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The Rules of Pacers Digest

Hello everyone,

Whether your are a long standing forum member or whether you have just registered today, it's a good idea to read and review the rules below so that you have a very good idea of what to expect when you come to Pacers Digest.

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Why do we do this? So that it's more difficult for spammers (be they human or robot) to post, and so users who are banned cannot immediately re-register and start dousing people with verbal flames.

Below are the rules of Pacers Digest. After you have read them, you will have a very good sense of where we are coming from, what we expect, what we don't want to see, and how we react to things.

Rule #1

Pacers Digest is intended to be a place to discuss basketball without having to deal with the kinds of behaviors or attitudes that distract people from sticking with the discussion of the topics at hand. These unwanted distractions can come in many forms, and admittedly it can sometimes be tricky to pin down each and every kind that can rear its ugly head, but we feel that the following examples and explanations cover at least a good portion of that ground and should at least give people a pretty good idea of the kinds of things we actively discourage:

"Anyone who __________ is a liar / a fool / an idiot / a blind homer / has their head buried in the sand / a blind hater / doesn't know basketball / doesn't watch the games"

"People with intelligence will agree with me when I say that __________"

"Only stupid people think / believe / do ___________"

"I can't wait to hear something from PosterX when he/she sees that **insert a given incident or current event that will have probably upset or disappointed PosterX here**"

"He/she is just delusional"

"This thread is stupid / worthless / embarrassing"

"I'm going to take a moment to point and / laugh at PosterX / GroupOfPeopleY who thought / believed *insert though/belief here*"

"Remember when PosterX said OldCommentY that no longer looks good? "

In general, if a comment goes from purely on topic to something 'ad hominem' (personal jabs, personal shots, attacks, flames, however you want to call it, towards a person, or a group of people, or a given city/state/country of people), those are most likely going to be found intolerable.

We also dissuade passive aggressive behavior. This can be various things, but common examples include statements that are basically meant to imply someone is either stupid or otherwise incapable of holding a rational conversation. This can include (but is not limited to) laughing at someone's conclusions rather than offering an honest rebuttal, asking people what game they were watching, or another common problem is Poster X will say "that player isn't that bad" and then Poster Y will say something akin to "LOL you think that player is good". We're not going to tolerate those kinds of comments out of respect for the community at large and for the sake of trying to just have an honest conversation.

Now, does the above cover absolutely every single kind of distraction that is unwanted? Probably not, but you should by now have a good idea of the general types of things we will be discouraging. The above examples are meant to give you a good feel for / idea of what we're looking for. If something new or different than the above happens to come along and results in the same problem (that being, any other attitude or behavior that ultimately distracts from actually just discussing the topic at hand, or that is otherwise disrespectful to other posters), we can and we will take action to curb this as well, so please don't take this to mean that if you managed to technically avoid saying something exactly like one of the above examples that you are then somehow off the hook.

That all having been said, our goal is to do so in a generally kind and respectful way, and that doesn't mean the moment we see something we don't like that somebody is going to be suspended or banned, either. It just means that at the very least we will probably say something about it, quite possibly snipping out the distracting parts of the post in question while leaving alone the parts that are actually just discussing the topics, and in the event of a repeating or excessive problem, then we will start issuing infractions to try to further discourage further repeat problems, and if it just never seems to improve, then finally suspensions or bans will come into play. We would prefer it never went that far, and most of the time for most of our posters, it won't ever have to.

A slip up every once and a while is pretty normal, but, again, when it becomes repetitive or excessive, something will be done. Something occasional is probably going to be let go (within reason), but when it starts to become habitual or otherwise a pattern, odds are very good that we will step in.

There's always a small minority that like to push people's buttons and/or test their own boundaries with regards to the administrators, and in the case of someone acting like that, please be aware that this is not a court of law, but a private website run by people who are simply trying to do the right thing as they see it. If we feel that you are a special case that needs to be dealt with in an exceptional way because your behavior isn't explicitly mirroring one of our above examples of what we generally discourage, we can and we will take atypical action to prevent this from continuing if you are not cooperative with us.

Also please be aware that you will not be given a pass simply by claiming that you were 'only joking,' because quite honestly, when someone really is just joking, for one thing most people tend to pick up on the joke, including the person or group that is the target of the joke, and for another thing, in the event where an honest joke gets taken seriously and it upsets or angers someone, the person who is truly 'only joking' will quite commonly go out of his / her way to apologize and will try to mend fences. People who are dishonest about their statements being 'jokes' do not do so, and in turn that becomes a clear sign of what is really going on. It's nothing new.

