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MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- Marc Gasol never quite understood how and why the Memphis offense got away from him. He expressed those sentiments after the Grizzlies coughed up a 27-point lead in Game 1 and his frustration came to a head in Game 4 in Los Angeles, when the ball was coming to him late in the shot clock or after the Clippers' help defenders had sniffed out the plan.

On Wednesday during shootaround he was asked if his dormancy in the series could be chalked up to the work of the Clippers' big men fronting him. He politely rejected that theory, pointing out that his defender wasn't the guy doing to fronting, but the Clipper big man hulking on the back line ready to pounce if the ball was delivered to Gasol at either the foul line or the low block. And, furthermore, the Grizzlies guards -- the ones charged with delivering him the ball at his preferred spots -- were getting hounded by the Clippers. So there was that, too.

Translation: I'm seven feet tall! Just pass the ball over the top of the defense and I can figure it out from there! Haven't you watched me play? And if you're not in a position to make those passes, let me know how I can help.

Granted, the Clippers have nobody to match up with Rudy Gay. And, yes, Mike Conley has become a pretty good pick-and-roll practitioner on the right side if Zach Randolph isn't clogging the right block. And of course Gasol is also your best screener, so he's often useful in other capacities.

A playoff series flows in cycles, and in Game 5 the Grizzlies returned to what's worked best for them offensively all season: Starting with Gasol as the fulcrum to leverage the Clippers' defense.

From the opening tip, the Grizzlies created a better work environment for Gasol in the half court. The Clippers' big men are mucking things up? Then have Gasol and Randolph cross low before delivering the ball to Gasol at the foul line!

Defenders are fronting Gasol at his favorite spot? Then let's find some other angles on the side. You'd rather work your offense in the middle of the floor, but sometimes games against tough opponents call for adjustments. So rather than bang your head against the wall, which the Grizzlies did over a long weekend in Los Angeles, take 80 percent of what you like and compromise on the rest.

It wasn't just Gasol's teammates and coaches who would have to accommodate. Gasol would need to work quickly, which we saw at the 4:10 mark of the first quarter when, fronted by Blake Griffin, the ball was delivered to Gasol off the right block -- but closer to the baseline. That's usually an invitation for quick help, but not if you catch and go! Gasol caught and went, spinning baseline before Griffin or any other red jersey could respond.

We saw this old friend again in Game 5. We also saw Gasol trailing in transition, where he's so dangerous.

Better yet, we saw Gasol with a renewed spirit, a mood that was a long departure from his pouty disposition in Game 4. When the Grizzlies missed him on one possession after he'd established prime position Griffin, he turned and growled at the bench after Randolph turned the ball over. If the Grizzlies needed a moment to reset, Gasol rallied his teammates into a huddle. He was emotive and feisty, feeding off a home crowd that was as eager as he was to see the ball in his hands.

It wasn't a perfect night for Gasol or the Grizzlies' offense. 18 of Gasol's 23 points came before intermission, and the Clippers' zone complicated things for Memphis. As is often the case, Memphis' anemic shooting from outside allowed the defense to gradually constrict the Grizzlies' half-court stuff -- with Gasol as the most acute victim. Watch the possessions again and you can see that the Clippers effectively ran a box-and-one, with Reggie Evans or DeAndre Jordan attached to Gasol.

But such is the nature of playoff basketball: one long exercise in problem solving. For a good, long stretch of Game 5, the Grizzlies and Gasol figured things out.

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

Marc Gasol and Reggie Evans have spent five games battling for paint supremacy. Tuesday they also battled for Flop of the Night by participating in a tremendous double-flop.

Let's get right to breaking down the flop footage (video), because there's a lot happening here.

As Evans comes to set a screen for Chris Paul, Gasol is already using two hands to push Evans away from where Paul wants the screen to be set. In response, Evans grabs a hold of Gasol's hand, in an apparent effort to show the ref that Gasol is fouling him -- which he is.

Evans then decides less subtle methods are necessary.

