Indiana Pacers: Have it all
The Step Back has been born from the aesthetics and traditions of the Hardwood Paroxysm Basketball Network. In the past, Hardwood Paroxysm has produced a massive stand-alone season preview. This year, that preview effort has been rolled up into the launch of The Step Back.
The Step Back’s writers and illustrators have prepared a hefty deep-dive into each team, built from multiple smaller sections. This year’s theme is television comedies and each section is named after some of our favorite sitcoms. For links to all 30 teams, as well as details about the focus of each section, check out our guide on how to read this preview.
Community
By Chris Manning (@cwmwrites)
In an article from The Vertical published in late September, Indiana Pacers forward Paul George was clear in where he wants his team to be this season.
“Honestly, I look at us challenging them. I’ve been in the East and I’ve been No. 1 with LeBron being on a team,” George said. “Really, what I’m looking at is it coming down to me getting us past the Conference Finals. … I’m confident in myself. I’m confident in what I can do.”
The “them” he’s referring to is, of course, the Cleveland Cavaliers. Basically everyone thinks the Cavs will head to the Finals this season for the third straight year, with LeBron James still being the best player in the world and Cleveland just cruising the last two years.
On an individual level, George may be the player best suited to challenge LeBron in the East. Prior to the broken leg he suffered two seasons ago, he led the Pacers squads that pushed LeBron’s Miami Heat teams like no other team could. He was long enough, skilled enough on both ends of the court, and actually athletic enough to make LeBron work for buckets. Now that’s he’s fully back, he starts to look like that guy again. Even if beating LeBron and the Cavs seems like an unlikely accomplishment — and it definitely is — it’s a fair goal for George to shoot for.
But is the rest of his team ready to do the same? On paper, both the Toronto Raptors and Boston Celtics should be better than the Pacers. Look further into the Eastern Conference at teams like the Detroit Pistons and Charlotte Hornets that have fewer questions to answer than the Pacers. Even teams like the Washington WIzards and Atlanta Hawks could be argued as being better than the Pacers.
Ultimately, the Pacers’ season is going to be decided by how many questions they can answer about themselves in a way that makes them better. Things like, “what kind of coach will Nate McMillan be?”, “can Monta Ellis fit between George and Jeff Teague?”, and “how good will Myles Turner be now he’s being scrutinized in year two?” They all carry weight that will shape how good Indiana will be. And even one breaking the wrong way could push them further down the standings than they’d like. As easy as it is to see Indiana peaking and becoming the second best team during the regular season, it’s not hard to see them struggling and just barely making the playoffs, either. The latter option — or something in the middle — is also probably likelier than the former.
At the end of the season, though, this comes down to George. Although he’s at least in the conversation for best player not named LeBron in the Eastern Conference, he, too, has something to prove and questions to answer about how good he actually is. And like his coach and teammates, answering correctly could at least give the Pacers a chance to back up George’s confidence.
The Odd Couple
By Chris Barnewall (@ChrisBarnewall)
The Indiana Pacers decided this offseason they had to change things up if they were going to get any better. Out went Frank Vogel, gone is George Hill, in are Thaddeus Young, Jeff Teague, Al Jefferson, and Nate McMillan. After last year’s comments from Larry Bird about playing faster, what exactly the Pacers are after with these additions is up for debate. Most of their new players seem seem to imply a slower pace of play within the team, but if that’s the case, then do their additions fit with current players on the roster?
In this case, we’re talking about the backcourt of Jeff Teague and Monta Ellis.
Teague has been an All-Star caliber point guard for the Atlanta Hawks for quite awhile now. His lack of consistency has always been a frustration point for Hawks fans, but his talent has never been something to question. After fighting some injuries last year, it’s expected for Teague to have a bounceback season, but is he in a situation that’s going to allow him to bounce back?
Next to Teague is a player that most consider a starting capable NBA two guard. Ellis isn’t the best two-guard in the NBA, and it’s arguable that he would fit better in a backup role. But from a pure talent standpoint, there’s nobody on the Pacers roster that should be starting over him at his position. Despite never being a great three-point shooter, Ellis can score in bunches and has had something of a career renaissance the last few years of his career.
The problem? Ellis and Teague are strikingly similar players in playstyle, which could cause some issues. They both require the ball in their hands to play their most effective basketball, they don’t shoot a ton of three-pointers, and are drivers towards the rim. Despite his reputation, Ellis is actually a pretty good passer, giving him a decent drive-and-kick game, which is exactly the way Teague gets his best passing done. Obviously, Teague has spent more time in his career setting up others and playing in a system, but this doesn’t look like those Hawks teams that are going to rely on ball movement and intricate sets. Instead, this feels like a team that’s going to rely a lot more on isolations or basic pick-and-roll sets, maybe a little grind-ier. That’s not a style that benefits from having repeating skill types on the floor together.