In any case, quite frankly, the overall quality and health of the entire forum's community is more important than any one troublesome user will ever be, regardless of exactly how a problem is exhibiting itself, and if it comes down to us having to make a choice between you versus the greater health and happiness of the entire community, the community of this forum will win every time.

Lastly, there are also some posters, who are generally great contributors and do not otherwise cause any problems, who sometimes feel it's their place to provoke or to otherwise 'mess with' that small minority of people described in the last paragraph, and while we possibly might understand why you might feel you WANT to do something like that, the truth is we can't actually tolerate that kind of behavior from you any more than we can tolerate the behavior from them. So if we feel that you are trying to provoke those other posters into doing or saying something that will get themselves into trouble, then we will start to view you as a problem as well, because of the same reason as before: The overall health of the forum comes first, and trying to stir the pot with someone like that doesn't help, it just makes it worse. Some will simply disagree with this philosophy, but if so, then so be it because ultimately we have to do what we think is best so long as it's up to us.

If you see a problem that we haven't addressed, the best and most appropriate course for a forum member to take here is to look over to the left of the post in question. See underneath that poster's name, avatar, and other info, down where there's a little triangle with an exclamation point (!) in it? Click that. That allows you to report the post to the admins so we can definitely notice it and give it a look to see what we feel we should do about it. Beyond that, obviously it's human nature sometimes to want to speak up to the poster in question who has bothered you, but we would ask that you try to refrain from doing so because quite often what happens is two or more posters all start going back and forth about the original offending post, and suddenly the entire thread is off topic or otherwise derailed. So while the urge to police it yourself is understandable, it's best to just report it to us and let us handle it. Thank you!

All of the above is going to be subject to a case by case basis, but generally and broadly speaking, this should give everyone a pretty good idea of how things will typically / most often be handled.

Rule #2

If the actions of an administrator inspire you to make a comment, criticism, or express a concern about it, there is a wrong place and a couple of right places to do so.

The wrong place is to do so in the original thread in which the administrator took action. For example, if a post gets an infraction, or a post gets deleted, or a comment within a larger post gets clipped out, in a thread discussing Paul George, the wrong thing to do is to distract from the discussion of Paul George by adding your off topic thoughts on what the administrator did.

The right places to do so are:

A) Start a thread about the specific incident you want to talk about on the Feedback board. This way you are able to express yourself in an area that doesn't throw another thread off topic, and this way others can add their two cents as well if they wish, and additionally if there's something that needs to be said by the administrators, that is where they will respond to it.

B) Send a private message to the administrators, and they can respond to you that way.

If this is done the wrong way, those comments will be deleted, and if it's a repeating problem then it may also receive an infraction as well.

Rule #3

If a poster is bothering you, and an administrator has not or will not deal with that poster to the extent that you would prefer, you have a powerful tool at your disposal, one that has recently been upgraded and is now better than ever: The ability to ignore a user.

When you ignore a user, you will unfortunately still see some hints of their existence (nothing we can do about that), however, it does the following key things:

A) Any post they make will be completely invisible as you scroll through a thread.

B) The new addition to this feature: If someone QUOTES a user you are ignoring, you do not have to read who it was, or what that poster said, unless you go out of your way to click on a link to find out who it is and what they said.

To utilize this feature, from any page on Pacers Digest, scroll to the top of the page, look to the top right where it says 'Settings' and click that. From the settings page, look to the left side of the page where it says 'My Settings', and look down from there until you see 'Edit Ignore List' and click that. From here, it will say 'Add a Member to Your List...' Beneath that, click in the text box to the right of 'User Name', type in or copy & paste the username of the poster you are ignoring, and once their name is in the box, look over to the far right and click the 'Okay' button. All done!

Rule #4

Regarding infractions, currently they carry a value of one point each, and that point will expire in 31 days. If at any point a poster is carrying three points at the same time, that poster will be suspended until the oldest of the three points expires.

Rule #5

When you share or paste content or articles from another website, you must include the URL/link back to where you found it, who wrote it, and what website it's from. Said content will be removed if this doesn't happen.

