The Indiana Pacers started 0-3 and even though this isn’t the NFL where 0-3 means you pack your bags and start guarding against injury … it’s not a good look.
The first four games of the season, Paul George didn’t hit 20 points. Monta Ellis looked like the guy who wears uncomfortable clothes just because the cool kids do it and he wants to fit in. Jordan Hill was a head scratcher. George Hill looked like Sisqo.
Since then, a lot has changed.
In the five games since, the Pacers have gone 4-1 with the only loss being a competitive one in Cleveland, clearly the East’s best thus far.
George has not scored fewer than 26 in any of those contests. Hill looks like he needs to be getting minutes consummate with the pay he’s receiving. Ellis is still a work in progress, but improving.
PG13 will win comeback player of the year basically by default. It seems like it’s been so long, but at the time, George was reasonably one of the top 5 players in the league when he went down. If you really get to thinking about it, at his peak before breaking his leg, how many players had his type of range, explosion and athleticism to the basket, and ability/willingness to play defense?
You could argue, “maybe only LeBron.” No joke.
What’s just as encouraging is the rebounding totals, totaling at least nine for five of the last six games. Rebounding is easily a more physical proposition than anything on offense.
George, if you’ve watched him, has become increasingly at ease going to the hoop. No, he’s not showing up on the nightly highlight reel with his host of, “how the hell can a human being do that?” plays of old, but he’s going to the rim hard and finding ways to finish.
The confidence is overtly obvious, the same confidence that was reasonably missing last year when he played the final six games before exiting with another injury and then DOOM set in all off season.
The rest of the Pacers have picked up, too. While it’s confounding to understand how and why Ian Mahinmi gets more run than Jordan Hill or why sometimes Myles Turner and his obvious rookie flaws are coming off the bench over the scrappy Lavoy Allen, that’s just a Vogel-ism going on this season.
Ellis will round into form. He’s a volume shooter often passing up shots trying to fit in with a new team. That will work itself out in time.
The reason the Pacers are 5-4 and looking the part after an 0-3 start, though, is PG13 playing Rated R once again. This is a deep roster that, if it has a go-to guy, can compete for an NBA title. George has always been that guy, and is once again.
But … George Hill still looks like Sisqo.
