For a while now, there have been a lot of hints that there are some serious chemistry issues in the Pacers’ locker room. With so many young players and no established leader, that isn’t exactly shocking. But it seems as though things have reached a boiling point.

And Larry Bird sounds to be pretty fed up with the nonsense, reports Mike Wells.

Player professionalism is being questioned. Some players have begun arriving for practice just before the scheduled start time. Others constantly joke around during workouts.

The lack of commitment in practice is showing up in games. The Pacers have lost by at least 10 points in five of their past seven defeats.

“You have to have the players behind you and they have to be willing to work hard,” Bird said. “I know what’s going on; the players know what’s going on. We’re just not getting the effort.”

Even more scathingly, Bird said that, not only does he “know what’s going on” — he tried to fix it at the trade deadline.

“Our problem is internally,” Bird said. “I see what’s going on inside the locker room. I’ve seen a lot of it all year. I tried to address it with different people at the trade deadline.”

Bird was unable to move T.J. Ford, Solomon Jones, Brandon Rush or Josh McRoberts, who has not been a locker room disruption, before the trade deadline last month.

I’ve only been inside Indiana’s locker room a handful of times this year, so I have no actual, first-hand understanding of this team’s collective mental make-up. Just following the logic of what Larry is saying, however, it stands to reason that at least one of the players who was reportedly almost shipped to Memphis or New Orleans at the trade deadline was part of the problem (or at least Bird’s perception of the problem).

Then again, who knows? When Bird said he tried to “address it” at the deadline, he may have been referring to another, unreported, failed deal that we never heard about. Lance Stephenson, most notably during and after the atrocious loss in Houston last week, has been at the center of recent displays of internal animosity, so perhaps Larry shopped the troubled, talented youngster to other GMs across the league to no avail?

I’m just speculating here based on Larry’s comments.

But as Tom Lewis of Indy Cornrows rightfully points out, these are Larry Bird’s players. So ultimately, he, as the man who acquired every last player on this roster, has to take some responsibility for the way that the guys have essentially stopped being competitive since the All-Star break. If the team is “just not getting the effort” from these players during a playoff race then it’s quite possible that these simply are not the right players.

And that — on top of the ongoing, tedious, dramatic soap opera that this season has become — likely means that the players are not the only ones with a waning interest in whether or not Indiana makes the postseason.

I’m sure many fans feel the same way.

Memphis Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley said Thursday that he and his team did not pull out of a proposed deal that would have sent guard O.J. Mayo to the Indiana Pacers in exchange for power forward Josh McRoberts and a first-round pick.

“Indiana was not able to get it all together,” Heisley said in a telephone interview. “People are going to say I have reservations (about the proposed trade). I think from our point of view, we were interested in the trade going forward. It was a very, very difficult conversation for us. It took us a long time to decide. We were getting a lot of players at the two and three position and we were getting a little skinny at the four. We had three candidates we were looking at and when we decided on one, O.J. had to be part of that trade. It wasn’t that we were anxious to get rid of him.”

Like I said … not a lot of insight into exactly why Indy wasn’t able to “get it all together.” My entirely speculative guess is that it has to do with the fact that the NBA trading deadline is insane and phones are ringing off the hook all day for basically every GM in the league. Meanwhile, Memphis was also busy acquiring Shane Battier and dealing away Hasheem Thabeet so it’s not exactly like the Pacers had their full attention.

And according to Indy Star Pacers beat writer Mike Wells, there was a third team involved, New Orleans, and they were the one that pulled out at the last minute.

Call was logged at 3:01 p.m. and Orleans was involved, but they were the team that pulled out, according to a source. Rush was going to N.O.

The fact that the call came after the 3:00 pm deadline may have also been a factor here, as multiple sources were implying earlier. Who knows? Certainly not an idiot with no league sources such as myself.

UPDATE: Here’s more from the Grizzlies side on what exactly happened, the following coming from reporter Ronald Tillery of Memphis’ Commercial Appeal. (via SBnation)

After spending all of the time and energy it took to convince Griz owner Michael Heisley to agree to trade O.J. Mayo to Indiana, the deal fell through because the teams didn’t make the NBA’s 2 p.m. deadline.

Here’s why: Memphis and Indiana agreed to swap Mayo for forward Josh McRoberts and a first-round pick but Indiana insisted on making it a three-way trade to make the deal work financially.

In the final minutes leading up to the deadline, the New Orleans Hornets pulled out. Indiana recruited another team to keep it a three-team transaction. And there’s the rub. By the time the “other” third team got involved and everything was agreed upon everyone missed the deadline.