An example:

If I copy and paste an article from the Indianapolis Star website, I would post something like this:

http://www.linktothearticlegoeshere.com/article
Title of the Article
Author's Name
Indianapolis Star

Rule #6

We cannot tolerate illegal videos on Pacers Digest. This means do not share any links to them, do not mention any websites that host them or link to them, do not describe how to find them in any way, and do not ask about them. Posts doing anything of the sort will be removed, the offenders will be contacted privately, and if the problem becomes habitual, you will be suspended, and if it still persists, you will probably be banned.

The legal means of watching or listening to NBA games are NBA League Pass Broadband (for US, or for International; both cost money) and NBA Audio League Pass (which is free). Look for them on NBA.com.

Rule #7

Provocative statements in a signature, or as an avatar, or as the 'tagline' beneath a poster's username (where it says 'Member' or 'Administrator' by default, if it is not altered) are an unwanted distraction that will more than likely be removed on sight. There can be shades of gray to this, but in general this could be something political or religious that is likely going to provoke or upset people, or otherwise something that is mean-spirited at the expense of a poster, a group of people, or a population.

It may or may not go without saying, but this goes for threads and posts as well, particularly when it's not made on the off-topic board (Market Square).

We do make exceptions if we feel the content is both innocuous and unlikely to cause social problems on the forum (such as wishing someone a Merry Christmas or a Happy Easter), and we also also make exceptions if such topics come up with regards to a sports figure (such as the Lance Stephenson situation bringing up discussions of domestic abuse and the law, or when Jason Collins came out as gay and how that lead to some discussion about gay rights).

However, once the discussion seems to be more/mostly about the political issues instead of the sports figure or his specific situation, the thread is usually closed.

Rule #8

We prefer self-restraint and/or modesty when making jokes or off topic comments in a sports discussion thread. They can be fun, but sometimes they derail or distract from a topic, and we don't want to see that happen. If we feel it is a problem, we will either delete or move those posts from the thread.

Rule #9

Generally speaking, we try to be a "PG-13" rated board, and we don't want to see sexual content or similarly suggestive content. Vulgarity is a more muddled issue, though again we prefer things to lean more towards "PG-13" than "R". If we feel things have gone too far, we will step in.

Rule #10

We like small signatures, not big signatures. The bigger the signature, the more likely it is an annoying or distracting signature.

Rule #11

Do not advertise anything without talking about it with the administrators first. This includes advertising with your signature, with your avatar, through private messaging, and/or by making a thread or post.
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Colts 2021 Season thread

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  • D-BONE
    replied
    Originally posted by Bball View Post
    Well, Kurt Warner probably won't get a Christmas card from Carson Wentz. He's making Carson look like the Trent Richardson of QB's....

    If it weren't for the deceivingly solid TD/INT ratio, I'd say that's a pretty apt comparison. Certainly more than appropriate for the end of season performance. I think the bigger potential problem in the Wentz experiment is how do you avoid another year of it?

    I fear we may be locked in. There's really no option to replace him but with an experienced QB. Been plenty of speculation on guys like Wilson and Rodgers looking to move on, but none of that is certain. And there would be a lot of competition for their services. I'm resigning my self to another year of Wentz as a maintain low expectations strategy and be pleasantly surprised if we manage to creatively work ourselves into something less unsavory.

    Leave a comment:


  • Bball
    replied
    Well, Kurt Warner probably won't get a Christmas card from Carson Wentz. He's making Carson look like the Trent Richardson of QB's....

    Leave a comment:


  • Sollozzo
    replied
    We know that the result with Ehlinger couldn’t have been any worse against Vegas. It would have been interesting to see what he could have done. I doubt he sails one over Hilton’s head (you’d expect a HS QB to hit that).

    Leave a comment:


  • Bball
    replied
    Well, you also have to consider the mindset when building the team of the QB making the receivers better. "Throwing them open". Getting them the balls they can catch. Learning the receivers and playing to their strengths. Being a team leader and demanding more of the receivers and trying to get the best out of them.

    Maybe they took it too far the other way. Or maybe, our QB play has just declined to the point it's not viable. But then, would any receiver look his best with the ball sailing over his head, into the dirt, or hitting closer to one of the two defenders surrounding him than the receiver (AKA throwing into double coverage... AND... a poorly thrown ball at that)?

    Wentz reverted to being Wentz pretty quickly. The question of what would happen if we needed Wentz to win a game for us was answered: More pressure = Wentz being Wentz, only magnified.

