The Indiana Pacers touched down in Memphis today after a morning workout at the Fieldhouse. In fact, I know they arrived safely in Memphis around 4:30PM because Brandon Rush led the Pacers' Twitter brigade by announcing the plane's touchdown.

Earlier T.J. Ford mentioned the team's departure which included the Pacers' point guard even though he isn't expected to play in any of the games this week after tweaking a hamstring yesterday.

Speaking of departures, I'll be travelling early tomorrow morning so here are few links of interest, including a nice look at Roy Hibbert. Plus, as Mike Wells mentioned yesterday, Hibbert explains why the rookies will be wearing pink backpacks while the rooks react.

• Caught in the Web: For Roy Hibbert, it is time to start putting all of the hard work he put in this summer to the test.
• VIDEO: Rooks react to the pink fashion accessory supplied by Roy Hibbert.
• Box scores. Beautiful NBA box scores. Eight of them to be exact after the first round of preseason games on Tuesday night.
• The Griz are dragging their feet on picking up Mike Conley's contract extension, but for now he is running the point.
• Real nice preview of tonight's game from 3 Shades of Blue.

The Indiana Pacers leave the friendly confines of Conseco Fieldhouse today as they head to Memphis in advance of their preseason opener tomorrow night against the Grizzlies.

Minnesota and the L.A. Lakers tipped off the NBA preseason in London yesterday and a nice slate of eight games state-side tonight kick the preseason into high gear. Highlights, box scores -- it's time people!

After watching the Pacers.com practice highlights from Monday's scrimmage I'd say they are ready to go and probably excited to battle an opponent after beating up on each other for over the past week.

A few things stood out in the highlights:

• First and foremost, there was a certain burly, bowl-cut stylin' power forward wearing number 50 participating in the scrimmage. I counted five-on-five which means Tyler Hansbrough's restrictions were eased a bit yesterday. He certainly wasn't playing tentatively, as if he would know how.
• Darren Collison and A.J. Price both looked good running their respective teams both setting up teammates and knocking down shots. T.J. Ford and Sol Jones were out yesterday with hammys, so I'd say Price helped himself with his play on the White squad.
• Mike Dunleavy also looked great moving around and snapping off shots that repeatedly found the bottom of the net.
• Brandon Rush flashed some solid, assertive offensive play, even finishing a drive to the hoop with a left-handed layup...that he made.
• Roy Hibbert and Josh McRoberts were on opposing teams but both caused problems with their active offense. I dare say, one of Hibberts running hooks in the lane was borderline smooth.
• Offense, offense, offense. The defensive effort wasn't necessarily poor, but it seemed like in these highlights all of the shots were falling. Mabye Bruno edited out all of the misses.

After the jump, a few more links of interest including Lance Stephenson building from the ground up at the defensive end.

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Mighty Mike Wells visits opposite ends of the spectrum with the two items of interest on the Indiana Pacers today.

First for the bad news, Wells shines a light on the big ol' elephant in the corner from the first week of training camp, that being Tyler Hansbrough sitting out the intense, five-on-five scrimmages that capped off most of the practices last week.

He's cleared to play but isn't playing? Curious, no? If it is just a fitness issue, why not build up the stamina by increasing the activity and running full-court? Even more curious is Jim O'Brien's comment that indicates he'd like to see him scrimmage as much as anyone.

"He was behind coming in because he didn't have a training camp last year, then he missed most of the season, and the more times he misses five-on-five, the further behind he gets," O'Brien said. "There's no way of sugar-coating it. He'll start to catch up once he's able to go in every drill we do."

Maybe JOB is limiting expectations since there may not be many minutes for Hansbrough to start the season anyway, although if he doesn't play we'll never know.

Now to turn that school-girl frown upside down, Wells also puts out a community service announcement to make sure the Pacers' rookies are seen around town with the pink "Princess" backpacks Roy Hibbert is demanding they carry all season. This is the least of Lance Stephenson's worries at this point so he's happy to oblige and of course, Paul George is all in and ready to add his own swag to the rookie initiation.

