 of Miami’s 24 in the quarter, and combined for 69 points on the night.

Over the last three games, James and Wade averaged 33 points each. LeBron also averaged 11 rebounds and 8 assists, while Wade contributed 7 rebounds and almost 4 assists. The cold, hard truth is that LeBron and Wade – by themselves – are probably the third or best team in the league.

And they were the better team tonight. Congratulations to the Heat, who move on to face the winner of Philly-Boston series for the Eastern Conference crown. Congratulations to the Pacers, who had a great season end too soon, and now get to figure out how to take the next step.

More on this game in the hours and days to come. For now, here is how each guy played individually tonight. Agree? Disagree? Express your thoughts below in the comments or yell at me (@8pts9secs) or Tim (@TimDonahue8p9s) on Twitter.

	David West, PF 41 MIN | 10-16 FG | 5 REB | 2 AST | 3 TO | 24 PTS Unreal early in the game, and a warrior throughout, West left it all on the floor for his adopted franchise tonight.
	Danny Granger, 38 MIN | 6-14 FG | 2-2 FT | 4 REB | 4 AST | 15 PTS Scored 9 first quarter points and gave 38 minutes, but once the adrenaline wore off, he was clearly hobbled. I watched him closely in the first quarter, and he clearly would have to gather himself to make plays. After a while, the tank ran dry.
	Roy Hibbert, C 40 MIN | 5-8 FG | 2-2 FT | 8 REB | 4 TO | 12 PTS Prototypical Roy – enough flashes to make the casual observer think he should get a lot more touches, but not enough tools to actually get them. No question, the Pacers can scheme and pass better, but Hibbert also needs to get better at holding position, at catching the ball and being strong with it, and most importantly, he has to become something better than catastrophic as the screener in the high PnR.
	George Hill, SG 35 MIN | 7-13 FG | 3-5 FT | 2 REB | 5 AST | 18 PTS When Hill missed first one, then two of his three free throws after drawing contact on a three-point attempt, I tweeted, “feels harbinger-ish.” 18 points and 5 assists is a nice line, but he really isn’t a point guard. He loses track of what the offense is supposed to be doing too much.
	Paul George, 43 MIN | 4-10 FG | 10 REB | 2 AST | 3 TO | 11 PTS No way around it, Paul George spent most of the series and most of this game as a disaster offensively, and we could spend days discussing his travails running the fast break. But, he’s young, and he’s a good kid. Bizarrely, if you want encouragement, watch him guarding Wade from tonight’s game. It will make you feel better about Paul, and also make you appreciate just how ungodly unstoppable Wade was.

	Dahntay Jones, SG 4 MIN | 0-0 FG | 3-3 FT | 3 PTS Only one rotation as the starting unit played 31 minutes together.
	Leandro Barbosa, SG 8 MIN | 0-1 FG | 1 REB | 3 TO | 0 PTS Almost certainly the Blur’s final game as a Pacer. They needed him to give them some points, but he had only turnovers. He was a great add for the price, and he really helped this team down the stretch and in the first round. But he just didn’t help against Miami.
	Louis Amundson, C 3 MIN | 1-1 FG | 1 REB | 0 AST | 2 PTS Perhaps his last game as a Pacer, though I would imagine TPTB are interested in bringing him back for the right price.
	Tyler Hansbrough, 9 MIN | 0-4 FG | 3-4 FT | 5 REB | 1 AST | 3 PTS For a couple minutes, it was Buckaroo Banzai – terror on the offensive glass, bundle of energy. But then, it was gone. He missed all four of his shots, and really produced nothing after the first quarter. Some very hard questions ahead for Tyler.
	Darren Collison, 16 MIN | 1-3 FG | 2-2 FT | 1 AST | 5 PTS After playing so well – and being so important – in the Orlando series, there just wasn’t a role for DC against Miami. To small to guard Wade, with no opposing point guard to pressure, his defense wandered, and so did his game. It bears re-watching to see how much of his struggles were cause by the rest of the bench being so bad, and how much of the bench’s struggles were on him.