With Gasol draped across his shoulder, Evans violently raises his arms up to tell the referee "Hey! This guy is all over me!"

However when Evans raises his arms, he gives Gasol a chance to flop backwards on what looks like an elbow to the chest.

In a way, it's beautiful. Gasol fouls Evans, which isn't called. Evans works up some drama to call attention to the foul. Evans' drama, in turn, triggers' Gasol's flopping impulse, which earns the much sought-after call.

Both men flopped to the best of their ability, but to the victor goes the call, and our Flop of the Night.

Bonus flop: The theatrical exchange harkens back to this Hall of Fame double-flop between Manu Ginobili and Raja Bell, in which Bell flops so hard he accidentally "trips" Ginobili who is already mid-flop when Bell's foot touches him.

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com

• Ethan J. Skolnick of the Palm Beach Post: The Indiana Pacers are coming this way, for a second-round series that starts at 3:30 p.m. Sunday. The Heat will try to reverse a trend that, during the season, went the wrong way. Over the course of four games against Indiana, Miami played four very different variations of coach Erik Spoelstra's squad. The Heat shot worse and scored fewer points in each successive game of the matchup, while each time allowing more. The 118-83 win on Jan. 4 was the Heat at its best, even without Dwyane Wade; LeBron James scored 33 with 13 assists, and the Pacers shot 34.8 percent. The 105-90 win on Feb. 14 was the Heat at its most resilient, romping out to a 35-point lead on the third night of a back-to-back-to-back. The 93-91 overtime win on March 10 was the Heat at its most cohesive, with James and Wade taking turns making critical plays. And the 105-90 loss on March 26 was the Heat at its weariest and sloppiest, as Indiana capitalized on a letdown – after Miami's loss to Oklahoma City – and six James turnovers to pull away in the third quarter. Now Miami will encounter a Pacers team that has gained confidence and experience from its first series victory as a group, even if that victory came at the expense of a depleted Magic team. Indiana will also be a relatively rested team, having finished its first-round work a day earlier than Miami, and having routinely spread minutes throughout a 10-man rotation. "This next series will feel like it's played in a cage, rather than a basketball court," Spoelstra said.
• Neil Best of Newsday: In a season that defied logic, notably when a young guard named Jeremy Lin came from nowhere to revive the team, it made sense for a bench-warming guard who turns 34 Sunday to outscore everyone in the first 12 minutes, from Melo to Stat, from LeBron to D-Wade. All of which, much like Linsanity, was fun while it lasted, but didn't last for long. Then another season-long theme kicked in, and kicked the Knicks out of the playoffs: They simply were not quite good enough to be as good as they had hoped to be. That realization had sunk in long ago, but now that there are no more games after last night's 106-94 clunker, the Knicks are free to admit it and to talk out loud about what needs to happen next. "I think we have to have a better mindset going into the season,'' Amar'e Stoudemire said. "We definitely have to have a consistent season. This season has been up and down, coaching changes and so on and so forth.'' Said Tyson Chandler : "We need to have a nice flow in which everyone touches the ball. We've got to make sure we get other guys involved.'' Hmm. There is a lot to chew over in those comments, seeing as how they address two much-discussed issues: The Knicks' lack of a consistent roster and the propensity of their biggest star, Carmelo Anthony , to dominate the offense.
• Ron Higgins of The Commercial-Appeal: The Grizzlies should be ecstatic that they won game five on Wednesday in FedExForum, 92-80, to stave off elimination and advance to a game six on Friday in Los Angeles trailing 3-2. But here's the problem. A Clippers' team, even with point guard Chris Paul being "held" to 19 points, with Blake Griffin sustaining a sprained knee in the fourth quarter, with the team shooting 37.1 percent from the field and getting outscored 48-26 in the paint, cut the Griz lead to six with 55.7 seconds left. A Memphis team that scored 57 points in the first half, thanks to rediscovering that center Marc Gasol and forward Zach Randolph can score with enough touches, had just 35 points in the second half. Gasol and Randolph scored 23 points and 19 points respectively, but