I do consider it important to note that I am not dismissing the potential of Paul George nor   do I wish him anything but success on the Pacers or any other franchise because for a 22-year old NBA player with the world in front of him, he certainly seems to have a good head on his shoulders.

But the word “potential” has shielded him from criticism on a fairly consistent basis. It’s fair to say that his scoring has not been consistent, his offensive assertiveness has been lackluster at times and his offensive game plan does not always compliment his natural athleticism, however, I will admit his defensive ability is quite valuable.

Basically what I am getting at is the concept of “selling high.” Paul George certainly has potential that may lead many of us to believe that he will improve in leaps and bounds. However, he has not shown us enough to be able to say vast improvement is lock by any means. The whole league would agree that “there might be something about this Paul George kid.” Which means that if Paul George does not make a huge improvement this season then his stock will probably never be higher than it is right now.

As I was taking a look at Tim Donahue’s excellent post about the Pacer’s offseason possibilities (really a must read) I talked myself into everything Donahue presented. I can see the logic behind it all. But I got to thinking about “what if these things just don’t happen.” Perhaps just due to bad luck. Donahue points out that Eric Gordan may demand a max contract, which would be a huge risk. Irsan Elyasova seems like a great fit, but another team might bid high for him forcing the Pacers to over pay. And I absolutely love the thought of Steve Nash on the Indiana Pacers, but financial reasoning aside it just might not happen because, you know, what franchise wouldn’t absolutely love the idea of Steve Nash on their team? Who knows what exactly Steve wants.

And perhaps that leaves the Pacers with re-signing Hibbert (and probably Hill) and attempting to retain the same basic core. In that situation their best chance of becoming a better team would lie in the player who is the most likely candidate for strong improvement: Paul George (perhaps along with Hibbert). Which allows you to see how much stake is truly put into Paul George. And at that point one might may want to look at one of their best assets as just that: an asset.

So I think it is fair to say that Paul George (at a very affordable price) could bring in significant talent to the Pacers who already have significant talent surrounding him. So I have provided a few examples of possible (and financially plausible) trades that are just meant to show the kind of potential that might be brought in if the Pacers were to move George. Obviously I have no idea if both sides of these trades would agree to the terms nor do I have the ability to know if they would truly make the Pacers better.

Paul George to the Philadelphia 76ers for Thaddeus Young

This would be a conservative trade. This would be the type of trade that the Pacers would make if they did have an inclination that Paul George’s ceiling is a little bit lower than most people think. In his fifth year in the league, Young is a little bit more likely to be getting close to the player that he is going to be in the future.

The stats between Young and George are quite similar. In fact, George’s playoff scoring and rebounding statistics were better than Young’s. But Young also came off of the bench and scored more efficiently and took higher percentage shots (leading to a higher field goal percentage). Young is also a very versatile player who has shot 50% over his career and can slide back and forth from small forward to power forward while playing good defense at either position. He would not be a big name, but he would likely fit seamlessly into the Pacers rotation as a player who does not have to start nor does he take many shots away from teammates.

Paul George to the Denver Nuggets for Kenneth Faried and Jordan Hamilton

Perhaps this trade makes less sense because you would be trading potential for different potential. But part of me believes that the potential that Faried has to offer is significantly harder to find. The guy wasn’t supposed to be a factor in his rookie season, but he ended up playing significant minutes in playoff wins. He could very well be Hansbrough 2.0. He has a relentless motor, incredible strength and he’s got enough offensive skills to be more than just an energy guy. Plus his nickname is the Manimal and he dunks the ball really hard.

Jordan Hamilton was also just a rookie last season and he received very limited minutes. But his size and position allow him the potential to possibly be as good as Paul George is right now sometime down the road. He did not get much playing time for a deep Nuggets squad, but he averaged nearly 20 points per game as a sophomore at Texas.

This trade would bring in two second year players at a very cheap price. One of which would make an immediate impact on the floor. This trade would also be made with the idea that Paul George may very well demand a lot of money down the line if he does make a fair amount of improvement. Being able to acquire young quality players before then is a possible strategy.

Paul George to the Houston Rockets for Kyle Lowry 

Kyle Lowry is coming off of a breakout season. More recently, he is coming off of a trade demand-in-the-making. Apparently he does not believe that he can play under coach, Kevin Mchale next season. While I do not know enough to take sides in their dispute, I will admit that I am completely on the Kyle Lowry bandwagon as far as his future as a player in the NBA.

