Indiana Pacers and I Await New Beginning Tonight Against the Detroit Pistons
Like many people, I’ve lost touch with the NBA over the last few years.
Once Reggie retired from the Pacers, I felt the team lost its heart and I lost my emotional attachment. A lot has changed with the organization since that last playoff run with Reggie. Who am I kidding, a lot has happened with the team since “The Brawl†and much of it hasn’t been good.
What I have decided to do now, is start over. They way I see things, the Simon brothers have taken a renewed interest in this team, Larry Bird has realized the problems within, and between the three of them they are re-starting this organization.
If the last few Pacer seasons had been the Batman Forever and the Batman and Robin for this franchise, then this season is Batman Begins.
Expectations both nationally and locally have been set low, yet there is excitement surrounding the Pacers. For lack of a better term, it’s a fresh familiarity. What I mean is people are excited about the purple and gold but they don’t know who’s wearing the colors. I am one of these people. Sure I know Mike Dunleavy and Danny Granger, but the rest of the cast is largely unknown to me. I know we have “upgrades†at key positions, but it’s been so long since I followed, I can’t say that myself.
What I am going to start doing tonight, along with many of you long suffering Pacer fans, is renew my fandom. I am cashing out on my NBA bashing and starting all over with the franchise that taught me to embrace international culture (Detlef Schrempf and Rik Smits), showed me what a rifleman was (Chuck Person), and allowed me to win a spelling bee (R-E-G-G-I-E). No, it’s not going to be the same as 
when the brothers Davis (not really brothers) were down low, posting up, setting picks, and dominating the paint, but I can accept change and embrace the new energy surrounding this organization.
Ladies and gentleman, my name is Dave, and I am a renewed Indiana Pacers fan. I ask that you stick with this team, as I plan on doing, for the rest of this season. Tonight will be my first true introduction to this team and for the rest of the season I will write about and follow them.
It is in Jim O’brien we trust.
(Editor’s Note: For a preview of tonight’s Indiana Pacers 2008-09 season tipoff against the Detroit Pistons, as well as TV and radio information, visit the Indiana Pacers official website.)
[tags]indiana pacers, nba[/tags]
Tags: indiana pacers, NBA
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I’m sure they appreciate having you back since they had the lowest attendance in the league last year. I really hope they turn this around because I live in Indianapolis and ,although I’m not really a Pacer fan, I still think Indianapolis deserves a good NBA franchise.
P.S.- you know what really pisses me off right now? The band “the Franchize” has forever ruined that word for me to the point that I spell the word with a “z” first and have to correct myself to spell it correctly.
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Even worse than that, our family’s cat just had twins. Right now, everyone comes over and is just awash in love for the adorable twin kittens. But in a year or two, when they aren’t so cute anymore, they’ll just be the twin cats. Apparently, there is a band in Indianapolis that goes by the same name. I’m not all that familiar with their current work, but I do know that their saxophonist has a killer beard. Regardless, I dread the day when our adorable twin kittens begin to remind me of that jovial saxophonist with the beard of good humor. (On a side note, should a certain bearded saxophonist ever form his own band, it should be called [His Name] and the Beard of Good Humor. Almost as good as “morsels of tenderness”…or “records record rec recordings recordplayers recreation records.”
But getting back to basketball…
Indianapolis does deserve a good NBA franchise. (Damnit Gerlach…I just typed a Z before deleting it). I have never thought that Indy football fans deserved a team as consistently excellent as the Colts have been this decade, prior to this year. All the Colts fans out there who swear the Colts fan base is not fair weather — just wait. Maybe not this year, but if their current downward trend continues, more and more empty seats will start popping up in Lucas Oil.
Indiana sports fans in general are just not very sophisticated when it comes to football. Basketball, on the other hand, is a totally different story. Indy basketball fans will support a team that plays the game hard and values old school principles of good basketball. I’m with you — I hope this new season for the Pacers is a fresh start and that they can start to rebuild some goodwill with an obviously and justifiably frustrated fan base.
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[...] games into the season and I am psyched about my return to the Pacers. As of right now they are 1-1 but they could be 2-0. The opener against Detroit showed that the [...]