in the second half they combined for just nine points on 0-for-7 shooting after going a combined 14-of-18 from the field in the first half. When asked why the disparity between halves, why didn't the inside duo touch the ball as much the second half, Griz coach Lionel Hollins pointed to the fact Gasol and Randolph didn't make a second-half basket. That's an off-the-cuff answer with no meat to it. ... The Grizzlies' biggest concern for game six is getting some sort of outside shooting. Once the Clippers cut off the passing lanes to Gasol and Randolph, the Grizzlies didn't get enough offense elsewhere to win comfortably. Rudy Gay made some huge plays in the final minute, including an impossible drive with 19.2 seconds left to give the Griz an 88-79 lead. But his offense was stagnant most of the game. If the Griz want to get to a game seven on Sunday in FedExForum, that has to change.
• Dan Woike of The Orange County Register: The Clippers know they're going back to Los Angeles for Game 6 in their first-round series with the Memphis Grizzlies. They just don't know how healthy their two best players will be Friday evening. Blake Griffin injured his left knee and Chris Paul strained his right hip flexor in the Clippers' 92-80 loss to the Grizzlies on Wednesday at the FedEx Forum. Both Griffin and Paul returned to the game but looked visibly uncomfortable. Griffin's injury occurred when he drove the lane on Marc Gasol, drawing a foul before landing awkwardly on his left leg, which flexed backward. The Clippers called the injury a hyperflexed knee before diagnosing it as a sprain. Paul, who missed the final game of the regular season, was noticeably bothered by the injury. Griffin will have an MRI today in Los Angeles. "The pain scares you most," he said. "It's not because it hurts; it's because you don't know why." Griffin said the knee stiffened on the court after he returned, but the pain felt different than the left patella fracture that kept him out his rookie season. Paul vowed to be on the court Friday for Game 6. "I'll be ready," he said, adding that both he and Griffin are "tough guys."
• Michael Cunningham of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: The AJC’s D. Orlando Ledbetter was at the event and reported the following Hawks-related highlights from Michael Gearon Jr.'s speech. On media coverage of Hawks’ playoff series against the Celtics. “Did you see what Al Horford did last night? The timeline for recovery for his injury is another three months. He’s not even supposed to be playing and Josh [Smith] should not be playing. Zaza [Pachulia] can’t stand up, but if we can get past this round there is a chance that we can get him back. So this is a team that is overcoming adversity. I wish . . . some of the national media or even some of the local media, more the paper than the TV guys, recognize how hard these guys are playing based on how injured they are. On top of all that, we don’t get any calls, which I know everybody always hears. But I’ll give you a stat. Last night, we are playing this old physical team. They are old. I know what happens when you play basketball, old guys foul. [Kevin] Garnett is the dirtiest guy in the league. We are playing Boston last night and they had two fouls the whole first half. We had five times that and we’re athletic.”
• Scott Souza of the MetroWest Daily News: With Johnson starting in the backcourt instead of the 6-foot-4 Kirk Hinrich, the Celtics faced a matchup dilemma long feared when the 6-foot-1 Rajon Rondo and 6-foot-2 Avery Bradley were first paired as Boston’s starting guards. The result in Game 5 was Bradley, who has been playing with a sore left shoulder, logging just 18 minutes as Celtics coach Doc Rivers was forced to rely heavily on the bigger Ray Allen and Mickael Pietrus in the backcourt. The problem Rivers is faced with when making moves in this type of chess match is that the board looked best if Boston could have kept it just like it was. The Celtics have been strongest with Bass and Bradley on the floor alongside Paul Pierce, Garnett and Rondo. It was when Rivers made Bass the starting power forward and moved Garnett to center that the team began its turnaround from a 15-17 record heading into the All-Star break. The Celtics are 23-10 this season, including the playoffs, with Bradley in the starting lineup, and were just 19-19 when he wasn’t. But if playoff series are about adjustments, Drew made one that worked for Game 5, and Rivers and his staff had to think long and hard about how they intended to counter it during yesterday’s day off. The Celtics are still in command of the series with the chance to end it on their home court tonight. But the Hawks changed the complexion of it on Tuesday night by presenting Boston with a big problem that doesn’t look like it is going to go away easily.