    I'm still not sure the NFL did us any favors when it changed the rules just in time for Wentz to get cleared to play vs Vegas. That might've been a good time to get Ehlinger on the field and just see what he's got. Heck, it might not have even done Wentz any favors because it meant ultimately Wentz got TWO bad and losing games on his resume he could be blamed for rather than just one. But it also increased the sample size for Colts coaching and management. And ownership.

    Irsay is not Simon (thank God!) and so it's much harder to predict how this will go. Wentz came to the Colts with a reputation of damaged goods and some question of whether he ever really was what he at first seemed when he first got into the league. It's not like he really had no question marks, but underperformed once he got here, so leaving hope he could get back to the previous level. Worse, he didn't improve as the season went along. He got worse. Reich was supposed to negate that issue.
    Irsay isn't going to be driven by the salary ramifications of what it's going to take going forward to shore up the QB spot. Cap situation, yes... but if there's a better option, he's MUCH more likely to want to cut losses.

    At the least, I have to think Wentz is not going to enter next season as the guaranteed QB1. But I also have to wonder if he will be here at all, and just what other options the Colts can come up with. I'm not sure they'll want Wentz in another season of questioning if Reich can be the Wentz whisperer... I'm not sure Reich or Ballard want to put their reputations on the line holding out hope in Wentz after this past season.
    Last edited by Bball; 01-14-2022, 05:32 PM.

    Leave a comment:


  • Trader Joe
    replied
    There is no doubt our perimeter talent is crap.

    Our nickel corner gets more hype than either of our outside corners. Our safeties are all extremely mediocre (Caveat being that Blackmon was hurt ealry in the season.) Kwity Paye got a lot of hype but ultimately didn't produce at a high level.

    Receiving talent has been an issue for years. Remember all the hype Michael Strachan was getting in training camp? What'd he do this season? Nothing and then I heard his name again in the closing pressers. This team has weirdly undervalued receivers ever since they whiffed on a couple guys like Anthony Gonzalez.

    Leave a comment:


  • Trader Joe
    replied
    Seems like Wentz is done, just a matter of what they do to replace him. I honestly think Reich or Ballard has to take the fall alongside him unless they pull out some kind of miracle.

    Leave a comment:


  • Sollozzo
    replied
    I listened to Rick Venturi on JMV this week. I like Venturi because he is very blunt and doesn't sugarcoat things just because he works for the Colts (his takes when Luck quit a couple years ago were really good too).

    He obviously talked about Wentz and said pretty much what everyone else has said.

    He said the Colts have too much invested on the inside, which I thought was interesting. He thinks our talent at the outside and in the skill positions is very weak when you take away Taylor and Leonard. That is probably true. Our receiving talent is extremely mediocre and we can't get any sort of pressure on QB's.

    He said even though it doesn't look like Reich will be canned right now, if Reich ultimately is canned at some point down the road this meltdown will probably be top of mind for Irsay. I agree with that. Regardless of whatever roster flaws we have, this team was still in the driver's seat at the end of the year and completely blew it. It just seems like the ugly shadow of this season will always haunt Reich unless this team has some massive success moving forward.

    Good segment overall.

    Leave a comment:


  • Bball
    replied
    Some more things I found in the fallout of the Colts' season. This is talking about the Eagles not being surprised in Wentz's issues as a Colt and some of their own analytics. This one is REALLY telling because for all the analytics people, it's one that should resonate. Some of us (me!) have been saying Wentz is one lucky SOB when it comes to INTs because he should have many more than he does. So the stat is skewed from the reality of the play, and the throws. It might look good if you ONLY read the stat, but the games are more telling... and so, apparently, was some advanced internal Eagles' analytics that I bet would look much the same this season:

    And most of all, Wentz had a penchant for making things more complicated than they had to be in the offense, either failing to embrace the simple plays or forcing bad decisions. So much so that the Eagles' internal data on dropped interceptions placed Wentz among the NFL’s worst.

    Leave a comment:


  • Bball
    replied
    "We embarrassed ourselves. Embarrassed our owner. Embarrassed our city." — Colts GM Chris Ballard

    Leave a comment:


  • Bball
    replied
    "When we made the decision, after Philip [Rivers] retired and we made the decision to make a move on Carson, at the time of the decision we felt good about it and I still don't regret the decision at the time," Ballard said Thursday. "Sitting here today, just so y'all know, I won't make a comment on who is going to be here next year and who is not going to be here next year. That's not fair to any player."