Related posts:

1. Post-Game Grades: LeBron James and Dwyane Wade Too Much for Pacers
2. Post-Game Grades: Indy Loses a Brutal OT Game to Miami on a LeBron 3 and Wade Prayer
3. Post-Game Grades: Pacers Lose Pivotal Game 4 to Two Freight Trains, Squander Early Lead

While there were many things the Pacers could have done better, and many opportunities they missed, the basic reality is that the Heat were just better. Specifically, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade were just better. For Miami to win this series, those two players had to deliver nothing short of greatness.

And deliver it they did.

The bastards.

I was in the Pacer locker room after the game. It was a subdued, quiet place. George Hill sat leaning back in his chair looking at the ceiling. Paul George was hunched over, chin in hand, engaged in his normal postgame ritual of reading the stat sheet. Danny Granger sat patiently, but quietly answering questions for a procession of reporters – each waiting on queue to ask him the same thing in a slightly different way.

Then there was David West.

West was scheduled to be the Pacer player coming to the table in the interview room, so he wasn’t – strictly speaking – available for questions in the locker room. As people moved around him, West was million miles away. Or, more accurately, he was a few hundred feet away and in a different time. In his thousand yard stare, you could almost see the flicker as he replayed the game in his mind. Each missed shot. Each turnover. Every Dwyane Wade bucket – each one more ridiculous than the last.

Later, he would talk about the game in hushed, thoughtful tones. He would talk about the future, and this as a good learning experience for the younger guys, and the fact that the Pacers need to  dedicate themselves to getting past this point next season. He would sum it up by saying, “It just wasn’t our time,” but not without betraying his underlying belief that it could have, perhaps even should have been.

But, sitting in the locker room, he was just a man trying to get a hold of his pain and disappointment. In that way, and in that moment, David West was exactly like many, many Pacer fans. He was like me.

For as much as tonight hurts, I can’t help but smile. It has been a very long time since the end of the Pacer season arrived with regret, instead of relief. It is a familiar pain…a welcome pain. It’s the kind of pain you can only feel when your team matters to you again.

I wandered around the locker room, picking up snippets of audio from different players, but nothing extensive. I had plenty of opportunities to ask questions, but none came to me. So, I drifted around, hoping for some divine inspiration, until I noticed that Pacer P.R. Director David Benner had briefly abandoned his guard post around West.

After glancing around, I slipped over to West’s locker, and told him I had no questions. I only wanted to thank him for how helpful he’d been to me as a writer during my first season with credentials, and how much I’d enjoyed watching him play.

How much I’d enjoyed watching them play.

The analysis of what happened, and where Indiana goes from here will come in due time with due diligence. It is not coming tonight.

Tonight, I only have the pain that feels like a long lost old friend. And while that makes me sad, it also makes me happy … if that makes any sense at all.

No related posts.

My apologies to Danny Granger. I mocked him earlier today for seemingly not knowing the regulation size of a softball. But that was based on just a written quote. As you can see in the video above, “notorious sweller” Granger actually characterizes the size of his swollen ankle as “a small softball — if that exists. Maybe a baseball.” He adds that it’s “not crazy big” and that he has “had a worse ankle sprain where I’ve had to miss like two weeks but this one” isn’t that bad by comparison.

Roy Hibbert, David West and Dahntay Jones also offer there thoughts leading up to Game 6 tonight. Jones offers his thoughts on what will happen if Granger can’t go or has to play only reduced minutes. “Danny is out leading scorer, but our parts are interchangeable, and I think we’ll be OK,” said Jones.

Related posts:

1. Danny Granger Will Play in Game 6, Despite a Sprained Ankle the Size of a “Small Softball”
2. Some Pacers’ Players Went Out at Night in Orlando
3. Game #57 Recap: Indiana Barely Shows Up One Day After Two Pacer Players Were Minutes Away from Never Showing Up Again

And here we sit.