The Pacers open their preseason schedule this week starting at Memphis on Wednesday night. It should be interesting to see if Hansbrough suits up, plays a little or what will happen going forward. If he's cleared to play now but isn't playing, will he ever play?

After the jump, a few more links of interest with stories from around the NBA including Jermaine O'Neal once again pulling out his can of career spackle to smooth out his past for a new audience.

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The Indiana Pacers made it through their first week of training camp and will rest their weary legs today.

On Saturday, Jim O'Brien divided up the Blue and White teams for an intense scrimmage which the Blue team dominated. Pacers.com video of the scrimmage is well worth a watch or three.

Roy Hibbert made a big impact for the Blue as they ran a lot of their half-court sets through the big fella. He looked real comfortable in that role even providing the back-breaking 17-footer from the elbow when all else failed.

The other glaring item of goodness I took away from the brief video was Danny Granger's assertive play, not only coming off high screens to knock down shots be even finding a rolling Hibbert for a layup on one play. The last half of the video caught Granger on the sidelines in a full lather imploring his team to continue punishing the White team. Can't help but think that's a little something picked up during the competitive scrimmages he had throughout the summer with Team USA.

Mike Wells has a fabulou wrap upof week one with his first-hand observations from the Fieldhouse. After digesting the practice videos and reading Mike's thoughts, I can say things aren't going exactly as expected so far in training camp which may require shifting some expectation.

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We try not to drag my six-year-old to every practice and game for my nine-year-old because he's had enough of it already after several years of tagging along.

He gets bored and then whines about being bored and imploring him to stop whining, play with other kids or find something to do taps into a stubborn gene that makes it worse. An ice cream truck could pull up in front of us and he'd remain sour just to make sure we know he doesn't want to be there.

Last night, we had to bring the little guy to a scrimmage and before we left the house he was already complaining about the pending boredom he was heading into. So on the way there we had a one-way conversation about being a big boy and what he could do in lieu of whining the whole time. He was going to the scrimmage regardless of how much he complained, so it was time for him to make the best of a bad situation.

I'm convinced my words had no impact, but the boy did end up having a good time playing with other kids and finding some fun while hanging around the parents when he was on his own. He was amply rewarded for his good behavior and now we have a baseline example to refer to going forward.

After reading the T.J. Ford article this morning by Mike Wells, it looks like I have another strong reference to use for my boys with a good example of making the best out of a bad situation. Both Ford and Jim O'Brien have always put on a good public face about their struggles to work together, but since they are stuck together heading into another season, both parties met before training camp to clear the air and, well, make the best of the situation.

It appears that Ford has accepted his role as a backup heading into the season and JOB has accepted the fact that he will have to rely on Ford to be a part of the playing rotation. Ford's play is needed for one to help with the point guard depth but also in hopes of showcasing Ford for a trade later in the season.

These are two strong-headed individuals so we'll see how this plays out when a little adversity strikes, but at least they're heading into the season on the same page.

Read the whole story in the links after the jump which include a recap and highlights from an intense day three scrimmage with the rookies continuing to hold their own.

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The best news from day two of training camp for the Indiana Pacers was that all 17 players hit the floor ready to play and finished practice without any reported injuries. That crushed my over/under of 15 1/2 players making it for day two. I guess I can stop worrying about the lingering injuries of the offseason.

There were plenty of "camp legs" though, as Bruno's scrimmage video reveals, with shots short and long as players worked through losing the bounce in their legs after a long first day. Mike Wells offers up a little more on the scrimmage portion of practice in which the rookies showed up quite well as they ran together with James Posey and Jeff Foster.

Paul George may end up playing more than I expected if he can keep sticking out defensively as he has on the first two days. Both George and Magnum Rolle with his activity on the glass, give the Pacers something they lack in the dirty work area.