I do not mean to make a grand overstatement when I say that the difference between “potential” and “results” is the difference between Paul George and Kyle Lowry. All I mean is that I think that Lowry had a significantly bigger stake in winning games for the Houston Rockets than George did for the Pacers. Lowry is a triple-double threat who scores, rebounds, passes, plays excellent off-ball and on-ball defense and makes his teammates play at a high level.

Of course Lowry is a point guard which would mean that more changes would have to come. Either the Pacers would have to choose not to resign George Hill or to trade Darren Collison. I think both of these players have bright futures in this league; I just think that Lowry is a better player than both. With the absence of George the Pacers would have a very small back court, which means they would have to address this with some sort of low-key signing or look towards the draft for a bigger guard.

Paul George’s Future

It is probably very unlikely that any of these exact trades happen and if the Pacers choose to keep Paul George then they likely have a lot to look forward to with his presence. In fact, you wouldn’t hear me complain. But I do feel that the Indiana front office is in a position where they have to consider the idea.

In our last Post-Game Grades of the season Tim Donahue gave George a C+. Donahue wrote, “No way around it, Paul George spent most of the series and most of this game as a disaster offensively, and we could spend days discussing his travails running the fast break. But, he’s young, and he’s a good kid. Bizarrely, if you want encouragement, watch him guarding Wade from tonight’s game. It will make you feel better about Paul, and also make you appreciate just how ungodly unstoppable Wade was.”

Very well said. It leaves Indiana with a little bit of a dilemma: Do you wait for potential or do you milk that word for everything it’s worth?

We knew this last week when a report leaked, but now it is official: Paul George is on the USA Select Team. The Select Team’s main purpose is to play against Team USA during its training camp in Las Vegas from July 6-12 in the lead up to the 2012 Olympics in London, which begin July 27.

Here is the full 13-man roster for the Select Team.

• Ryan Anderson – Orlando Magic
• DeJuan Blair – San Antonio Spurs
• DeMarcus Cousins – Sacramento Kings
• DeMar DeRozan – Toronto Raptors
• Derrick Favors – Utah Jazz
• Paul George – Indiana Pacers
• Taj Gibson – Chicago Bulls
• Gordon Hayward – Utah Jazz
• Kyrie Irving – Cleveland Cavaliers
• Kawhi Leonard – San Antonio Spurs
• Jeremy Lin – New York Knicks
• Klay Thompson – Golden State Warriors
• John Wall – Washington Wizards

This also, in theory, sets George on a course for perhaps playing for Team USA’s varsity squad. There are obviously a ton of wing players that will always be in contention, but having this on his resume obviously can’t hurt.

USA Basketball Chairman Jerry Colangelo said as much in statement.

“Being chosen for the Select Team is quite an honor, and it’s an important step in becoming involved in USA Basketball’s National Team program in the future,” said Colangelo. “In the past, current national team finalists like Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, Kevin Love, Derrick Rose, LaMarcus Aldridge, Andre Iguodala, as well as many other outstanding players got their USA National Team start through the Select Team.”

Remember who LeBron was supposedly scared to shoot late in Game and never should have dished to Dwayne Wade on Miami’s penultimate possession? Perhaps he was just worried that this would happen again.

Here are the Pacers’ top ten plays of the season, as compiled by the NBA. Otherwise known as the Paul George (#10, #8, #7, #4, #2) and Lou Amundson (#9, #6) show. Here are the candidates the video offers us. A few certainly don’t belong. But what did they miss? Speak now on your favorites and the largest omissions or forever hold your peace.

#10. Paul George punctuates and OT win over New Orleans by grabbing the deflection, crossing over Chris Kaman and busting out a Vince-Carter-in-the-Dunk-Contest-level-of-fludity-and-power windmill in transition (amazing … we have discovered a renewable energy source that could power the state of Indiana for the next decade … my #1)

#9. Lou Amundson over the head lay in vs. Washington (meh … no reason to be on this list)

#8. Paul George up-and-under layup in New York (whatever … pretty run of the mill)

#7. Paul George two-handed dunk on a give-and-go from Roy Hibbert against Boston (sensational … love this play … should be top five)

#6.  Lou Amundson grown-man-swats Orlando’s Earl Clark, who mistakenly thought he had an easy layup after Amundson turned it over in the back court (YES)

