u/yoadknux

Obviously I'm not talking about the brawl as an event, that was an all-time franchise devastating event and the NBA screwed the Pacers hard while taking all responsibility from the Pistons, Ben Wallace, their fans, and their lackluster security.

I'm talking about the team itself. For me that era spans from 02-03 to 06-07 and peaked at 03-04.

First lets talk about the positives. Best regular season record in franchise history (61-21). 6-time All-star Jermaine O'neal (3rd in MVP voting), Defensive player of the year Ron Artest, 2nd in voting 6MOTY Al Harrington, all under Reggie's leadership who was still balling in spite of approaching his 40s. Supporting cast was strong, with Tinsley, Foster, Johnson, Croshere, although scoring wise there weren't many options.

Now the negatives. Chemistry, chemistry, chemistry.

1. Jermaine O'neal and Ron Artest were constantly butting heads about leadership and whose team it is. This is not speculation, this was stated by Reggie himself. JO's disciplined style was incompatiable with Ron's wild personality.

2. Ron was a locker room cancer. During the 03-04 ECF, he did not communicate with the team and missed practice, this was stated by JO. Ron asked for a MONTH off to produce Rap. Ron disappeared from training camp to host the Source awards. And of course, the brawl.

3. This team had a fair chance in 03-04 and they blew it, losing to the Pistons in 6. Even if by some miracle the Pacers managed to get by the Pistons, they'd still need to beat Kobe/Shaq's Lakers, which is a non-trivial task. The Pistons had Ben Wallace to contain Shaq, that's not something the Pacers had.

4. After 03-04, the Al Harrington asked out and was traded for Stephen Jackson. Jackson played well for the Pacers, and was a good fit, but was really more of a sidegrade. There weren't any additional changes, and they were basically running it back.

5. Say the brawl never happens and the Pacers finish top 3 in the East in 04-05. How will they dethrone the 03-04 Champions (Pistons), the actual 04-05 Pistons (Spurs), and the 59-win Wade/Shaq duo (won in 05-06)? There were LEGIT three championship teams better than the 04-05 Pacers.

6. Tinsley, as revealed by Harrington and Jackson, was also a disruptor. It is said that before the foul on Wallce in the brawl, Tinsley approached Ron and told him "now's your chance to get one back". He also had a key role in another devastating event, known as...

7. The Club Rio shooting. Entire team in a strip club, Tinsley ends up fighting some gang members, Jackson draws his pistol and gets run over... That's when the team fully dismantled.

8. At the end of the day, we're talking about a team that made the ECF once and that's it. The 99-00 team made the Finals and is rarely talked about. The Reggie-led teams of the 90s made the ECF 5 times in 7 years. The Smashmouth PG24 team made the ECF back-to-back, and that's without Danny Granger who was one of the best scorers in franchise history (That's the real What-if for me!). The Hali team of course which is perhaps the best Pacers team of all time.

I loved that team. JO is one of my favorite players of all time. I have like 4 jerseys from that era. But the more I look back, the more I realize - This team would not have won a championship, brawl or no brawl.

Personally I remember two things. I was in junior high at that time.

The first was "Oh damn, silver border, intense artwork, this is cool"

The second was "But Pokemon cards aren't really popular anymore, and I've outgrown it".

Now that I'm collecting again, I'm going back and forth about how I feel about these EX cards. They're objectively beautiful, they look more premium, but they're just not as vintage and not as nostalgic as the base/neo era cards.

The strange thing is that these cards have also dramatically increased in price recently. For example a raw (ungraded) Unseen Forces Lugia EX sold for $10k this month - these are numbers that rival and even surpass First Edition Neo Genesis Lugia. Are we seeing a trend?

That's a tough one for me.

I'm going with NWN1 because of how innocent it feels initially. Absolutely epic soundtrack and all the early Aribeth dialogue really gives you that "early adventurer" vibe, you totally go from zero to hero. Everything feels so mysterious. HotU is an amazing dungeon crawl with crazy encounters.

NWN2 OC + MotB is the better experience though. I'd probably call MotB the best NWN module (/expansion) of the franchise. Excellent dialogue, story and player choices, and true epic-level atmosphere where your actions shape the faith of dead and living gods alike.

Which says a lot about how bad ML has become.

Mega ML is a broken and annoying league, but it's still more diverse than the eternal Palkia-Zacian-Ho meta.

At this stage, I would not be too concerned if it takes more time off regular ML. It's more satisfying to drop a Dragon Ascent on something than to line up a Palkia on a Ho-Oh.

I can't think of any other top-tier mon who is as completely unplayable as Lugia.

Its double flying moveset is miserable against steel types, hard walled by Zacian, Metagross etc

It takes super effective damage from Rock/Dark/Ghost/Electric/Ice, which is... Reshiram Zekrom Kyurem Lunala Kyogre Necrozma Gholdengo Yveltal Zygrade

It has like 1-2 favorable matchups against Groudon and Keldeo

Neutral matchups? Not very impressive, gets outpaced badly by dragons and even by Ho Oh

Whenever I spice things with Lugia I end up regretting it because it has crap matchups

Update Aeroblast to be comparable to Sacred Fire in terms of DPE, give a ground or ice coverage move, and this thing will thrive again

So many What-if moments. Almost beat the Bulls in 98, but lose in 7. Almost beat the Lakers in the 2000 Finals, but lose in 6 with Reggie's missed game winner. Almost make the Finals in 03-04 but lose to the Pistons in 6, then brawl in 04-05. Almost make the finals between 11-14 but lose to Heat 3 years in a row. Almost win it all last season but lose in 7 with Tyrese's catastrophic injury. And now, almost secure a top 4 pick with the worst tanking season in franchise history, but lose the coin flip and end up with NOTHING.

Also every franchise player since the 2000s had some ridiculous career altering injury, from JO to Danny to George to Oladipo and Tyrese.

No franchise in the league has it worse than us. And it's rough

Danny's reaction always cracked me up