    ...
    "I'd like to quit Band-Aiding it," Ballard said. "I'd like for Carson to be the long-term answer or find somebody who will be here for the next 10-12 years. Sometimes it doesn't work out that way. I can dream about it, wish about it, do everything I can to figure out the solution, but you do the best with what you can do at the time."
    ...

    "Make the layups. Make the layups. Make the layups," Ballard said. "Carson wants to win. He has a will to win. Sometimes when you carry the burden where you think you have to make a big play all the time. Sometimes let the team help you, make the layups, make the layups."

    ...
    "At the end of the day, I think we have a lot of really good players and really good pieces," Ballard said. "You have to get stability at the quarterback position. That position has to play up to his potential to help the team win. I'm not blaming this all on Carson. I'm not because everybody else has to do their job, too.

    "But the hyperimportance of that position, it's real. You have to get consistency there. The years we've gotten it we've been pretty good, and we thought we had it until the end of the season. Something we have to continue to work through."

    https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/...arting-qb-2022

    Leave a comment:


  • Doug
    replied
    I didn't see the whole last game (thank goodness) but it looked like the line was outplayed on both sides of the ball. Not enough protection, not enough holes to run through. Not enough QB pressure. That's kind of how the first games of the season went. We have too much talent for that to happen.

    Leave a comment:


  • Bball
    replied
    I'll leave the title off this so people can make up their own minds about the Reich quote.

    Asked if Wentz will be the starting quarterback next season...

    “We loved the team we had this year, we knew everyone we brought in this year, we expected to play winning football,” Reich said, via Joel A. Erickson of the Indianapolis Star. “Next year’s roster will be next year’s roster. I don’t want to open it up about one player and then start talking about all of them.”

    That’s a very different answer than Reich gave a year ago, when he was asked whether the Colts wanted to keep Philip Rivers.

    “As I sit here right now, yes, I want Philip Rivers to be my starting quarterback next year,” Reich said at the end of last season.


    https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.co...35qx&cm_ainfo=

    Leave a comment:


  • Bball
    replied
    I don't know that the first 3 games were unwinnable. I think Reich's questionable coaching comes into play in those games... and the less than full strength the team was at... A better, more strategic coach might've gotten 1 or 2 of those, even if the team wasn't at 100%. And Reich's coaching strategies might've survived had the team been in better health and preparation.

    But what those 3 games really were was the reality of the season we were about to see. Perfect bookends to the season. Good starts, bad finishes. Questionable play calling and gambles. Weak QB play was never out of the question, even when he'd do something good or even great and have us thinking "Hmmmm maybe???". Never sustainably good enough to be certain of any win. A coach that can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory asking too much of a QB he has too much faith in.
    Even games that felt like the Colts had them under control, turned into closer than they should by the end. The Bills game was such an outlier to every other game. And weather, JT, and PI calls helped with that national game against San Fran. Weather might've helped with the Bills too. Wind doesn't hurt runners and O-lines opening holes.

    Leave a comment:


  • PacerDude
    replied
    Originally posted by Sollozzo View Post
    They would have still started out 0-3 regardless. The Seahawks, Rams, and Titans were all better than the Colts when we played them. .
    The Titans & Rams games were 1 score games in the 4th. They definitely had an opportunity to do something in both of those games.

    And they had their chances in the 2 OT losses also.

    Like the Pacers - the Colts just can't close things out.

    Leave a comment:


  • Trader Joe
    replied
    At the end of the day though, hopefully missing the playoffs is what it takes to just realize Wentz ain't got it. Dude threw for 3500 yards. 600 less than Rivers did last year with an extra game and with a completion % that was significantly worse. I'll say it again, but Rivers will likely go down as one of the least appreciated QBs of all time. If he had been QB of a team like the Steelers instead of the Chargers, he'd have more rings than Roethlisberger, JMO.

    More importantly before the two turds against LV and Jax, I wanna look at the 3 other games that were clues that this dude simply does not have the ability to be a high level QB

    Both Tennessee games, Wentz barely posts a completion percentage above 50% against the best team in our division and loses both games even though they were winnable. He averages less than 5 yards an attempt in these games.

    The New England game, 5/12 for 57 yards....with a pick. Yikes. We won the game on JT and the defense played ...ok, but also the Pats didn't really play their best and it still took a Taylor homerun to actually ice this game. Wentz ends up mostly skating by this horrific performance because well, the system won and it beat the Pats! Woohoo, right? Wrong.

    Leave a comment:

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