Gregg Doyel

gregg.doyel@indystar.com

INDIANAPOLIS – Let’s talk about the difference between winning and whining. Let’s talk about irony. Let’s talk, obviously, about the problem that is Paul George.

Look, is he the Indiana Pacers’ best player? Yeah, he is. He’s the most talented Pacer of all time, and I mean that as no disrespect to Reggie Miller. There’s a difference between the best Pacer of all time and the most talented. Reggie’s the best.

Paul’s the most talented.

That’s a problem right there. With his mixture of size and skill, George should be the best Pacer ever. He should be a top-10 player in this league, not far behind LeBron, Kevin Durant, Steph Curry, Russell Westbrook, Kawhi Leonard and James Harden. He’s a top-10 talent, but a top-25 player.

George was saying after the Pacers’ 111-98 loss to Washington on Thursday night that he’s “going to bring everything and put everything I have into it,” but the numbers don’t show that. The numbers show an erratic scorer — he does other things well, none of them great — whose point total in the past five games has yo-yo’ed up and down. But more down: 31, 13, 27, 13 and finally 17 on Thursday.

All of that is a problem, but it’s not the problem today. Today, the problem is Paul George’s mind, his mouth and his me-first leanings that leave Pacers coach Nate McMillan in a tough spot.

The Pacers, who enter the All-Star break on a six-game losing streak, are missing their top two power forwards: Thaddeus Young and Lavoy Allen. Because of that, they’re playing two guys — Kevin Seraphin starting, C.J. Miles off the bench — ill-equipped for the position. Seraphin is big enough, but too slow. Miles is quick enough, but too small.

Meanwhile, Paul George is just right. He’s not merely a potential power forward — he’s the prototype in today’s smaller, sleeker NBA that demands a combination of size, skill and speed from that slot. Paul George has all three.

But he won’t play the four.

George refused to do it last season, complicating Larry Bird’s offseason remake of what had been one of the league’s bigger, slower lineups. And McMillan indicated before Thursday’s game that George has declined to do it this season even now, with the Pacers missing two power forwards. This is what McMillan told me when I asked him Thursday: Any thought, on an emergency basis, of putting Paul at the four?

“We’ve tried that, but Paul is …” McMillan said, then paused, unsure how to finish that sentence. Paul is … what?

McMillan tried again.

“Um, we’ve tried that some — but no,” he said. “I wish it was that easy, and it really should be, but it’s not.”

It really should be that easy? Man, that’s as close as you’ve ever heard any of George’s bosses — McMillan, Bird, former coach Frank Vogel — say what’s on everyone’s mind:

Paul George is putting himself ahead of the team.

George says otherwise, of course. When I asked him Thursday night if he’d play the four, he said he would. Maybe.

“It might get to that point of trying to stretch the floor,” he said, “trying to speed us up, try to bring something different, something new to this team.”

Those are George’s words about playing power forward. These are McMillan’s: “That’s something he doesn’t want to do.”

George does have some advice for his coach, however. After the Pacers surrendered 18 3-pointers in a 113-104 loss Wednesday to Cleveland, George offered up these suggestions to Nate Taylor, IndyStar’s Pacers Insider:

“Maybe it’s changing schemes up in how we guard these spread teams,” George told my team’s Nate, not his team’s Nate. “This is a new league, a new NBA. I think we might have to go a different route … as opposed to trying to make changes during games where we’re kind of not really sure how to guard something.”

Not sure who George was taking a shot at there, McMillan or Pacers defensive coordinator Dan Burke. Maybe both? Whatever. His next “suggestion” seemed to be aimed at Larry Bird:

"I think,” Paul George opined, “we (should) just build for where the league is headed.”

You mean, like moving the team’s 6-9 perimeter sniper to power forward? The Pacers tried that last season, Paul.

You said no.

McMillan, by the way, had no idea before Thursday’s game that his best player had offered a coaching criticism the night before. I asked him about George’s comments, and got this in response:

“He said what now?” McMillan asked. “He didn’t come to me about that.”

Well, no. Of course not. Paul prefers to do his talking through the media, telling his team — through us — that it needs “a spark.” Someone asked Paul if, seeing how you’re the best player, maybe you should provide the spark?

“Man,” George said, “I can’t do everything.”

But here’s something he can do: Explain what’s wrong with the Pacers. Thursday night he offered the following reasons for the Pacers’ slump:

“We’re getting a lot of unsureness (on defense) again.

“We’re not connected.

“We’re exhausted.

“We’re more of a traditional team opposed to the new NBA.”

And finally he decided: “It’s a lot of different things going on that we’re battling.”

This past week he complained — to the media, not his coaches — that “we’re not tough enough,” missing the irony that he refuses to play power forward because he does not, in a nutshell, want to deal with the pounding.

And then Wednesday night he complained — to the media, not his coaches — about the team’s inability to defend the perimeter with Young injured and slower Pacers having to fill that void.

“It’s definitely hurting us right now,” George said of Young being injured. “No knock on Kevin or any of our other bigs playing at the four spot. They’re just not used to being in that position of guarding shooters.”

Yeah, Paul. But you are.

So be the power forward, or do everyone a favor and be quiet about it.

Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter:@GreggDoyelStar or atfacebook.com/gregg.doyel