• Christopher Dempsey of The Denver Post: Less than 24 hours after his team's odds-defying win over the Lakers, Nuggets coach George Karl was still smiling. But he also was ready to move on. Karl has been here before, and as the coach in these NBA playoffs with the second-most postseason victories (78), he understands the Nuggets have plenty of work left to do. So Wednesday morning he went about the business of reeling in any players who had the look of letting euphoria take over and cause too much satisfaction. "We've got to worry about just controlling our happiness," Karl said, sitting in a conference room at the team hotel before flying to Denver. "The real serious games are coming up (tonight), and if we're fortunate to figure out how to win that game, then we get an opportunity to play an incredible seventh game." According to center JaVale McGee, Tuesday's 102-99 victory, which cut the Nuggets' series deficit to 3-2, was already a distant memory. "That game is forgotten," said McGee.
• Elliott Teaford of the Los Angeles Daily News: Closing time: the sequel. The Lakers got it all wrong in Game 5 on Tuesday at Staples Center, which is why they must play a Game 6 tonight in Denver as they make a second attempt to close out the Nuggets in their Western Conference quarterfinal series. Since they are still ahead 3-2 in the best-of-7 series, they have a margin for error. It's a small consolation, however. The Lakers' frustration was evident after they stormed back from a 15-point deficit in the fourth quarter only to fall short in the closing seconds, tumbling 102-99 to the Nuggets and setting up match point No. 2 tonight. Game 7, if necessary, would be Saturday at Staples Center, but the Lakers weren't thinking about a winner-take-all game after squandering their first try at eliminating the Nuggets and advancing to play the Oklahoma City Thunder in the next round. ... For openers, the Lakers need to shoot better than the 33.3 percent (15 of 45) they shot during the first half of Game 5, when they didn't take advantage of the Nuggets' 41.3 percent shooting (19 of 46) and trailed 49-43. What's more, the Lakers must ditch their customary languid style of play in favor of a more frenetic approach to Game 6. The Nuggets have won twice in this series just by outhustling the Lakers to rebounds and loose balls.
• John Smallwood of the Philadelphia Daily News: Each time you fail; the task seems to grow more difficult. A team that had jumped to a 3-1 lead does not want there to be a Game 7. If the Sixers think winning a close-out game is tough, they have no concept of what it would be like to face a re-energized Bulls team on the road in an elimination game. "I don't like the word desperation," Collins said when asked if that was his team's attitude going into Game 6. "Sometimes guys when they think desperate get out of their nature. I want there to be a real sense of focus about what we have to do. We have to meet their challenge . . . They imposed their will [in Game 5]. We hung around but they imposed their will, our guys know that. Collins has talked all season about how he wanted to "manage the extremes" of the highs and lows of his young team. Inherent in that is the understanding that players learn from experiences and use that to move forward. We find out Thursday night how much this squad learned from Tuesday.
• K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune They have been called soft, overpaid and busts. They have heard criticism from countless corners outside the Bulls' locker room. By tuning such noise out, what Luol Deng and Carlos Boozer have done serves as a microcosm of this Bulls' season. Both players have overcome adversity not just to persevere but succeed. "One thing about Carlos: He doesn't let that stuff bother him. He shrugs it off," Taj Gibson said. "That's what I admire about him. It falls off his shoulder and he gets ready for the next game. And he's the same every game. He's solid. He never worries about the negative. He's always consistent." A repeat of Tuesday night's performance would serve the Bulls well in Thursday's must-win Game 6, as their best-of-seven Eastern Conference quarterfinals shifts back to Philadelphia.