#5. David West sends a game vs. Cleveland into overtime with a waning-seconds runner (wonderful in context … pretty dull otherwise … wasn’t even a game winner … more bad defense than anything to over-celebrate)

#4. Paul George hits a 65-footer to close the half against Miami (these always make top ten lists … I’m never impressed)

#3. George Hill follow-dunks a Granger miss with authority against Minnesota (SICKNESS … George getting his Robert Pack on here)

#2. Paul George reverse, leaning dunk in transition after an amazing Lance Stephenson pass against New Jersey (this is what’s up … throw in the pass and this is obviously a better play than the PG dunk at #10, but whether or not you prefer this dunk or that one is more about aesthetic preference than objective quality … virtually equal)

#1. Leandro Barbosa saves a rebound while falling out of bounds, spots up behind the arc, receives the skip pass from George Hill, catches and shoots, gets fouled, makes the three, converts the four-point play (love it … so many great things happen on this play)

Regardless of rank, pretty nice little walk down memory lane of a tremendously fun Pacers season. And somewhat befitting this team that neither its best player (Danny Granger) nor its lone 2012 All-Star (Roy Hibbert) even make an appearance.

UPDATE: LICoolDre202 on Twitter already pointed out that they left out George Hill’s kick-save-and-a-beauty steal/breakaway/walk-off game winner over Golden State. That should definitely be on here. And probably number one. Perhaps the NBA left if off because of the blown kick call?

“One other change that we’re going to look at tonight,” Vogel said, ” and I haven’t made a final decision if this is going to be our playoff rotation – but we’re going to look at extending Paul George’s minutes with that second unit as well. Partially, because he’s a budding superstar, and partially because giving DC another guy out there he’s used to playing with will help the transition.

“So, Dahntay will be out of the rotation, unless we have foul trouble or a need. That will be for tonight, probably, then day-by-day for the next couple game to see where we’re at. Paul will play Dahntay’s normal minutes in the second quarter and the third quarter.”

This is the type of experimentation that makes sense given the Pacers’ current position in the standings. They are one win or one Atlanta loss away from locking up their best possible playoff seeding – third in the East. Given tonight – and the remaining two games – are all at home, the clinch feels likely.

On Thursday night, David West told me that it was his preference to play, but it wasn’t his decision. I followed up with Coach Vogel as to whether he’d rest players, and he was non-committal.

“When and if we clinch the third seed, I will talk to our guys and see what they want to do,” Vogel responded. He went on to say that he’d balance what he felt was best for the team with what they players feel is best for them. While some guys would certainly get some rest, Vogel seemed reticent to just shut things down.

“I don’t really feel comfortable with just going a full week without having played a real game with normal rotation,” Vogel finished his pre-game gaggle by opining.

And really, he doesn’t have to. The beauty of this Pacer roster is that they only have two players – Danny Granger and Darren Collison – who average over 30 minutes  per night. Granger leads the team at just over 33 minutes, which is his lowest average since his rookie year. Meanwhile, there are six players averaging between 19 and 29 minutes a night.

Compared to most teams, coach Frank Vogel can rest his players simply by playing his normal rotation. That’s a credit both to him, and to Larry Bird’s job of putting this team together.

Last night, the Pacers’ youngest starter was awfully excited about some new video game controllers he acquired. ”Gold plated !” he tweeted as he posted the photo on the upper left after thanking Zak of Laza Modz for making him custom Paul George Xbox components. Paul loves him some Call of Duty and was so grateful to now be able to play in style that he even got the guys behind the controllers some seats to last night’s Pacers win over the Thunder.

I doubt the controller is actually gold plated for real, but if it is, that’s pretty much the modern version of the Godfather: Part II gold phone. Regardless, pretty cool on all accounts.

UPDATE: Here is George’s new Call of Duty-style controller.

There are a number of things you can place blame for the Pacers losing to the 16-35 Nets. Indiana is in the midst of a very difficult stretch of schedule, and coming off of a 15-point win over the Miami Heat just three days ago, they clearly under-estimated the Nets. Danny Granger had a frustrating and unproductive night, scoring only 5 points and committing 3 turnovers before fouling out. They were also out-rebounded and turned the ball over more than the Nets.