So heading into tonight’s game, here are my thoughts on a few things.

Danny Has To Be Effective

In my opinion, the Pacers’ chances begin with this, and they’ll end with it if he’s limited. The Pacers need him to be able to hit shots, and they need him to be able to chase LeBron. But mostly, they just need him.

When Granger went down on Tuesday night, the Pacers staggered. While it’s true they hadn’t played well up to that point, Indiana was still within a bucket when it happened. Also, they probably hadn’t played as poorly as they did in the first half of Game 2 — which they ended up winning. For all the flak Danny gets, he’s crucial to this team. Put simply, they are significantly less talented without him. But more that that they are incomplete. This illustrates a point that I’ve been trying (and failing) to make all season: the Pacers are actually more susceptible to injury, generally, because they rely on more players.

Consider this: For Miami to be a good (read: playoff team), they basically just need LeBron to be healthy and productive. To be a threat to win the Eastern Conference title and perhaps even an NBA title, they need LeBron and one of either Dwyane Wade or Chris Bosh to be healthy and productive. (I’m not sure that it matters which.) If they have all three, then they are favorites in the East, and at least even favorite versus anyone in the West for the title. In effect, as long as they don’t lose LeBron, they are better than most teams.

For Indiana to play at this level, however, they pretty much need their top six players (Granger, David West, Roy Hibbert, George Hill, Paul George, and Darren Collison) to play well. In addition, they probably need a good contribution from Leandro Barbosa, and they need the rest of the bench (Hansbrough, Amundson, Jones) to at least tread water. While they have more bodies that help, that’s also more pain for the whole when any one is either hurt or unproductive.

Further, they are built this way. This probably goes a long way towards explaining their propensity for what fellow contributor Jeremy Comstock called “vomit inducing losses.” They lean on each other so much, that when one falls, they all fall. And while they’re all important, Danny Granger probably bears more weight in this foundation than any player, with the possible exception of David West.

Does that mean that the Pacers would have won Tuesday, or will win tonight, if Danny were healthy? No. It just means that I can’t see them winning without him being a meaningful contributor.

The Suspensions Are Irrelevant

There was a bunch of hubbub about the flagrant fouls on Tuesday night, and the NBA came out with further punishment yesterday. None of the players involved are of any significant meaning to the series.

Let’s recap.

Udonis Haslem suspended for Game 6 - At one point in his career, the loss of Haslem would have been crippling. I don’t think that’s true any more. Though some will point to his Game 4 performance, I will argue that while his points hurt, the Pacers were beaten by the outrageous performances of James and Wade. James and Wade are the difference. Haslem is not.

Tyler Hansbrough upgraded to Flagrant 2, will play in Game 6  – I’m sure many Pacer fans will argue, but I don’t see Tyler as a factor. He will play, and because of that, he has the chance to make a difference. I just don’ t think he can or will. After scoring 22 points on 10-for-19 shooting in his playoff debut, Tyler has averaged 5.6 points on 31% shooting over his last 14 playoff games. This playoffs, the Pacers are a net 10 points per 100 worse with Tyler on the floor, and their overall rebounding percentage drops from 54.3% to 47.6%. I see his reprieve as no real cause for celebration.

Dexter Pittman suspended for three (3) games -  Really. Does anybody care?

Were these penalties appropriate? My opinion isn’t of any consequence, which is why it’s so easy to give it. I’d say Haslem’s appropriate, Tyler’s too light, and Pittman’s way too light.

My take on the fouls committed by both Haslem and Hansbrough is that they were defacto punches. Haslem has no real grounds for defense, and the fact that he caught Tyler in the shoulder instead of the face is really just happenstance. Given the size and motion of the players, the force involved in the blow was probably greater than any punch that I — or most of the people watching — could throw. It was intentional, and it was clearly retaliation. Plus, Miami had probably used up their get out of jail free card when Wade was not suspended for Game 3.