After extending the series with Sunday's win, the New York Knicks lost Wednesday to the Miami Heat, losing the series in five games and making it 12 straight seasons since last winning a playoff series.

The winless stretch is the second-longest in Knicks franchise history, succeeded only by a 15-season span from 1954-68.

Sunday's win only seemed to temporarily stave off the inevitable. It was a series almost entirely dominated by the Heat.

In their four losses, the Knicks lost each by double digits and were outscored by a combined 70 points. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the negative 14-point average scoring margin is New York's second worst in a best-of-7 playoff series in postseason history.

The Knicks struggled to move the ball in Game 5, recording just 13 assists on 36 made field goals (36.1 percent), their worst team assist percentage this season.

They struggled to get easy baskets all series, with three of the games ranking among their worst assist percentage games of the season.

Additionally, the Carmelo Anthony/Amare Stoudemire project continues to produce mixed results.

In the past 2 seasons, including the playoffs, the Knicks have gone just 31-40 with both Anthony and Stoudemire in the lineup, including 1-7 in the postseason. When it's just been Stoudemire, the Knicks are a .500 team; they're 13-7 in games where just Anthony has been in the lineup.

Helping expedite the Knicks' playoff exit was LeBron James, who led the Heat with 29 points, eight rebounds and seven assists in Game 5. James improved to 7-0 all-time in first-round playoff series.

James inched his scoring average in potential series clinchers up to 28.3, the fifth-best mark in NBA history (minimum 10 games).

Awaiting the Heat are the Indiana Pacers, against whom the Heat had success, taking three of four regular-season meetings. Indiana struggled offensively in those games, averaging 92.3 points in the four games, shooting 40.4 percent from the field.

The Heat and Pacers have met just one other time in the playoffs: the 2004 Eastern Conference Semifinals, which the Pacers won in six games.

On Grantland, Greg Oden's former teammate Mark Titus spends plenty of time with the unemployed former first overall pick, and it's a wonderful must-read and the saddest thing ever, all at the same time.

Doubtless the biggest eye-opener is talk of Oden drinking more alcohol than he thinks he should have (and whatever "doing things I shouldn't have been doing" means), particularly when a hard-drinking cousin from the Air Force moved into his Portland house to "mentor" him.

Oden has discussed his relationship with alcohol before -- but it's news how it all shook out, and how Titus reports Oden's friends reacted in real time, with profound concern, talk of interventions and the like.

Read the whole story, though, and this alcohol aspect is just one of a half-dozen Oden tales of things gone wrong:

• You know that wrist injury that dogged him in college? He got it, we learn, scrapping with his brother -- something that he long kept a secret.
• His close friend died, tragically, on a day he might have been safely watching Oden play, but for a ticket mix-up.
• Being in the same draft with the supernova Kevin Durant has created all kinds of pressures and scrutiny.
• Portland was an unlucky place to land -- it's described both as not a good place for a young black man with a lot of money looking for a mentor, and as the team with perhaps the worst medical staff in the league.
• There is talk of the etiquette of sexting, and how basic decency demanded he snap a photo of his privates and send them along.
• There is the psychologist who helped him, until Oden pushed him away out of suspicion he was sharing Oden's personal information with the team.

And on and on.

By the time we get to the nitty gritty of his health -- really with Oden, the only thing that matters -- there is this insight about Oden's locked out summer of 2011 which really underlines a theme of victimhood:

Somewhat thankfully, the NBA lockout forced him away from the Blazers' facilities last summer, and he moved to Los Angeles to continue rehabilitating at a private clinic. Even if the change of scenery served him well, that clinic was juggling too many athletes to give him the personal attention Greg thought he needed, so he found a different clinic that was more hands-on. Greg's new physical therapist informed him that, while his left knee was healing well, it wasn't nearly as strong as it should've been. He referred Greg to a New York colleague who specialized in things like "making someone's knee better after it endures two devastating injuries in less than a year." Before Greg shifted operations to New York, however, the lockout ended and forced him back to Portland. Again, he felt rushed to return to the court before he was ready. And wouldn't you know it — he ended up needing another microfracture surgery in the same knee he was already rehabbing.

You feel that idea? That if somehow the lockout had been longer everything would be better?

Somewhere around there I reached the point of enough already with the excuses.