The NBA trade deadline is a hard one. Missing it by 30 seconds might as well be missing it by 5 hours.

The fact that Indiana “insisted” on tailoring the deal to their financial needs makes it seem that, yeah, the Pacers dropped the ball here more so than it just being too difficult to work things out with Memphis. Then again, how could this work financially with just OJ and McRoberts? OJ is making $4.5 million while Josh is making less than $1 million. The salaries wouldn’t work even if the Pacers threw in Brandon Rush, who was reportedly headed to the Hornets in the three-team proposal.

Once again … Who knows?

I’m sure we will hear from the Pacers front office on the particulars eventually. (UPDATE: Bird is being evasive so far.) In the meantime, I rather enjoyed Indy fan Bubbamania’s reaction to the fact that New Orleans may have been the saboteur in this deal happening.

NBA screws pacers again, since they run N.O

Could might be, Bubba. Could might be.

Lastly, Roy Hibbert’s got jokes, too.

They have given up at least 97 points in each of the past six outings, a stretch of futility during which they have allowed an average of 108.7 points per game. The FG% defense isn’t any better with an average FG% allowed of 49.0%. The one good showing came up in Portland, where they held the Blazers to 42.2%, but the other five squads have all shot north of 45% — with four of them finishing above the 50% mark. (The worst was the 54.3% allowed to the Clippers.) And they haven’t been much better protecting the perimeter, giving up at least 10 threes in each of their last three games.

This is weird because the team was excellent defensively in November and still borderline elite throughout December. But now, it seems as if the team has begun to concentrate so much on repairing its broken offense that they lost focus on the one thing that could help turn this season around.

Mike Wells decided to ask the team exactly what is going on.

“It’s like we’re overly concerned with our offense because it’s been a struggling point for us, that we’re slipping on defense,” swingman Mike Dunleavy said. “We need to get back to defending the way we’re capable of.”We just need to worry about the offense secondarily, because I think we’ve tried so hard to solve that, we’ve neglected the defense and now we’re not doing either one well.”

Danny Granger identified what is the most obvious reason for the recent defensive futility: Roy Hibbert has not played well enough to keep himself on the court, and the team is much harder to score on when he is clogging up the interior.

“Roy hasn’t been playing a lot lately,” forward Danny Granger said. “Roy used to give us a back line of defense when teams would drive on us. We’ve also had so many different lineup changes, too. That plays a part in messing up our schemes.”

Regardless of the “why?” question, the team now looks to have a below average defense to go along with one of the worst offenses in the league. A lot of teams have made the playoffs with a terrible offense and a high-level defense. Conversely, a lot of other teams have made the playoffs with a high-level offense and a terrible defense.

But to my knowledge, no teams have ever made the playoffs with both a terrible offense and a terrible defense. And I don’t see that trend changing — so the Pacers are going to have to pick it up on at least one side of the ball if they want to play more than 82 games this season.

Besides, this year’s team is playing the best defense any Indiana club has since 2006, so he has to be doing something right. You don’t just trip and fall into being a top ten defensive team. (Although the weak defensive efforts we have seen all too often in January are obviously a troubling sign that this early-season ranking might soon look hollow.)

I guess the issue of how this team is being coached just something that has been on a lot of people’s minds this week now that we officially enter the second half of the regular season.

Mike Wells sat down with O’Brien for a Q&A on the state of the team and his role in that. Among the topics discussed are the rotation-tinkering, Roy Hibbert’s struggles, transitioning to a “youth movement” and his future with the Pacers after the next 41 games.

Q: Is it frustrating that you’re at the halfway point of the season and still adjusting the lineup?

A: It’s not frustrating. You’re trying to find the right balance and the right rotation that will allow you to play winning basketball. If you’re not playing winning basketball, then you’re always going to tinker with the lineup. Nobody gets a free pass from the standpoint of their playing time. If people are not playing at the level where I feel it gives us the best chance of winning, then I’ll adjust. You have Danny (Granger), who is going to get his minutes. Darren (Collison) is playing at a pretty good and consistent level. Other than that, I’m trying to find the right combinations.

Q: You have players going from being inactive to getting minutes in the rotation. Can you explain your rationale behind it?

A: It does change because we’re looking for the right combinations and you can’t dress everybody. I’m constantly looking at different situations. The guys know that. For an example, I’m looking at Paul (George) to see if he can give us more of a consistency than what we’re getting from Brandon (Rush). What you can’t do with a young team where the majority of the players are of equal levels of talent, is if they’re not playing at the level you think they need to be playing at, you need to make changes. I’m never going to hesitate to do that, and I’ve shown that.

