Season Previews: Indiana Pacers - Team Preview Archive Well, the whole changing of the culture bit has certainly been a success in Indiana. Jason Pierre-Paul Womens Jersey. Theyve been thorough in ridding themselves of the negative elements that had plagued them for much of the last half-decade and theyve been replaced with hard working basketballers of solid NBA caliber. Good on them for that. So...now what? While its all well and good to have positive citizens making up the roster, at some point pure talent and winning substantial basketball games has to factor back into the equation, and it hasnt yet in Indianapolis. It would appear that for the next two years this team is going to be pressed up too close to the luxury tax to make any significant moves, barring the trade of a big-ticket salary next summer (Troy Murphy, Mike Dunleavy, T.J. Ford), and the team as constituted is still among the lower third in the Conference. Danny Granger is a wonderful scorer and all, but hes a secondary player on a contender at best and wheres his meaningful help from the team looking to feature him? Maybe Dunleavy comes back from a year-and-a-half injury and approximates the single solid NBA season hes ever had (2008) in seven years. Maybe T.J. Ford finally plays up to his potential without a starting caliber guard on the bench breathing down his neck. Maybe the whole is greater than its parts and head coach Jim OBrien can coax more out of this club than seems likely by simply looking down a roster sheet. Maybe. Still, even if all of that comes to pass, does that even make the Pacers a Playoff team?The simple fact is that while the Pacers have been playing it patient in their team-building, the rest of the East is passing them by. Theyve got some competent young pieces they can develop - Brandon Rush finished last season quite nicely - but they certainly dont have a whole lot in the stables to be envious of outside of Granger. Sure, they were a killer offensive club last season (105 ppg) but theyve lost two key scorers (Jarrett Jack and Marquis Daniels) and its hard to say that their defence has improved so much that they can offset the loss. Put another way, can Earl Watson and Dahntay Jones overcome (with their scoring and defence) the 27 ppg that Jack and Daniels combined for on average, taking into account that Jack is probably on par with the aging Watson at this point as a defender? No, probably not. As nice as it is to focus on cleaning up ones image, the Portland Trail Blazers were able to do it without grinding their development to a halt in the process. While not everyone can be lucky enough to land Brandon Roy (or LaMarcus Aldridge) in the draft, the Pacers moves this summer confuse as theyve gone and acquired players better suited to beefing up a Playoff team than rounding out a rebuilding roster. Is a four-year deal for Jones really going to help this team ascend the ranks of the East? He was a key cog for a very deep Denver team last year, but hes not an impact guy on his own. At best he was the Nuggets eighth-best player last season and he managed to catch on with a club that had the perfect use for him. Whats his role in Indy once Dunleavy returns full-time? Play the third SG on the depth chart role? Couldnt the team have invested in someone younger, with more potential, in that role instead? Someone who might actually develop into an asset down the road when this team is ready to compete again (unlike Jones, wholl be 33 at the end of his deal)? The Pacers evoke memories of those teams that think that they can rebuild on the fly, but often just keep themselves irrelevant for longer than is necessary as a result (recent iterations of the New Jersey Nets or Milwaukee Bucks come to mind).