Writer Connor Allen

On November 19th 2004, a little boy and his younger brother, up well past their bedtime, sit in silence as they watched their favorite basketball team establish itself as championship favorites. In the waning moments of this dominant performance, the Indiana Pacers franchise self-destructed. All it took to destroy this contender was one beer thrown by a Mr. John Green, as Ron Artest charged into the stands for revenge, the two boys silence transformed from one of necessity to one of shock. As the incident continued and Stephen Jackson joined Ron Artest in the stands the older one finally turned to his brother and said be quiet we need to watch this. The boy had no true understanding of the repercussions that were to come but he was certain he was witnessing history, and he knew that his team was writing itself a page that would end up on the wrong side of history. The event that occurred that night has been dubbed the Malice at the Palace; in the course of one night the entire franchise was marred forever as they began to represent everything that people viewed as wrong with the NBA. The image of Ron Artest and Stephen Jackson assaulting fans became the rallying point for anybody who looked at NBA players as thuggish; the damage the event did to the league eventually caused David Stern to put into place a dress code in an attempt to clean up the league’s image. As for that little boy, he realized the championship door for the Pacers had slammed shut. This traumatizing event sent him into a nearly decade long spiral that concludes with him writing a blog post about how his team dealt with the fall out that he knows nobody will read, but his therapist said was imperative for him to move on.

While the league tried to deal with the fallout from the Malice and I bounced from child therapist to child therapist, the Pacers had an even trickier situation to deal with: what to do with the players involved in the brawl? At first they seemed to go the route of pushing forward and keeping the team together by allowing the 2005 trade deadline to pass without making any moves. In fact it wasn’t until a year later that the Pacers made their first big step toward moving on from the brawl, trading Artest for Peja Stojakovic at the 2006 trade deadline. This move made it clear they had no intentions of keeping the team together and the lack of moves the year before was likely a result of the long suspensions given to the players involved in the brawl. Then a year later the Pacers sent Stephen Jackson to the Golden State Warriors in return for Mike Dunleavy and Troy Murphy. The actions by management made it clear they were going to prioritize acquiring players with high character over players with talent. Then on Draft night in 2008 they unloaded the last high profile participant in the brawl in Jermaine O’Neal, receiving the 17th pick in return.

Now that management had cleaned up the mess left behind by the brawl, they had to focus on rebuilding the team. The first block actually came 3 years earlier during the 2005 draft when they selected Danny Granger with the 17th pick, by the end of the 07-08 season he had become the new face of the franchise. The next piece was added with the 17th pick they acquire from Toronto for O’Neal, which they used to select Roy Hibbert. After a successful career at Georgetown Hibbert’s NBA prospects seemed in question as a result of his lack of mobility and weak post game. The next year showed no signs of progress as they stumbled to the same 36-46 record as the year before and selected Tyler Hansbrough with the 13th pick. In 09-10 the Pacers had their worst season since 88-89 finishing 32-50 and obtaining the 10th pick in the draft. Yet even as they were hitting a 20 year low they still weren’t losing enough games to end up with a top 5 pick that many view as instrumental in any rebuilding process. They were a classic treadmill team, Danny Granger was good enough to keep them from being a bottom dweller but couldn’t be the best player on a team with any real aspirations.

So on draft night 2010 being a Pacers fan was a rough experience, there wasn’t any sign of success on the horizon and we were in more need for a savior than Princess Leia. But it’s hard to find a savior and in the build up to the draft there wasn’t much to get excited about, Cole Aldrich anybody? Luke Babbitt? Patrick Patterson? So as the Pacers pick approach it was hard to muster much excitement but there was one intriguing prospect, Gordon Haywood, the boy who almost beat the man with the shiny forehead, the hometown kid from Butler. To me the fit felt perfect and I had a feeling that due to record low attendance numbers the year before, the Pacers front office was going to make the pick to try to garner excitement. Then with the 9th pick Utah selected Haywood and as a Pacers fan it felt like one more step into the hopelessness of mediocrity. To quote Harvey Dent “The night is darkest before the Dawn,” and that statement encapsulates the 2010 Draft for me because with the 10th pick hope dawned. With the 10th pick in the 2010 NBA Draft the Indiana Pacers select Paul George Fresno State University, Paul George who? Fresno State? They play basketball?? Then the draft analyst began to talk about him and show highlights, the analysis on him was lots of raw talent but if he developed he could be the steal of the draft. And given that at this time I was more desperate for hope than a crack addict for their next fix, I grabbed on to those words “Steal of the Draft,” “Future Superstar,” “Face of Franchise,” and got behind the Paul George era.