Like with these responses, there isn’t a lot in O’Brien’s answers to Wells’ other questions that is surprising or particularly illuminating, but head over to the Star to read six more questions and answers. It’s nice to at least see O’Brien willing to respond to the most prevalent criticisms I’ve heard fans throw at him.

The front-runners for Melo, the New Jersey Nets, yesterday pulled out of trade talks. Oligarch owner Mikhail Prokhorov has assured everyone that this isn’t some negotiation ploy; the Nets are done dealing with Denver. So the timing does make sense. New York would want to jump into the Melo sweepstakes immediately and thus a Randolph-for-a-pick deal with Indiana is logical.

But it’s all poppycock, says Mike Wells of the Indianapolis Star, the long-time NBA reporter we should be trusting right now. On Twitter, he has informed me that Knicks GM Donnie Walsh (and former Pacers GM who Wells knows well) is calling BS on the whole deal.

“Donnie Walsh has shot rumor down … He said Pacers have not proposed any offers to him for Randolph.”

More emphatically, he reported this:

Indy has NOT acquired Randolph. Pacers already have 15 players on the roster and they’re over the salary cap.

Well, there ya go.

Here’s another mitigating factor Wells notes.

Bird has always liked Randolph, but Pacers are looking to add veteran rotation players. They’ve already got enough youth on their roster.

Lastly, there is one more logistical hurdle of a Pacers/Knicks deal that makes Randolph-to-Indy unlikely. The Knicks don’t want a player in the deal; they just want a pick. And since both Indy and NYC are over the cap, the salaries would have to match. This means it couldn’t just be a pick for Randolph; the Pacers would have to add roughly $2 million to match what Randolph is making this year.

they would have to add a player. my man @alanhahn at newsday says knicks only want a draft pick. that eliminates indy

UPDATE: The Pacers do have a trade exception of $3.5 million that I forgot about, so may be able to get this done without sending any players to New York.

Probably for the best.

As mentioned, I’m pretty sure Randolph isn’t any good.

UPDATE: Business Insider is now admitting that they got this one wrong, adding this addendum to their original report.

Multiple reports say that Randolph is at practice [with the Knicks]. Appears as though our information is wrong. We sincerely apologize for the error. We’re reaching out to our source to find out what went wrong

So much for that.

Mike Wells told us this information.

This is frustrating to Darren, writes Mike Wells of the Indianapolis Star.

“I don’t know why I didn’t play,” said Collison, who has started all 19 games he’s appeared in.

“I’m not going to lie, it’s been tough. Right now, I’m not used to it. It is what it is.”

O’Brien liked what Price could bring to the Pacers, so he got his shot.

“I thought our best chance of coming back was with A.J. in the game because he spaces the court, he shoots the 3 and he also needed playing time,” O’Brien said. “I also think he did a nice job.”

O’Brien has sat Collison in the past because he prefers Ford’s experience. Collison’s problem is that he’s still having a difficult time running the offense and playing the type of aggressive defense O’Brien wants.

Collison is averaging 13.5 points and 4.2 assists in more than 28 minutes a game.

“It’s real tough, but I guess you have to control things when you’re in the game,” Collison said. “When you’re not in the game, you just have to stay in tuned and try to help other guys.”

Aside from the normal ups and downs of winning and losing, things have by and large been smooth sailing in Indiana so far this year. There was the summer arrest of Lance Stephenson and the five-game suspension of Brandon Rush for failing a drug test, but there has been almost no turmoil since.

Given that, it will be interesting to see how this reverberates over the days and weeks to come. Stay tuned.

The best measure of team defensive prowess remains points scored per 100 possessions. In that, Indiana remains merely the 8th best team in the NBA at 102.9 points allowed per 100 possessions. (League average is 106.8 and the Celtics lead the league with 99.2.) So, yeah, obviously the Pacers are not the best defensive team, largely because they foul too much and don’t cause many turnovers.

But when it comes to preventing teams from making shots, they are — at least for now — tops.

Now for the bad news.

As you can see in the below tweet from the Indianapolis Star’s Mike Wells, who first brought this to my attention, the Pacers have not been able to translate that ability to cause misses into victories as well as the other stingy defenses throughout the league have. How come? Probably that whole highly-mediocre-offense-that-never-gets-to-the-line-or-scores-second-chance-points thing.