This would work better if either of the two guards were great three-point shooters, but Ellis is 31 percent for his career from behind the arc and Teague just doesn’t take very many of them. Even in the Hawks freewheeling three-point offense, Teague still only shot 3.5 times a game from deep last season, and that was a career high. When he did shoot them, he made them at a 40 percent clip, so there is potential to play him similar to how they used George Hill as a shooter. However, if they did that, then why get rid of Hill at all? It doesn’t make sense to bring in Teague and then not let him play like himself.
It’s not that Ellis and Teague are going to be a bad fit together, but more of a repetitive one. They play very similar styles offensively, and that isn’t going to force the defense to have to work very hard unless the Pacers find a way to get creative with them. These two just don’t really complement each other, and there are going to be times for Indiana where that’s a problem.
Arrested Development
By Brendon Kleen (@BrendonKleen14)
There’s no reason to dance around the obvious: Larry Bird is the force holding the Indiana Pacers back most.
Over the offseason, Bird himself attempted to identify the Pacers’ flaws, as most general managers are wont to do. In wrapping gauze around the team’s biggest wound, Bird hired Nate McMillan to rinse the offense of its supposed wimpishness. But forgive me if that doesn’t exactly strike me as the proper solution for the specified problem.
In McMillan’s final season in Portland (2010-11), the team finished 10th in offensive efficiency, but literally dead last in terms of pace (possessions per game). The prior season, the Portland Trail Blazers were seventh in offensive efficiency, but again were dead last in pace. Of course, there is more to playing “quickly” than purely stacking possessions up — moving the ball, moving bodies, and making fast decisions are areas that McMillan figures to help out in.
This point was made excellently early in the summer by Ben Gibson of 8Points9Seconds. Bird spoke of the Three-Year Rule for good coaching stints, arguing that most of the good coaches are gone after three seasons. He also ignored game context and the fact that scoring tends to drop in the playoffs (102.7 points per game in the regular season last year compared to 99.8 in the playoffs, per Basketball-Reference) to cite an 84-point performance against the slow-going Toronto Raptors as another cause of Vogel’s demise.
In short, WHAT?! Gibson goes on to use, you know, numbers to show that Vogel had at the very least taken advantage of the increased weaponry afforded to him as each passing year brought the team further away from their defensive identity. Here they are:
2012-13: 94.7
2013-14: 96.7
2014-15: 97.3
2015-16: 102.2
Those numbers are the points per game for each of Vogel’s last four seasons as head coach. Notice a trend? There are complaints to be made about game management, as Vogel’s head-scratching reliance on flip-flopping between all-D and all-O lineups sometimes meant the Pacers were at a disadvantage against more balanced units. But in terms of pure scoring (like what Bird was referencing by mentioning the 84 points in a three-point loss), that’s not half bad.
I think the problem with believing McMillan is the answer to Bird’s prayers for motivation and firepower runs further than a lack of faith in his ability to run and take advantage of a more athletic roster. Our own Ian Levy made the argument during the offseason that for all we know, McMillan could change course and be what Bird wants him to be. But the rosters he had in Portland fit the mold of a dominant half-court power.
In 2008-09, the Blazers finished first in offensive efficiency behind Brandon Roy. Next to Roy were guys like a young LaMarcus Aldridge, the always slick Rudy Fernandez, and a blossoming jack-of-all-trades in Nicolas Batum. That’s weaponry.
In Indiana, McMillan gets to tinker with guys like Monta Ellis, Jeff Teague, Thaddeus Young, and Al Jefferson. That’s a group of intelligent players, and perhaps it does have the makings of a nice offensive unit, but the team would be better suited tilting the other way and playing to the strengths of Paul George and Myles Turner. Those are two players who have the ability to overwhelm in individual matchups and explode in transition.
It’s understandable that Larry Legend would look at the roster and see an opportunity to win up-tempo games. But to ignore the fact that his current coach was already doing that, replace him with one who has no history of doing so, and implement a roster seemingly incapable of that style is incredulous. Al Jefferson + Nate McMillan ≠ pace and space.
By trying to fix too much, he may have truly fixed nothing at all.
Perfect Strangers
by Matt D’Anna (@hoop_nerd)
Ten Word Analysis: Not great, but not problematic, either. Perfectly meh.
TeamSPACE charts are based on mapped clusters of shot activity. These areas are affectionately called Hunting Grounds, because they are the areas on the court where a player hunts for shots — and successfully scores most often. TeamSPACE takes the Hunting Grounds of all five players in a lineup and puts them on the court together — because, you know, they have to share that physical space, and there is only one ball.