But coming into the game, one would think the only chance the Nets would have of winning, let alone winning by 16 points, would be if Deron Williams had a monster game. By the time he was taken out with just under 3 minutes left in the game, D-Will had 30 points and 9 assists while shooting 11-for-19 from the floor. He did the most damage as the Nets pulled away in the fourth quarter, during which he dropped 13 points on 6-for-7 shooting.

Being realistic, the Pacers arguably had five of the seven most talented players in this game (with Gerald Wallace joining Deron as the Nets other representative). But the Nets had the most talented player. And Deron is really the only guy who played that can utterly take a game over. He is that kind of superstar. He is that good.

Despite lackluster performances by a few Pacers, some blame for the loss should be put on Frank Vogel’s lack of defensive attention on Williams. In fairness, Vogel did give the long-armed George Hill an extended assignment on Williams in the fourth and eventually put Paul George on him late, but the coach admitted after the game that it was little  help. ”[Deron Williams] is one of the best players in the world,” said Vogel to reporters. “We tried a bigger defender on him, but it didn’t matter. He was not going to be denied. When he’s going like that, he’s tough to stop.”

I understand that if it were easy to guard Williams then he wouldn’t average 22 points per game, but there are opportunities for double teams. In a game like this, you want to contain Williams as much as possible and live with whatever open shots it leaves his teammates. This is especially true on a night when the Nets are playing without Anthony Morrow and Brook Lopez.

It can be difficult to double team a point guard, but it is not impossible. When Williams makes his initial pass, ball denial becomes crucial. If he has the ball anywhere near the sideline, a trap could be implemented and only a difficult pass could beat the defense. The 76ers did this continually throughout the fourth quarter against the Bulls in early March, for example, and forced Joakim Noah, Carlos Boozer and Luol Deng to make plays with the ball.

With the game tied going into the fourth, it was Rose and another better-late-than-never act from Luol Deng that opened up a 13-point lead for the Bulls, and it seemed like all was well. Despite just terrible stretches of offense for good chunks of the game, it looked like the Bulls would run away from the Sixers and get the vengeance they wanted so bad.

But then Doug Collins decided that enough was enough and began to throw hard traps at Rose on essentially every single possession down the stretch. Collins had the long and athletic Andre Iguodala man up Rose, and directed one of his rangy bigs to double Rose and force the ball out of his hands. The ploy worked wonders as Rose was not able to get free and the other Bulls were not able to convert open looks.

The Sixers - on the back of reserve big man Thaddeus Young – quickly closed the gap and got the lead down to two on several occasions.

The Bulls ended up winning, in part because those guys made just enough plays but also because Rose is so good that he beat a double team late and made a running, off-balance 6-footer from the baseline in the waning seconds. It was just a tremendous shot that no defense could ever stop. The lesson in that game: Sometimes, you can only contain great players for so long, but limited success is still success and in-game adjustments gave the Sixers their best chance of winning.

As noted, Williams is a similar type of superstar who can put his team on his back. This means that he will often pick up his play in the fourth quarter. The Pacers do not have that type of player and rely on spreading around the scoring and consistency to get them by. When they play teams (even bad teams) with superstar-caliber players, offensive execution in the first three quarters becomes crucial so that when a player like Deron reaches another level, the Pacers can weather the storm by simply rebounding well and getting to the foul line.

The Pacers offensive struggles can more or less be considered a fluke (despite settling for jumpers and refusing to feed Hibbert after he missed a couple shots). However, Williams ability to slice up the defense is the greater problem.

It is true that the Pacers will not see Deron Williams in the playoffs, but they may very well see Derrick Rose. And if D-Will can drop 30 and 9 in front of a half-empty crowd at the Prudential Center on a Wednesday night in Newark during a meaningless game then you can only imagine what D-Rose will have in store for a playoff series. These caliber of players are great, but that does not mean that they cannot be game-planned for. If you come into a game just assuming they will “get theirs” because of the name on their jersey, then you will be on the wrong end of the scoreboard, especially if you don’t have a superstar to counteract them.

In NBA basketball, the better team usually wins. As we saw after Doug Collins’ in-game adjustment, even a successful strategic shift may not be enough to overcome a disparity in talent. But there is always something that can be tried when the current plan — or the players’ inability to try hard enough to execute that plan — isn’t working. The other option is to continue doing the same thing and hoping for different results. It was Albert Einstein who said that doing so is the very definition of insanity.

