Unfortunately, having Roy Hibbert concentrate on being a defender is not going to cut it. He is not a good defender. Hibbert often gets himself in bad defensive position and then commits fouls that he shouldn’t because he cannot recover quickly enough. He has improved in this area from his rookie year, but he is still a liability on the defensive end of the floor. He blocks shots and that’s about it. He has to be a low post scorer to be effective or he should not be resigned.

Take a look at game three. The Pacers were far better off at the defensive end with the Jeff Foster-Tyler Hansbrough combination than with the Hibbert-Hansbrough combination. Why was that? Foster’s a much, much better defender than Hibbert.

You could go out and get a starting power forward and bring Hansbrough off the bench as a sixth man, but that doesn’t fix the problem of having a center who is not going to be your low post scorer. Hibbert can’t play the high post nearly as well as Hansbrough. All you would have is a new power forward who could post up and a center with no defined role. I don’t see how that makes the team better. Besides, Hibbert’s own comments show that he believes he is the low post scorer on this team… even if he doesn’t execute that role very well.

If you were going to trade Danny Granger, you better get a star in his place, because he’s the best thing the Pacers have going offensively. He’s not a one-on-one creator for late game heroics and he does force shots sometimes. However, if he’s not the number one option, he’s still far more valuable than anyone else on the current roster. Granger is the best outside scorer on this team. There’s no one on the Pacers that can replace that role.

Hibbert is better than he was a rookie, but if you want to make this Hibbert vs. Granger choice, I’d take Granger 10 times out of 10.

Fortunately, we don’t have to make such a choice. We can keep both players. We can move both players… but only if it makes this team better. All moves have to be made with an eye to making this team better. Finding a way to close out games and establish a low post presence is critical to this team’s future.

Also, I was at the game last night and there was a possession where he got the offensive board inside the low block and instead of going up hard and throwing it down, he saw contact coming and laid it up. Because he was worried about the contact he missed it and I believe boozed came up with the rebound on the other side. Pacers and hibbert have to figure out something for him.

I’m interested to hear more of your thoughts on Hibbert. Your paragraph is fair, but it does talk about him in a vacuum. I mean, it is not necessarily that the Pacers have to have him be a scorer to be successful. If they got a PF who can score, that solves the issue of low post scoring. In that scenario, Hibbert can focus on being a defender and rebounder. His height is valuable (and rare). However, this would assume that we believe he CAN get better at those things. And without getting a PF, it would assume Hans can fill the scoring role down low which is unlikely considering his size.

When you look at all positions, my opinion is that Granger’s spot is the most expendable because of the ability that position SHOULD have to make his own shots. Whereas NBA’s history is full of examples of champs who have big man that aren’t scoring threats. Not to mention that getting someone like that would draw more double teams and be able to get the ball more easily to Hibbert in the post on a regular basis (assuming he makes his bunnies). So, in the end, I find Granger to be the bigger drain on his position than Hibbert. Also, Granger has plateaud, whereas Hibbert has improved all three years–a trend that could continue.