As the next season began it seemed as if the team was still stuck on the treadmill, but everything changed when Frank Vogel replaced Jim O’Brien mid-season. From that point on the Pacers played above 500. ball and snuck into the playoffs, granted with only 37 wins. Even after a first round exit at the hands of the Bulls, it was hard not to have hope for the future. On draft night 2011 the Pacers traded the 15th pick, Kawhi Leonard, to the Spurs for George Hill who filled a void at point guard. Then in free agency the Pacers signed David West to a 20 million over 2 years contract, which was a steal for a player of West’s caliber and resulted from the concerns about his torn ACL.

Suddenly the Pacers were a team to be reckoned with, going 42-24 in the lockout-shortened year and grabbing the 4-seed in the playoffs. After beating Orlando in 5, the Pacers moved on to play the Heat. After dropping Game 1 the Pacers won the next two and blew Miami out of the building in game 3. And as game 4 loomed and the national media picked apart LeBron James I made the cardinal sin of being a sports fan: I believed. Then LeBron James happened and as I watched game 4 progress and saw Lebron had found that next level I knew it was over. The Heat won the next two games in convincing fashion as they finally found their championship gear, leaving the Pacers behind in the dust.

Now the expectations were raised, the team’s performance against the Heat had shown they could play with the best and the animosity that lingered from the series made it clear the Pacers had one goal: beat Miami. It was a quiet offseason with management deciding to just run things back with the same group. Then with just weeks until the season tip-off Danny Granger underwent knee surgery and suddenly the Pacers had to start the season without their leading scorer from the year before. The team struggled to adjust going 4-8 in their first 12 games. Then two events occurred that straightened the ship. First, Paul George became the player Pacers fans had hoped he would become and established himself as the new leader of the team. The second thing was the growth of a hidden gem from the same draft as George to replace Granger in the starting lineup. With the 40th pick in that draft, the Pacers took their first chance on somebody with questionable character since the brawl when they picked Lance Stephenson. The first two years saw Lance play sparingly, with his biggest moment coming when he taunted LeBron in the playoffs. But in game 7 of the regular season Frank Vogel insert Lance into the starting lineup and he hasn’t come off of the bench since.

The Pacers were able to get the 3 seed in the East and after beating both the Hawks and Knicks in 6, they once again found themselves faced with the task of defeating the Birdman-lead Miami Heat. In a series that saw Paul George and Roy Hibbert elevate their play to superstar and All-Star levels respectively, the Pacers were able to force a Game 7 in Miami. After a hard fought first quarter Miami seized control in the second and never let go steam rolling the Pacers by 23. After a spring bloom in the playoffs the question that lingered was are the Pacers here to stay.

The 2013 offseason was an active one for the Pacers as they attempted lockdown their core and fix a bench that struggle to keep the Pacers in games. The two biggest moves though came in the form of locking up their own players with Paul George and David West signing for 80 million over 5 years and 36 million over 3 years respectively. Both moves showed a commitment for the team that was on the brink of the Finals and made it clear that this was the core going forward. The next goal of the offseason was to fix the bench, in free agency they signed CJ Watson to play back up point and Chris Copeland to provide some much needed scoring off the bench. Then before the season started they acquired Luis Scola for Gerald Green, Miles Plumlee and a 2014 first round pick. It seemed like the bench had been shored up and the 2013-14 season started to feel like something special.

The start was magical; with a 16-1 start and Paul George making what seemed to be the leap suddenly it felt like there wasn’t a team in the league with a brighter future. The team inevitably slowed but after 55 games their record was 42-13 and they had the best record in the league. Yet even after so much early season success the Pacers still made two high profile moves to try and strengthen the rotation. Both of these moves prioritized talent over character, after the success project that was Lance Stephenson the Pacers front office seemed to think they were an organization that was immune to the consequences of having too many character question marks in a locker room.

The first splash came when they signed Andrew Bynum. Even after watching Bynum manipulate the Cavaliers into paying him 6 million dollars for him to quit on the team the Pacers still decided he was somebody they wanted in their organization. It would have been one thing if this was the first instance of Bynum displaying poor character but his career was littered with questionable behaviors, be it the assault he performed on JJ Barea in the playoffs or going bowling while recuperating and reinjuring his ACL. Now I must admit I was in favor of the move at the time, it seemed to me to offer low risk and high reward move plus it prevented the Heat from signing him. But in retrospect it should have been clear that Bynum’s presence would disrupt the chemistry of the team.