But after another loss to a good team last night in Atlanta, it is starting to look like the Pacers meteoric rise from the team that made the playoffs last year with a losing record to a borderline contender may have been based on unsustainable success not so dissimilar to Linsanity. From January 22 to February 3, Indiana went 12-4 despite playing 11 games on the road. They won in Boston, in Toronto, in Oakland, in Los Angeles (over the Lakers), in Chicago, in Orlando, in Minnesota and in Dallas. While that was a wonderful run that helped them compile the fifth best road record in the league as of today (12-9), it is starting to seem like it might have been an aberration during an NBA season that has seen seen many.

There is no reason for Pacers fans to panic. The fact is that this team did travel around the league and beat a lot of good teams on their home courts. You cannot erase that — not in the standings nor in this roster’s collective confidence. This Indiana team also still has better personnel, one through ten, than all but a few other Eastern Conference teams, even if they lack a truly elite player. And most important of all, the Pacers’ starting lineup has still performed at an elite level on both ends of the floor all year long (scoring 107.3 points per 100 possession while only giving up 95.1 points per 100 in more than 600 minutes).

But as the team continues to muddle through its current, brutal nine-game stretch of schedule that began Monday night in Chicago, it will be noteworthy to see if they can come out of the other side looking as rosy as they did going in. The next seven games are against Miami, Orlando, Portland, Philly, New York, New York and the Clippers. Only the Knicks, at 18-20 (but 10-5 over their past 15), are below .500.

So if, two weeks from now, we’re still talking about that February 3rd win over the Mavericks as being the Pacers’ last impressive victory, this team is going to seem a lot more ordinary than it has throughout most of this season. Minutes after Indiana completely out-classed the champs, Tim Donahue texted me “Is this for real?” We talked about it later that night, deciding that, ya know, geez, it might just be.

That could still be the case. But for anyone to continue to believe it, the Pacers are going to have to start beating some good teams again.

Paul George rocked the dunk contest on Saturday night. Coming in as the favorite to win after Iman Shumpert was out with injury, George somehow lost as Utah’s Jeremy Evans was announced the winner.

George had some high-level dunks, as leapt over both Dahntay Jones and Roy Hibbert on his first and then turned off the lights for a sweet glow-in-the-dark 360 windmill on his second. His last one was disappointing unfortunately, as he failed numerous times trying to get a Larry Bird sticker on the backboard with one hand while throwing it down with the other.

After a strong showing compared to his competition, he still lost.

His response? George told the Indianapolis Star that this year’s dunk contest was a joke.

“(Not to) take nothing away from the dunk contest, (but) it was a joke,” George said. “I guess whoever had the biggest celebrity involved in their dunk was going to be the winner. I guess I should have tried to reach out to some people.”

I completely agree with George. The dunk contest has turned into a prop contest. I also didn’t like the new rules. It took a round off from the dunk contest, along with the fact that only the fans could vote for who would win. Next year, the NBA should definitely bring the old rules back and have judges back on so it won’t be simply a popularity contest decided by a fan base that overwhelmingly can’t even dunk.

Along with that, this class wasn’t good at all. They all had some decent dunks, but there was no true star like the competition has had for the previous years. And that is something that George also thinks needs to change.

“you have to have the faces of the league come back and get involved in it,” George said. “That’s what really made it big back in the day when you had Jordan and Dominique going at it. That was the All-Stars and the guys that were the men in the league. That’s what fans want to see.”

I’m looking at you, LeBron. You should definitely join.

After having Roy Hibbert join this year’s NBA All-Star game, another Indiana Pacer will now be part of All-Star Weekend, as Paul George was selected as one of the contestants for the Slam Dunk competition.

None of the dunkers from last year will be returning, most notably Blake Griffin, Javale McGee, and DeMar DeRozan. This year will have a complete new class of dunkers, with George joining Derrick Williams, Iman Shumpert, and Chase Budinger. Honestly, this class looks pretty disappointing, as there isn’t guys like from last year. Many outlets are already calling this class lackluster with how young it is as well.

But I guess it also increases the chance of George winning. He has my vote because after looking all these guys participating, PG looks like he has a nice advantage with his size and speed. George will also take part in the Rising Stars game, too.

The contest will be different this year, however. There will be no judges, which eliminates one round. Each player has three dunks and the voting will be through NBA.com, Twitter, and texts. I guess we’ll see who wins, but it looks like to me that it comes down to George and Shumpert.

Here’s NBA.com’s take on George to preview the upcoming event.