...Trouble as in they are going to struggle to make it to the Eastern Conference Finals. Whether they play Charlotte, Atlanta, the Knicks, or even Cleveland in the first round, it's not going to be a sweep.
The real trouble comes in the second round if they face the Nets or the Bulls. I think the Nets would beat Chicago in a 7 game first round series but both teams are capable of beating the Pacers as it stands right now.
I try not to overreact to the NBA regular season. You really need to take the regular season with a grain of salt in this league. However, the Pacers have looked bad for an extended period of time now. We're not just talking about a couple bad weeks of hitting a lull. This is a month of bad basketball and for 2+ months, they haven't resembled the team that started the season playing such great basketball.
The biggest issue I see with them is very simple: the ball sticks. There's wayyyyy too much dribbling and not enough movement without the ball. I felt that they made a bad trade when they brought Evan Turner in. Sure, he can bring them some offense off the bench but he's another guy who needs the ball in his hands. The Pacers offense needs more shooters. I thought they could have kept Granger and gone with a small lineup of Hill-Stephenson-George-Granger-Hibbert. You run your offense through Hibbert in the middle and surround him with 4 guys capable of knocking down a perimeter shot or taking their man off the dribble off a kickout.
This halfcourt offense is a mess right now. It's basically George or Stephenson dribbling at the top of the key and the other 4 guys standing around. Vogel has some work to do. You can sharpen up your ball movement with some good practices so this is something that can be turned around. Still, I think they are in some serious danger.
The real trouble comes in the second round if they face the Nets or the Bulls. I think the Nets would beat Chicago in a 7 game first round series but both teams are capable of beating the Pacers as it stands right now.
I try not to overreact to the NBA regular season. You really need to take the regular season with a grain of salt in this league. However, the Pacers have looked bad for an extended period of time now. We're not just talking about a couple bad weeks of hitting a lull. This is a month of bad basketball and for 2+ months, they haven't resembled the team that started the season playing such great basketball.
The biggest issue I see with them is very simple: the ball sticks. There's wayyyyy too much dribbling and not enough movement without the ball. I felt that they made a bad trade when they brought Evan Turner in. Sure, he can bring them some offense off the bench but he's another guy who needs the ball in his hands. The Pacers offense needs more shooters. I thought they could have kept Granger and gone with a small lineup of Hill-Stephenson-George-Granger-Hibbert. You run your offense through Hibbert in the middle and surround him with 4 guys capable of knocking down a perimeter shot or taking their man off the dribble off a kickout.
This halfcourt offense is a mess right now. It's basically George or Stephenson dribbling at the top of the key and the other 4 guys standing around. Vogel has some work to do. You can sharpen up your ball movement with some good practices so this is something that can be turned around. Still, I think they are in some serious danger.