Check out the links after the jump with stories on Mike Dunleavy, and more notes from day two including Brandon Rush awaiting word on the team picking up his fourth-year option. This is an interesting topic which is more complicated than it appears on the surface and may not be resolved until the last second of deadline day on October 31st.

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The Indiana Pacers, all of the Indiana Pacers, took the floor for their first day of training camp yesterday. The team practiced around noon and then again later in the evening and from all reports, all 17 players were in the mix as expected.

It almost seems strange that everyone played as expected with no last second qualifiers for restricted play. I'm putting the over/under for all 17 going full bore again today at 14 1/2. If they hit the over then camp is indeed off to a great start regardless of the rusty games that need to take shape.

Fortunately, Conrad Brunner (aka Bruno Scorsese) put together six minutes worth of clips from the team's first scrimmage yesterday. Obviously, things looked a bit sloppy and you can't possibly draw any conclusion from the highlights, but that doesn't mean there weren't some items of interest throughout.

• Within 15 seconds I was laughing out loud. On Monday, Jim O'Brien said in essence that Josh McRoberts won't be evaluated on his shooting and he isn't expected to be a Troy Murphy type player. Then on the video, the first play for J-Mac's team has him draining a 3-ball. Looked like a nice arcing stroke too, in contrast to the flat, front-rim magnet he's shown in the past.
• T.J. Ford was going at it hard. Gotta love seeing some pride rise to the top as he battles Darren Collison all camp.
• As you'll read in the links, JOB gives the early edge at PF to Josh McRoberts. At this point, it is kind of by default, but he does work well with Hibbert. Like seeing the high/low action between the two since both are pretty good passers.
• Nice to see Jeff Foster out there banging bodies, A.J. Price running with the team and Danny Granger knocking down threes. I saw Hansbrough playing in a news clip last night and going through some contact drills but as you can see in this video, he didn't run in the 5-on-5 scrimmage. He mentioned his conditioning was behind so his scrimmage minutes are limited.
• Brandon Rush looked all too familiar on a few plays he struggled to finish.
• Nice to see Paul George get in the passing lane for a steal. As much as his offensive game was criticized in summer league, he did have a nose for the ball at the defensive end. The best way for the rook to get some minutes this year is to defend his man and create turnovers.
• Finally, you gotta love Roy Hibbert and A.J. Price literally cheering from the sidelines after Granger drained a 3-ball. Hibby even threw his arms up as the ball was in flight. Nice to see them all competing so hard.

After the jump, plenty of links from day one including more on McRoberts impressing JOB, and a behind the scenes look at media day.

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Larry Bird didn't meet with the general media during the Pacers media day event on Monday. He did make his presence known however, showing up to take a photo with newly acquired point guard, Darren Collison which spoke volumes.

The Pacers president didn't join any other players in front of the camera which made the scene striking. The hopes and aspirations of Bird's rebuilding plan rest to a large extent on the future success of Collison and his ability to solidify the point guard position.

Bird has stood behind the wrong players in the past. Most notably, in a very similar image to the one snapped yesterday, Bird sent a strong statement by gracing the cover of Sports Illustrated with Ron Artest before the 2005-06 season when everyone figured Ronnie was prepared to redeem himself after missing a season. Obviously, Ronnie wasn't ready for redemption and from that point on, the roster slowly crumbled to the ground and has been rebuilt slowly to where we stand today, looking at a core of young players with a future worth pondering.

So seeing the legendary former player and highly scrutinized team president standing by his man made perfect sense. In the final year of his contract, Bird made a bold summer move by trading to acquire Collison while maintaining fiscal sanity and not mucking up the team's future salary cap situation with the deal. Bird swung for the fences and expects to trot around the bases as Collison shows the potential of the future team leader everyone projects.

As for Collison, the speedy point guard at least sounds ready to back up Bird's faith in his game. He's also likes the players that will run alongside him.

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