[Editor's Note: kester99 dropped this sweet diary entry, laying all of the J.O. issues on the table for discussion. I wanted to raise it to the front page to make sure no one missed it.]

If a basketball season can have themes, like a novel has themes, then the main theme of this Pacers season has to be their struggle to return to the playoffs. That struggle is going to be well documented and commented on in every venue of Pacers news and comment that exists. The Indy press, web blogs, open forums, etc are going to be cranking out a lot of column inches concentrating on that won-lost record.

I think we're going to see the continuing development of a secondary theme this season - it's already heating up again out there in the forums - which is: Are the Pacers better with Jermaine O'Neal on the floor, or without?

The two opposing viewpoints here, if I can summarize them, are:

Better with him --

JO is our best scorer. He has the highest ppg, was the only player on the team last year with a positive plus/minus, is an intimidating defensive force on the block, and is the only genuine all-star on the team.  The difficult times he and the team have had are because he has not had an effective post-scoring big man at center to take the defensive focus off JO, and also has not had an effective 3-point shooting team to do the same.  With most of the defensive focus on him, he has been banged up, the team's offense has been predictable and therefore less effective, and still he has turned in a positive plus/minus rating.

With Coach O'Brien's offense, the excessive defensive pressure on JO will be lessened.  The 3-pointer emphasis, the early-offense philosophy, will open up the middle, and JO will flourish. Fewer defenders constantly focusing on him means less banging, less chance of a serious injury developing, and the opportunity for JO to work his will against one-on-one coverage.  It is just as true to say that there has to be a viable inside threat to make the outside threat effective, as it is to say it the other way around.

Better without him --

There have been periods during the past couple of seasons, when Jermaine was out with injury, that the team has had to adjust to playing without him, and has gone to a smaller, faster line-up. They have made the adjustment and had success. When JO came back off injury, team performance went down...the offense became more plodding and predictable.

Making JO the continuing focus of our team is asking for trouble because he has become injury prone, and will be out of the game when we need him, and when the team has come to rely on his presence.

He doesn't really want to be here. He wants his minutes to keep his stats up to continue to be seen as a valuable commodity, only because he wants to be traded to some team with a genuine chance of getting him a ring before he gets too old and banged up.

What's the reality?

I've seen the arguments above (or variations) made many times in the past couple of years. The only one that I feel I can say for sure is bogus, is the belief that JO doesn't want to be here, and that he's only in it for the stats.

He's said that he feels like a kid on Christmas morning, waiting to open those packages, when he thinks about playing the upcoming season under Coach O'Brien's direction. He's said he would like to retire in Indy. He understands that the NBA is a business, and that he may end up somewhere else, but really, he wants to win here and now.

Other than that, I can't say what the reality is, and neither can anyone else.

Will this team execute O'Brien's motion offense and the O'B/Harter one-on-one defense well enough to surprise the lazy herd of pundits whose collective unconscious has moved the Pacers to the back of the pack? Will JO finally get a little elbow room to work, and make the best of it? Will he keep up with his team running up and down the court? Will that physical demand put him and his knees back on the bench for extended periods?

You just have to read the book. It's why they actually have to play the games. And when we turn the last page on the regular season, we'll all get to see if there's an epilogue entitled "Pacers in the Postseason."