NBA players have the right to get their own medical advice, apart from the team, whenever they want it. Players do that all the time. But Oden never really pursued that too aggressively, which blows my mind.

Are there doctors who could have Oden healthy and on the court right now? Maybe. Nobody knows.

By the time he was enthusiastic about the solution in New York, Oden was four years and $20 million in salary into knowing that his career hinged on getting the best medical care money could find. By last summer Oden knew that he was particularly injury prone (wrist, tonsillectomy, microfracture 1, ankle injury, foot issue, fractured kneecap, microfracture 2). He had wondered aloud in May 2010 if maybe he had systemic health issues underlying all that. The lockout didn't end until past Thanksgiving, four years after when Oden should have been on that jet to New York or Switzerland or wherever it is they have answers.

And now that he has had microfracture 3, still no real answer. If New York was the promised land, why isn't he there right now?

Greg has, by his own admission, watched a hell of a lot of "Two and a Half Men" and "Gossip Girl." He has not, despite all the time and money you could ever ask for, gone to the trouble of finding the best medical care in the world -- at least not that he has discussed.

Maybe it's too tall an order to expect an injured young athlete to take charge of complex affairs in that way. It's normal and right to make mistakes when you're young. That's cool. But it's getting past time when we can blame anybody but Greg, for instance, for things Greg did or didn't do.

The truth is he has had a ton of bad luck and a ton of good luck. Put it all together, and he can create all kinds of success and happiness, and we won't have to keep hearing such sad stories.

• J.A. Adande telling a great Kobe Bryant story.
• Al Horford played 41 minutes in just his second game since returning from shoulder surgery. In that time he grabbed 11 rebounds, made a game-saving defensive play on Rajon Rondo and, according to John Hollinger, really lubricated the sputtering Hawks offense: "The telltale sign: Open corner 3-pointers. They'd been as rare as chowder in these parts, but Atlanta got several Tuesday night and converted 7-of-16 from distance. Marvin Williams, instated as a starter to guard Boston's Paul Pierce, made three of them, tripling his total from the first four games."
• I love this: The Nuggets are using a laptop in the huddle at the end of games to help predict what plays the Lakers might run. Don't be surprised if in a few years, each assistant has a iPad-like tablet, instead of a clipboard, in hand.
• Kobe Bryant's sweaty, game-worn mask garnered $67,100 in a charity auction.
• Kevin Durant's top 10 plays, which remind you that he's a very under-appreciated dunker.
• Facebook's massive IPO might help bring a new arena to Seattle.
• Basketball Value with a data on how every five-man lineup has fared thus far in the postseason.
• It turns out the Dream Team did lose a game -- to a squad of collegiate players lead by Bobby Hurley and Chris Webber. That footage will be a part of a Dream Team documentary coming to NBA TV.
• The Celtics are still up 3-2 against the Hawks, but Brian Robb of Celtics Hub is worried about Paul Pierce. The hobbled vet didn't attempt a single free throw in Game 5.
• No reason for Jeremy Lin to play if that knee isn't 100 percent.
• This story (Insider) is about LeBron James's historic season and how it compares to Michael Jordan's best years. But I can't help noticing this other bit: The numbers say no great player turned it up in the playoffs like Hakeem Olajuwon.
• The Bulls needed some bailout shooting from Luol Deng to survive Game 5. On By the Horns, Matt McHale isn't exactly thrilled: "Deng’s threes were also a red flag. The Bulls needed all three of them in the fourth quarter. Lu repeatedly beating the buzzer with contested threes isn’t something the team can count on consistently, especially not on the road in Philadelphia on Thursday. When Philly’s defense turns up the pressure in the fourth quarter, the Bulls cannot seem to generate good looks. Or even average looks. You can check out the shot chart. Philly’s D is either forcing long jumpers or intimidating the Bulls at the rim. In the fourth quarter last night, Chicago went 1-for-6 in the paint."
• The Lakers want to exploit their advantage in the post, but the Nuggets are making it awfully crowded down on the low block. Forum Blue and Gold's Darius Soriano has sage advice: "The Lakers need to move the ball more, cut and screen more, and then look for quick duck ins from their big men where they can catch the ball on the move or sliding into position where they’re more of a threat to score. By incorporating more ball and player movement before post entries are made, it should also afford the Lakers that extra beat of time they need to make a quick move to try and get a basket. Cross screens can also be utilized both in “horns” actions and in more simple sets that don’t involve the double high post look to begin a possession."
• Apparently, playing defense in the playoffs requires some blatant shoving.
• Aaron McGuire, writing about the Spurs on 48 Minutes of Hell: "The Spurs have managed to win six games this season while shooting 40 percent or lower from the floor (meaning that we shot less than or equal to 40 percent in 11.1 percent of our wins). Last season, despite their insane record, the Spurs won only once while shooting that poorly from the floor. This isn’t a matter of luck. The Spurs’ defense this season has played significantly better than last season’s, and while they certainly had their periods of lesser performance akin to last season, the Spurs we’re watching in this year’s playoffs are currently playing better defense than anyone in the Western Conference."
• Shawn Kemp (on stage!) will bring you some beef, but only if you'll have it with mustard.
• If it was his last game with the Magic, Jameer Nelson went out with a bang.
• It's not your fault if you don't know how good the Indiana Pacers are. Jonathan Auping writes on 8 Points 9 Seconds: "The Indiana Pacers played a grand total of one game on national television this season. (Side note: I do not consider NBA TV to qualify as national TV. I am talking about games played on ABC, ESPN or TNT. There’s something about having either Kenny and Charles or Magic and Wilbon talking about your first-half performance that feels like validation). The only chance that the country had to watch the Pacers was a 111-94 win over the Philadelphia 76ers on ESPN back on March 14. The Charlotte Bobcats had exactly as many nationally televised games as the Pacers."