Hansbrough’s situation is fuzzier, and many don’t feel it warrants a suspension. That’s fine. His play was much closer to an actual basketball play, and he did pretty clearly get the ball. However, for me, that’s a pretty thin fig leaf. The full chopping down motion is the killer for me. It, too was unnecessary, and it wasn’t even a good basketball play. Again, you have a 6-foot-9-inch, 250-lb man swinging his arm with full force. Anybody care to guess what kind of damage that’s capable of doing? You can’t swing like that on a basketball court. You just can’t.

Pittman? Well, Pittman himself is unimportant in virtually every aspect. His sole purpose for being seems to be simply to keep the ground underneath him from flying into the air. However, the concept of a meaningless scrub headhunting on the basketball court isn’t.  Seems to me that it would have been a great opportunity to send a message — pour encourager les autres — to all those guys who think they have nothing to lose by doing something like that, no, really, you do. But … that probably would get resistance from the NBPA, and there’s really nothing that will prevent someone from being absolutely committed to stupidity.

S-O-F-T is a S-T-A-T-E of M-I-N-D

Being involved in sports — as a participant, coach, or spectator — is in no small part an exercise in immersing yourself in a slurry made up of testosterone and macho bullshit. None of us are immune, and if we were all honest, we’d all admit that we like that part of it — a lot. So, naturally, when Larry Bird called his team “soft,” then helped Jared out by spelling it for him, it created quite the buzz.

These comments are viewed largely in the context of the flagrant fouls discussed above, and many wonder if the Pacer prez wants to see some retaliation. Given the nature of sports — how things were occasionally handled when Bird played — it’s easy to get there. While that may be want Bird meant, I actually took it completely differently.

I viewed it from the perspective of the way the Pacers had played the game mentally — especially after Granger left. The team staggered, and was timid and indecisive in almost every move. They were stagnant, made sloppy passes, sloppy cuts, sloppy rotations defensively. They didn’t even create any 50/50 balls, let alone get them.

After the Game 1 loss to Orlando, I spoke about the Pacers’ need to attack. In a podcast this weekend for the Heartland Summer Series, I said that the Pacers and Vogel always focused on doing what they do and being who they are, as opposed to wins or losses. That didn’t happen Tuesday. They stopped being the Pacers. Some of that was driven by Danny leaving them incomplete, but I can understand Bird’s disappointment when it certainly appeared that his team simply packed their bags in the third quarter, and waited for the game to end.

It’s important to note that the difference between S-O-F-T and S-T-R-O-N-G has little to do with cheap shots or retaliation. It has everything to do with maintaining composure and focus, and playing with force. More than anything else, I took Bird’s words to be telling his players, “You’re better than this.”

Because they are.

Points in the Paint

A big subject for the series has been the Pacers’ size advantage with Roy Hibbert and David West, and there’s no doubt those two have been key in the wins. A key metric in this discussion has been points in the paint (PitP), and there are some things to keep in mind about that.

First, as Charles Barkley pointed out on Tuesday’s pre-game show, “points in the paint” means points scored in the paint, regardless of the action. Therefore, fast break dunks and layups count as PitP. On Tuesday, Miami outscored the Pacers in the paint by 20, which corresponded pretty directly to their 22-2 advantage in fast break points.

Second, Miami — while “smaller” — was one of the best interior defensive teams in the league. I discussed this in the spiderwebs, but it’s also evident in the fact that they allowed the second fewest PitP in the league this season, at around 36.6 per game. The are extremely adept at fronting the post while bullying the passer, and that’s very difficult for a team like Indiana to defeat.