In the past, it was one color per player; which meant that blending colors represented overlapping spaces for shot activity. But this time around, these are not your ordinary TeamSPACE shot maps. Each lineup is analyzed in the aggregate — one color! — and that unit is compared that unit to the rest of the league. So you will see a persistent red layer on every chart, highlighting the league’s Hunting Grounds from last season. The most prolific locations should come as no surprise: the paint, the corners, most of the top of the arc, and a couple of dabs at the foul line and top of the key.
So…how were these lineups chosen for each team? In the past, it’s been about projecting the starting lineup, estimating the most used lineup, or even designing the “most favoritest” lineup. This year? It’s the these charts represent the “most interestingly feasible” lineups….what? That’s a loaded phrase, so let’s unpack it a bit.
The goal is to identify the collection of five players on a team that could potentially play together, and if they did, the offensive results could be glorious. Ideally these lineups aren’t too far-fetched, but also slightly off-kilter and confusing to an opposing defense. While this type of analysis is not conducive for assessing defense, somewhat reasonable decisions are attempted to be made. So while it’s tempting to just put all the best shooters together…how realistic is it (outside of Houston, at least)? And, full disclosure: I favor some stretch in my lineups. It not only provides plenty of high-octane potential, but getting stretchy is also on par with current league-wide trends.
Each TeamSPACE chart has a couple of other sitcom-related features:
Family Matters: You’ll notice a series of Jaleel White’s across half court. Each lineup is scored on a scale of 0-7 Steve Urkels for how well it matches league-wide trends. Remember, there’s seven league Hunting Grounds (right corner three; at the rim; left corner three; foul line/top of the key; right wing; middle 3pt; left wing). A lineup gains points for matching each area; it loses points for messy excess shot activity.
Odd Couple: “Most interestingly feasible” is obviously debatable, so in order to account for some of those decisions, you’ll see Oscar and Felix on each chart. Often, there are players that are in the lineup…and maybe/probably they should not be. They get the Oscar label. And, there are those players that are out of the lineup…and maybe/probably should be included. They are the Felix for their team.
And briefly, a word about data. These strange visual displays are based on last season’s shot data, weighted by made buckets — so rookies and season-long injuries are sadly excluded. This analysis is nothing without the help of Darryl Blackport, and the research materials available atBasketball-Reference and NBA.com. Further, these charts feature some of the best logo re-designs I could curate from the ol’ Information Superhighway, including Dribbble.com and Pinterest. I made none of the logos; I merely selected some of my favorites. Enjoy!
Everybody Loves Raymond
By Brandon Jefferson (@pengriffey_jr)
With this one quote, Monta Ellis forever changed his perception. Ellis came straight from high school into the NBA and immediately his Mississippi twang and diminutive stature — for a shooting guard, at least — made him stick out like a sore thumb.
Luckily for Ellis, and basketball lovers as a whole, his first stop in the NBA was playing “Nellie Ball” for the Golden State Warriors, and his whirling dervish style of play was a nightly spectacle to behold. Within a couple years, he was part of a group that now is best known as the “We Believe Warriors”.
Ellis next found himself in Milwaukee, and though the spin moves, acrobatic layups, and complete lack of regard for efficiency remained, it wasn’t the same anymore. However, towards the end of his tenure with the Milwaukee Bucks, the interview that gave us the quote above was born and with it, Ellis regained his old swagger.
Ellis has been with the Indiana Pacers since he signed a four-year, $44 million contract in the 2015 offseason. In his lone season with the Pacers, he averaged his fewest amount of points (13.8 points per game) in his career since his rookie season (6.8 points per game in 2004-05).
Yet, Ellis has grown over his 10 years in the NBA. He’s no longer the shoot-first, ask questions later kid we saw in Golden State. He doesn’t make the paint his version of a gymnastics floor routine quite as often anymore. At age 30, Ellis has found new ways to keep his fans faithful aside from wowing them on a basketball floor.
Ellis is a husband, a father, and a snazzy dresser. The scrawny kid with a thick Southern accent is no more; Ellis is now a man. He’s matured right underneath our noses. He’s replaced the fitted hats and white tees with tailored suits and champagne glasses.
At the Pacers’ media day, Ellis had the following to say about his offseason, via Mark Monteith of Pacers.com: “I rededicated myself this summer in the gym,” he said. “With the team Larry (Bird) put around us, the pieces he brought in, we have a great opportunity here. I have to do better. I have to do a better job of being the person I’ve been throughout my career. Last year was tough I felt like I let the team down, the organization down, the fans down by not doing what they normally see me do. It’s a new beginning and I wanted to be part of that.”
Bird and the Pacers are trying to reclaim their spot as one of the top teams in the Eastern Conference this season. Ellis will be a big part of that and getting the most out of the former Most Improved Player will go a long way to helping them attain that goal.
However, even if the Pacers ultimately fall short in their quest to be No. 2 to Team LeBron, Ellis’ growth and development off the court has forever endeared him to NBA fans for years to come.
Because, as a wise man once said, “Monta Ellis have it all.”