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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Ch. 63
Game 1 at the Fieldhouse and the place was hopping. We knew, if we got through Round 1, we’d get a shot at one of our hated rivals and having it be the Pistons was just fine with us. It was going to be a good old Central Division battle, and we came out ready to take no prisoners. WE respected the guys across from us, of course, but we sure as hell wanted to beat their *ss.
Beginning from quarter one, we ran our game and played our way — fast breaks, passing, balls to the wall action that Detroit could barely contain — sometimes. But they couldn’t stop me from passing the ball all over the place, I made some passes that were just bad objectively but found their targets and led to points; we were just having that kind of game.
We ended the first up 25-20, and in the second we continued to push the pace (we were the Pacers after all, pace was in our damned name) and we didn’t let off the gas. We passed, we stole, we blocked, and we took high percentage shots — we jacked up open threes, lived in the paint, and avoided the mid-range unless absolutely necessary. Detroit simply couldn’t keep up … all the running was wearing them down at at the half we sniffed blood.
In the second half we kept going and the Pistons slowly fell away — they didn’t collapse entirely, they did enough to give themselves a chance, but there was no way in hell they were going to beat us, I wasn’t going to let them. We walked out of Game 1 with a major victory.
Despite Drummond dominating us inside, we made sure no one else on Detroit really got off. We were feeling good about ourselves … and then we got shellacked in Game 2, a brutal 106-93 loss as we piled up fouls and missed bunnies. It was embarrassing, especially because Drummond scored 40 (40!) and ate us alive.
Myles got hammered by the media for his soft play inside, I got hammered for not “leading the team” and it was a wake-up call for us. Our first loss of the playoffs against a rival, we were now on the defensive. McHale told us to be ready to run in Game 3 and that was the mentality we had every hour leading up the that game.
Detroit came out in their statement uniforms, trying to pump up the crowd, but seeing them blatantly copy what we did in Game 1 only pissed us off more; they kicked our *ss and thought they could steal our *hit? No way.
We blew the *ucking doors off them. Myles came out and shut down Drummond over and over, blocking him three times straight down the floor. Drummond was flustered.
We finished the first up 33-19 as the Pistons crowd went from anxious to angry. Detroit came out and turned the ball over twice, back-to-back, in the second and the crowd started booing … they had lost their fans and the advantage. We romped and it was pass, pass, shot — over and over we beat them the same way, pass, pass, shot; SVG was furious and he took two timeouts before the half just to chew his squad out.
It didn’t help them at all really. It lit a fire under Drummond, who had a much better second half, but by then the hole was so deep that the Pistons had no chance to come back. Sabonis was playing out of his mind against Drummond, bothering the bigger (and, admittedly, better) player and what was there to do? Detroit rolled over and they became our *itch.
We took the next two games easily and advanced to the ECF, where we met up with the darling team of the East … the Sixers. Meanwhile, out West, Durant’s revenge tour continuing as he upset the Warriors in seven and met the T’Wolves (the one team out West I didn’t want to see in the Finals).
We only needed to win 8 more games to repeat as champs. The pressure was officially on.
(Random number generator has assigned me Games 1 and 5 for this series … here we go)
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
This is going to be one hell of a finish, man. I'm rooting for IND-SEA, if only for the idea of KD passing a torch to Tate.
I'm guessing the next story will be on 2K18 as well? Really interested to hear what it is and read!Patiently waiting for a New York Jets title.Wish me luck.Comment
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Yes, the next story will be on 2K18 as well -- not sure if I'm going to bother with 2K19 this year, after how the launch of 2K18 last year was just botched in so many ways.
And, yes, seeing Seattle in the Finals would be great -- I'd be fine with losing to them or the T'Wolves, truthfully, as both franchises have suffered in different ways, but obviously would prefer to win of course.Comment
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Ch. 64
(Random number generator has assigned me Games 1 and Game 7 for this series — here we go)
Joel Embiid was talking trash before tip off, like he does, but I wasn’t having any of it. Embiid and the Sixers barely stole the first seed from us and I certainly was out to prove they were the first seed technically, but certainly weren’t the real number one team in the conference. Once the ball was tipped and the game was live, I got the ball and went straight at Embiid.