Sebastian Pruiti of NBA Playbook wrote a wonderful break down of Indy’s final bucket last night. We pick it up midway through with Pruiti discussing Roy Hibbert’s decision to slip the screen. (There is video and telestrator work if you click through.)

Hibbert sees what is going on and just forgets about setting the screen and runs straight to the rim.  This is fantastic awareness by Hibbert, he sees nobody is responsible for him and just tries to get to an open space.

Pau Gasol is a little late in noticing Hibbert’s cut to the rim, and he is trailing behind the play.  The Pacers’ terrific floor balance also plays a role here since the Pacers are so spread out that it puts the Lakers in a tough position.  Stay with your man or help out.

Both Kobe and Odom decide to stay with their men (Rush & Posey) and not help defend Hibbert.  This allows Hibbert to get an easy dunk on Gasol.

Dexter Fishmore is upset with how his Lakers played last night but concedes that, last night anyway, the Pacers were simply the better team, especially on the defensive end.

Indiana earned this W. They competed with hustle and smarts. They defended extremely well and with impressive discipline. The Lakers managed only a point per possession, their worst output of the year, and it felt like every point they scored was an uphill struggle. If you watched the game, how many Laker baskets do you remember that resulted from Pacer defensive breakdowns? For me, the answer is zero. These guys stuck to their assignments, stayed in front of their men, rotated when necessary and challenged seemingly every shot.

Kelly Dwyer of Ball Don’t Lie knows the Pacers are good — but how good?

I’m here to tell you that Indiana’s 8-7 record is a mirage.

Because they’re actually better than 8-7.

I don’t know how much better, because properly finishing close games still has some value in this league, but this team’s point differential is eighth in the NBA, ahead of teams in Utah, Chicago, Oklahoma City, Phoenix, Portland, Denver, and Atlanta. And point differential, not win/loss records, has long been the most telling statistic when it comes to ranking teams. You might not like the idea of the Pacers playing as this league’s eighth-best team over the first five weeks of the season, but points are points.

ESPN’s J.A. Adande got Roy to talk about how he improved this offseason.

He’s noticeably leaner and much more effective, thanks to a summer in which, “I watched every calorie I ate, I did MMA trainer, pumped my knees and everything like that,” Hibbert said. “I cut down from 14 percent body fat to 8. I’m at 250 [pounds] right now. I started out at 275. I just feel like I’m moving better and I’m not a big stiff.”

Darius Soriano of Forum Blue and Gold was thoroughly impressed by Roy last night.

it all started with Hibbert.  The Pacers run an offense that takes a lot of action from UCLA’s classic high post sets while also incorporating principles of the Flex and the Princeton offense.  They run a lot of motion, screens, and back cuts and Hibbert does a lot of initiating from the high post where he picks out cutters or takes his own (much improved) jumper from about 18 feet.  And when he wasn’t operating from the high post, he was doing damage from the low block by hitting his jump hook from both the right block and the from the middle with relative ease.  When Hibbert didn’t have the ball in his hands he was setting good screens to free up his mates for dribble penetration or curls into open space where they could get up good shots.  It’s easy to see why he’s the early leading candidate for most improved player as he’s taken on a heavy burden for his team and really stepped up in a variety of areas to improve them on both sides of the floor.

Mike Prada agrees with me — and Tom Lewis of Indy Cornrows — that the victory was more about the Pacers playing well than simply the Lakers having an off night.

The operative question to come out of last night’s surprising 95-92 Indiana Pacers victory over the Los Angeles Lakers is this: did Indiana take the game away from the Lakers, or did Los Angeles give it away with poor play.

Naturally, it depends on your perspective. For my money, it looked like the former. The Lakers certainly could and should have played better, but I think their poor play occurred in large part due to Indiana’s defensive intensity and offensive execution.

Mike Wells is starting to think this team is playoff-bound.

I heard from several people after the Pacers beat the Heat in Miami last week.

“I need to see them do it more once for me to start believing in them,” one person said. “Besides, the Heat aren’t as good as people think.”

I think it’s about time that this person and whoever else doesn’t believe in the Pacers to change their tune.

Hey, I’m the same person who said they would have a difficult time making the playoffs.

The Pacers continue to gradually change my thought about their playoff chances as each game passes (I still say they have to stay relatively healthy).

And, oh yeah — Wells is also reporting that one other guy you might have heard of thinks the Pacers are pretty good, too.

I don’t think this is much of a surprise.  Brandon still has a long way to go, but he is a good defensive player and fits in with the rest of the youth movement.  Picking up his option – well – it keeps the Pacers’ options open.