This report from Kevin Arnovitz has some interesting thoughts from Clippers and Grizzlies players on the rampant flopping in their first-round series.

While Chris Paul dismissed the notion entirely (he plays the head game at another level), Reggie Evans and Blake Griffin were more open to discussing, and defending, their flopping philosophies.

• Griffin: "It's one of those things where every play means a lot. You never know what one play can do, so you're making sure you're getting every possession you can."
• Evans: "If you can sell a call and get away with it, why not do it? It's all a part of the game. It's always the one who it doesn't work out in their favor -- that's the one that's always complaining about it."
• Evans: "People say I flop a lot. I pick my moments. One thing about these referees, they do a good job of knowing who's high on the radar when it comes to flops."

The quotes reveal why players flop in the first place and why they are more motivated to do so in the postseason, when winning is all that matters.

Evans also addressed specific questions about Paul's reputation for flopping: "I don't think he's flopping. He's not the flopping type of guy, in my opinion. I think he really gets fouls. You think of a flop, you think of something like what (Pau) Gasol or (Danilo) Gallinari do. That's a flop. But Chris is getting fouled."

I wonder if Evans has seen this video.

On Tuesday, David Stern told CBS’s Jim Rome that the NBA owners would discuss whether to follow a shorter schedule -- like this successful lockout-shortened one -- going forward.

However Stern doesn’t anticipate changes soon, because, more or less, change is hard and potentially expensive.

"The reason you don't make it a shorter year is because of the infrastructure that's been built,” said Stern.

“You have all of the buildings that have been selling an 82-game schedule. You have these local TV deals. You have these network TV deals. So, we'd have to negotiate with our players to take 20 percent less every year on the salaries that they're getting. That is a problem."

That would indeed be a problem, if indeed that's how it turned out.

But how much less players would make is probably not yet knowable. Currently, player salaries make up a percentage of Basketball Relate Income. Players only played 66 out of 82 games, but they could get more than 66/82nds of their normal salaries. This is especially true if sources are correct saying that TV revenues were close to those in a normal 82-game season.