Dunked all over him. Gave him a little point.
He didn’t like that. The Sixers went on an 13-2 run from that point on, burying us on every play and treating me like a chew-toy — they’d funnel me inside and lay into me. It was a physical game from the get go and Philly took the first quarter, 31-25; the hometown crowd was feeding them, the energy in the building was high and between quarter McHale told us to keep chugging along.
“We’re fine,” he said without any sort of worry. The Pit Crew came in at the start of the second and, lo and behold, they went on a 15-6 run that just drained the crowd. We got the lead, we built the lead, and we came into halftime with it — barely, but with it.
Embiid was having a time of it, but we were forcing the Sixers to shoot shots they didn’t like; that strategy paid off in spades in the third quarter as Philly got dominated again as we came out running, scoring a dozen points straight while they managed to miss their first couple of shots. We were playing with our ears pinned back the entire quarter, the lead allowing us to relax some, and we outplayed them — we won the quarter 36-23, and took the game easily from that point on.
They took Game 2, but we took the next two on our home floor and when we came back for Game 5 we were up 3-1. Philly was desperate, threw on their red statement uniforms, but the game played out almost like Game 1 — we were down early, we battled back, and we showed no fear. Whatever they threw at us, we took, and we came flying back down the quarter looking to get it back in the most high-flying way possible.
We were down by just one point at the end of the first and then we exploded in the second, as Sabonis and Lance both came off the bench and relished the chance to shut up Philly’s crowd. Simmons and Embiid were both in foul trouble and were glued to the pine, which left us free to run rampant.
We all knew we were winning the game at halftime. We had no doubts and McHale didn’t even try to hype us up, he just told us to finish the job. It was a Mortal Kombat time, it was time to FINISH THEM and we did just that, blasting them in the third 36-25 and walking out of Philly as the ECF champs for the second straight year.
We won our series first and had a few days to rest up. We now had to wait to see whom came out of the Seattle/Minnesota series …
And it was the Sonics. Kevin Durant was a man possessed as he, Jamal Craford, and Jordan Bell all fought past the T’Wolves (a deeper team that had been together longer) in six and got Seattle back to the Finals in year one of their rebooted existence. Warriors and Thunder fans were salty as *uck, but we were looking forward to seeing Durant and Bell again.
We had beaten them the year before with Golden State. We could do it again.
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Ch. 65
The NBA Finals. The goal that we had worked all year to get to and in Game 1, we looked like the favorites. We came out and ran out to a 21-4 lead — without missing a single *ucking shot. It was the most beautiful quarter of basketball I had ever witnessed and the Sonics were utterly confused. They couldn’t believe how little they could affect us and we were hot.
We ended up winning the quarter 39-25, getting out to a huge lead and we didn’t look back. Durant and Valanciunaus fought valiants, they got huge help from their bench (Tyler Lydon was fire) but the Sonics could not catch back up. I wouldn’t let them, Victor wouldn’t let them, Myles wouldn’t let them … our core was determined to win the game and we did in a big way.
After that game, nothing went right for us. Glenn Robinson went down with an injury in Game 2 and so did Myles — one a severely pulled hamstring, the other a sprained ankle — and we lost our edge. Myles’ three point shooting at the center position was crucial, more crucial than we could have imagined, and without him (and his defense — the man loved blocking shots), Durant and the Sonics had second life.
We lost the next three games by at least seven points each. I was crushed, but to lose a team like the Sonics … well, I’d rather it be them than the Warriors.
It wasn’t a good feeling losing in five games to a team we knew we could beat … to be undone by just a few injuries, but we had avoided major injuries all year. We were due for some bad luck … it just happened at the worst time possible. The exit meetings after the end of playoffs were solid, nothing surprising, but I was sick to my stomach about the game, about the series, about how far we came and how close we were to pulling it off.