Third, Miami is very good at scoring PitP — finishing 8th in the NBA this season. Both LeBron James (758) and Dwyane Wade (572) had more PitP than either Roy Hibbert (564) or David West (424). While some of that is purely a function of the fact that James and Wade are higher volume scorers, it’s also a good reminder that coming into the paint is at least as big a factor in PitP as being in the paint.

Finally, Indiana — though big — is only a middle-of-the-road PitP team, ranking 13th at about 41.2 per game. Only about 42% of their points come from the paint, largely because their offense is predicated on probing the defense with a post pass or pick-and-roll/backdown, then reversing the ball to catch the defense rotating. The Pacer offense works best when the “second side” is getting a lot of action. While that translates to good shots, not all are in the paint.

In the Orlando series, I said Indy needed to win these categories: PitP and fastbreak points. The mind set I outlined is still necessary, but when we measure, we need to see the Pacers keep pace with Miami in these categories. If they can, then I don’t believe Miami will be able to separate from Indiana, and the Pacers will have a much better shot at a win.

What’s Gonna Happen Tonight?

The short answer is, “I don’t know.” However, as much as it pains me to write this, I think the Pacers’ season ends tonight.

For whatever else you think of them, Miami is an easy team to fear. If James and Wade deliver strong games, then I think it’s just a question of the final score. As I type this — with no inside knowledge whatsoever — I am not expecting Danny Granger to be effective tonight, and I think that will be too much to overcome.

Still, that’s an intellectual assessment. The Pacers are capable of winning this game — regardless of Danny’s condition — and I still have hope that they will. The series? Well, get it to a Game 7 and then we’ll worry about it.

For tonight, I say the Pacers need to be who they have proven to be, and see what happens.

Related posts:

1. Series Preview, Part 2: Offensive Rebounding Will Be Critical for the Pacers to Beat the Heat
2. Series Preview, Part 1: Pacers Will Play Heat in Second Round; Game 1 on Sunday at 3:30 pm
3. Post-Game Grades: Pacers Destroy Heat in Game 3 to Take a 2-1 Series Lead

We now know that Danny Granger is playing tonight. We still don’t know if he’ll last more than five minutes or be mobile/pain-free enough to be effective. He says his ankle is the size of a small softball. As far as I know, softball’s are pretty standardized size-wise. So Ihis ankle is a little smaller than a softball? Or perhaps bigger than a baseball? Or maybe he’s exaggerating completely and its just a little bigger than normal? Who knows.

But here is what Granger said about his injury, as reported by ESPN Heat beat writer Brian Windhorst.

Danny Granger’s ankle is swollen “like a small softball” and he’s on “every type of anti-inflammatory” he’s ever heard of, but he plans to play as his team faces elimination against the Miami Heat Thursday night.

He added this.

Granger is the Pacers’ primary defender on James and said he expects the Heat star to target him early in the game to test his mobility.

“Logic would tell you he would,” Granger said. “I know when we know a player has an injury, it’s definitely in our mind and we attack it. So I’m sure he will. He’s been in attack mode anyway, and I’m sure he’ll be even more in attack mode knowing that I’m limited. But I rise to the challenge.”

There’s the rub. The Pacers probably need Granger to beat the Heat considering how well LeBron and Dwyane Wade have been playing. Offensively, even a limited Granger should help. But defensively, they really can’t afford to have LeBron have an even easier time out there than he has over the past few games. Without Chris Bosh and Udonis Haslem, Miami’s pick-and-pop game is basically nonexistent so that should help the Pacers’ team defense contain LeBron. But if Granger can’t be physical with him like he has throughout the series, Paul George may have to be the one who tries to keep James in check while Dahntay Jones does his best on Wade. Or, better yet, still George on LeBron, let George Hill get manhandled by Dwyane and let Darren Collison run the point for 35 minutes while you hope that perimeter speed/quickness advantage can neutralize what you lose on the other end.