Then on February 20th the Pacers prioritized talent again when they shipped out one of their locker room leaders in Danny Granger. The same player who carried the team through the post Malice years, the player who sacrificed his own numbers for the good of the team, the player who came back from injury to the team that had been his and was willing to come off the bench. In return for this cornerstone of the franchise the Pacers received somebody whose coach had earlier this year publicly stated need to fix his attitude and whose college teammate released a book that described antics of his that bordered on insane and dubbed him “the Villian.” But the tantalizing potential that Evan Turner offered swayed Pacers management to take the risk. Now I will admit that with Granger’s struggles during this season the move did seem to offer a substantial upgrade in the talent department but I feel that for this team it was always more about the character than the talent.

This team’s identity was one of cohesion, a group of guys who played for each other not themselves, a team that got after it on the defense end and was physical with its opponents, but most of all a team that relied on teamwork over individual talent. But at some point in all this nitpicking the team lost this identity; no longer do you watch them play and imagine them as a band of brothers instead you see a team that meshes worse than oil and water. Now I don’t know what triggered this, it could just be the addition of questionable character into the locker room. It’s also possible that it was partially caused by Lance Stephenson feeling he was snubbed from the All Star team. Or maybe Paul George’s alleged scandal of impregnating a stripper, Paul George’s alleged scandal of cheating on Doc River’s daughter with said stripper, Paul George’s alleged scandal of send pictures of himself to a gay man posing as woman, Paul George’s alleged scandal with Roy Hibbert (Paul and Roy for 3 ), the list goes on with this team but one thing is certain the team has crumbled.

In the final 27 games of the year the Pacers went 12-15 as they scored at the rate your dorky friend scores with hot females. I spent much of this time making excuses for the team, it’s just a slump, all the best teams coast for stretches, Paul George is going to pull it together, Roy Hibbert is an all star, they just need time to mesh, they’re restless for the postseason. But no matter how much I denied it the facts remained, the Pacers were sputtering at a historic rate. As the regular season closed I found myself watching the standings hoping for what I believed to be the easiest path for the Pacer. I wanted the Hawks in the first round, then anybody but Chicago in round 2. Well the matchups I hoped for became a real possibility with Atlanta being the first round matchup and though a matchup with Chicago loomed in round 2, they still had to get through the Wizards who presented a difficult matchup for the Bulls.

Yet here I sit, writing this on the eve of the Pacer’s must win game 6 in Atlanta and find myself in a sort of shock, how did it get this bad? I felt like somebody at the end of a crumbling relationship who keeps asking them self how they let it get so bad. They just keep asking how they didn’t see this coming, how they didn’t see all the flaws in their love. Here I sit, wondering how I didn’t see the Pacers strikingly clear flaws: the inability to score, how the bench was still weak, and how they had lost their defensive identity. How did I fall for Paul George’s early season hot streak, how did I trust Lance Stephenson, and why did I accept Andrew Bynum’s hair? But most of all why did I let myself believe, hadn’t I learned anything from that November night a decade ago?

Maybe the answer does lie back in the Palace but maybe that answer isn’t in the brawl and maybe the answer isn’t even for me; maybe instead the answer is for the team itself and maybe the answer lies 15 years before the brawl with the Bad Boy Pistons. Those teams were built on the ideas of toughness and defense and being a team, the same qualities that once defined this Pacers team. So maybe the Pacers should look back to history, learn from it just as anybody can, take the lessons that made the Pistons successful and reestablish the identity they once had. Maybe they will find a way to harness the cohesion that took the Bad Boys to two championships. Maybe Frank Vogel will lock them in a room and make the entire team watch ESPN’s documentary on the Bad Boys to try and jog their memory to how they used to be and show them clips from the Malice at the Palace to show them what the path their going down leads to. Or maybe they won’t learn anything and maybe they won’t change but if they don’t, the Pacers organization could find itself as lost as it was on the morning of November 20th, 2004.

As for me, I will be tuned into TNT at 6 pm on May 15th as the Pacers try to end the series with the Wizards, if they drop this game they will face the challenge of winning yet another game seven. So what will I do as a fan? I will watch this team and I will pour my heart into them because something about it all makes me want to believe. I want to believe this is our year, I want to believe we are going to pull it together, I want to believe they can look back to the Palace, learn from the bad boy and transform back into a title contender. And so I do, I let myself get sucked in and I convince myself they can still do it because that’s what we do when we fall down a hole, we grasp for straws hoping one will be the stick strong enough to pull us up to the promised land.