That feeling stuck with me for weeks — in fact, that feeling only intensified after the series was over. I wasn’t just figuratively sick to my stomach, I was really *ucking sick to my stomach. I went to see the doctor, tests were run, and what they found … well, what they found ended my career.
Stomach cancer. Early stages. I was just 21.
Gramps was beside himself, he couldn’t believe it and he was panicking some. He’d lost his son, his daughter-in-law, his wife, and now it looked like I was next. The doctors told him I would likely be okay … I had surgery, did chemo, but there wasn’t going to be anymore basketball for me. The doctors told me I could go back after I recovered, maybe a year or more, but the brush with death — cancer — made me reconsider things.
Basketball and winning a title for Indiana had been my life’s pursuit it felt like … and I had achieved it. But there was so much more to life than just basketball. I looked at the league and I didn’t want to end up like Derrick Rose; a player with a future blindingly blight who became a shell of himself after an injury. Would I be the same player after my treatment? Would I be able to do the things that made me, me?
The doctors weren’t sure. I wasn’t sure. But I didn’t want to go out there and be less. I didn’t want to have my life consumed by basketball. Life was too *ucking short.
I announced my retirement in August of 2020. The media was obsessing over it, asking why I was unwilling to try; my teammates supported me 100 percent, not a one of those guys said anything against me, but there were murmurs in the league that maybe I wasn’t man enough, maybe I wasn’t a real leader … and I let them talk.
I had proven what I needed to.
My treatment took a little over a year and I watched basketball still, but I stayed away from it largely. My recovery was a *itch … I ain’t gonna lie, there were days I wished I wasn’t alive, but I got through it. Kristy was a big help, always there to lend an ear, and Gramps was always around.
After I recovered and got my legs back under me, I decided to travel the world a bit; I signed on as a driver for the Horizon people and started a second career as a racecar driver — safer? Probably not, but just as fun and certainly let me experience cultures and people I wouldn’t have otherwise.
By 2027, I was ready to really settle down and so was Kristy — we had stayed together, more or less, over the years and we got married that fall. We had our firstborn son, Jack Jr, 18 months later — Gramps was absolutely thrilled to be a great-grandfather — and Jack Jr was the first of five kids Kristy and I ultimately had (two more sons and two more girls — the girls twins).
Not a one of them ended up in basketball, if you can believe that. My firstborn went into baseball and made the majors as a relief pitcher — not a bad one either. My second son, Neil, ended up becoming a therapist — much to the amusement of myself and his mother — and my third son, Ryan, ended up in tennis.
My girls, Kelly and Candace, went into the arts — Kelly a painter, Candace a dancer — and my life since basketball has been full of highs that I wouldn’t have gotten in the sport.
The Pacers never won another NBA title, to this day I’m not sure why; maybe it was a curse or maybe it was just that I was in the right place at the right time. Whatever the case, Indiana is still basketball crazy and that will never change.
In the end, I wouldn’t trade any of it. It was an adventure unlike anything else and led me to more adventures in my life.
It was a hell of a ride.
The End
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Oh wow that’s a lot to catch up tough way to lose the finals like that to a 5 seed mostly a 1 man team
I was not not expecting such a dark way for Tate’s career to end
Really enjoyed it and don’t be stranger till your next one starts upRetro Redemption - Starting over with a oldschool PowerBone Offense
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Yeah, I was disappointed it ended after 5 games -- the sim engine giveth, the sim engine taketh away. Alas, a brief, but glorious era of Pacers basketball comes to a close.
Tate's career did end, but he went on to have a great life -- he got out while the going was good and got his happy ending.
I'll be around for sure, my next one should be up in the coming days ... assuming everything comes together as I think it should. We'll see.
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Sad day this story has come to an end. Nice conclusion for Tate. Good to see the Sonics finish!!
Waiting anxiously for the next story!!Comment
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Re: You Don't Know Jack: A Pacers Story
Steph put up 40 a game?! Dude barely gets over 23 PPG in any of my sims lolTwitter: @TyroneisMaximus
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