Regardless, we should know within the opening minutes of Game 6 whether or not Granger is worth giving minute to and if the team needs to implement a contingency plan that it hasn’t really tested yet this season. Granger only missed one start this season before sitting the final two games of the regular season, when the rotation was all weird anyway since those games were effectively meaningless. And the one game he did miss before that, on February 15 against Cleveland, came on a night that Hill also sat with an injury and Leandro Barbosa wasn’t on the team yet. So basically, this team as currently constructed, hasn’t played without it’s captain yet.

And I’m sure the Pacers are praying to the gods of medical science that they don’t have to tonight for the first time during what could be their last game of the season.

Related posts:

1. UPDATE: Danny Granger Sprained His Ankle, Will Be Sidelined up to 10 Days
2. Granger Hurt His Ankle, Might Not Play Tonight
3. Brandon Rush Will Miss Two Weeks with a Sprained Ankle

You may not have heard, but there were three flagrant fouls in Game 5 between the Pacers and Heat. Surprisingly, nobody was ejected. At least two and easily three guys could have been tossed. But they weren’t.

As the league is wont to do, however, it reviewed the infractions and Stu Jackson — the NBA’s Wyatt Earp basically — has handed out some expected suspensions: Udonis Haslem is out for one game for his vicious two-arm smash on Tyler Hansbrough, and Game 3 starter Dexter Pittman will miss three games (no that anyone but him, since it’s without pay, cares) for throwing a Lex Lugar forearm at Lance Stephenson’s defenseless collar bone.

Hansbrough, who clubbed Dwyane Wade on the dome and then raked his eye for good measure, got nothing. His foul, which was originally deemed a “flagrant 1,” was upgraded to a more severe “flagrant 2″ but this is just semantics. It won’t affect his status for Game 6 on Thursday in Indianapolis. He will play.

This is obviously an advantage for the Pacers. Haslem hasn’t had a great season but it was arguably (well, LeBron argued it anyway; I wouldn’t) his four jumpers in the fourth quarter of Game 4 that ensured the Heat won to even up the series at 2-2. With neither he nor Bosh on the court, the Pacers will no longer need to pay any mind to a pick-and-pop possibility after ball screens are set for LeBron or Dwyane Wade. This, of course, won’t much matter if, as in Game 5, Indiana can’t keep Miami from scoring in transition. The Heat out-scored the Pacers 22-2 in transition.

Moreover, Danny Granger’s status for Game 6 remains uncertain. He skipped practice today and plans to try to go tomorrow. In fact, he said his foot would have to fall off for him not to at least try to play. His gung-ho attitude notwithstanding, if his ankle doesn’t allow him to perform near, say, 80% of his normal level, it is going to be very hard for the Pacers to beat a Heat team that has two of the planet’s best players playing at their absolute best. In short, no Haslem and no useful Granger swings the advantage decidedly back into Miami’s court.

For more on my opinions on the fouls (I agree with Stu Jackson penalty-wise), read this.

And if you want to hear me talk on Illinois radio about it (from this morning before the suspensions were decided), listen to the audio below. (via WGEM)

Related posts:

1. Hansbrough Probably Won’t Miss Any Games
2. FREE TICKET CONTEST: Win Two Free Tickets to See the Pacers Play the Lakers on Wednesday
3. FREE TICKET CONTEST: Win Two Tickets to See the Pacers Play the Heat Tonight

I wasn’t there and don’t even know exactly what Larry Bird means. So this is presented without comment. (image above via Mike Wells tweet)

In his story on Bird’s comments, Indianapolis Star Pacers beat writer added the following.

Those are the strongest words I’ve ever heard Bird say about his team – good or bad – in my seven-plus years of covering the Pacers.

And he ended his story well by framing what this might mean for the Pacers going into Game 6.

Bird has spoken. Now we’ll see if his players respond to being publicly embarrassed – on the court and by their president – or if they’ll curl up in the fetal position in Game 6 on Thursday.

Game 6 is on Thursday at 8:00 pm EST.

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