This idea of a shorter season is not new at all. In fact, Shane Battier believes a shorter season would make for better, more compelling (and thus more lucrative) basketball. He explains in a 2008 interview: “The NBA season only needs to be fifty games. I think the fans would love it because every game would mean so much more, like in college where every game is so important. Players would love it because it saves wear and tear on their bodies. I think TV people would like it because more people would watch. I just think it would be a great thing."

During the lockout, our Kevin Arnovitz wrote convincingly about the same idea, only he suggests 44 games would be the perfect amount. Many others have chimed in, too.

Even if the 82 game season is here for the foreseeable future, this shortened year reminds us that change is possible and allows us to question the league's time-honored conventions.

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The Clippers are winning a reputation as some of the league's most consistent and spectacular floppers, which might lead you to suspect they're gaining some kind of unfair referee advantage over their first-round opponents, the Memphis Grizzlies.

But if that's so, there are other factors in play, too.

Take a look at which teams are shooting the most free throws -- per possession -- in the playoffs as of today:

1. Memphis Grizzlies
2. Miami Heat
3. Los Angeles Clippers
4. Philadelphia 76ers
5. Dallas Mavericks
6. Utah Jazz
7. Oklahoma City Thunder
8. New York Knicks
9. San Antonio Spurs
10. Denver Nuggets
11. Indiana Pacers
12. Los Angeles Lakers
13. Boston Celtics
14. Orlando Magic
15. Chicago Bulls
16. Atlanta Hawks

In other words, yes the Clippers are high on the list, but the Grizzlies lead the league in getting to the line so far.

Meanwhile, the other team that has been accused of getting all the calls -- at least by Danilo Gallinari -- is the other L.A. team. In fact, the Lakers trail all but four playoff teams, including Gallinari's Nuggets, when it comes to shooting freebies.

Statistical support provided by NBA.com.

HoopIdea wants to #StopTheFlop. To spotlight the biggest fakers, we present Flop of the Night. You can help us separate the pretenders from the defenders -- details below:

Ronnie Brewer is a phenomenal defender with quick feet and a strong enough upper body to control the likes of Dwyane Wade. But he wins this flop of the night (click for video) by allowing Evan Turner to knock him to the ground without much contact at all.

From the reverse angle, you can see Brewer is using a maneuver we'll call "The Bruce Bowen." As he sees Turner reverse course, Brewer leaves his defensive stance and slides his hips forward in anticipation of the spin move, shifting his balance so that when Turner bumps him, it's enough force to send Brewer to the deck.

Brewer moves his feet admirably, but also plays for the fall against a player who is clearly not out of control. The well-timed, theatrical arm swinging is key, too, because it communicates Brewer's victimhood to the referee.

It's a savvy move, and earns a foul call from official Leon Wood, who doesn't have a great angle on the play.

Appropriately, Greg Anthony has a conflicted reaction, in one breath saying, "Ronnie Brewer sold that play there on the spin. I don't know if he's going to get an Oscar, but good job of acting there." And in the next, calling it "great defense."

When you see an egregious flop that deserves proper recognition, send us a link to the video so we can consider it for Flop of the Night. Here's how to make your submission:

• Alert HoopIdea to super flops with the Twitter hashtag #FlopOfTheNight (follow us on Twitter here).
• Use the #FlopOfTheNight hashtag in Daily Dime Live.
• E-mail us at hoopidea@gmail.com

JaVale McGee and the power of suggestion

It was undeniably the most important game of JaVale McGee's young career, and among his very finest performances. 21 points on 12 shots, many of which were jaw-dropping rim attacks. 14 rebounds. Two blocks, both in the fourth quarter ... including sending back a Pau Gasol dunk with less than two minutes left. As McGee stood on the court, post-game, doing a hero's interview with TNT's Craig Sager, Sager noted that McGee was rightly holding the game ball. As the conversation wound up, Sager advised McGee -- a wonderful player with a reputation as a kook -- to hang onto that ball. The camera lingered on McGee as he thanked Sager and made his way along the edge of the largely empty post-game Staples Center stands and into the tunnel. The last thing McGee did before disappearing from view? He heaved that game ball, baseball-style, into the great beyond of the arena.

Good thing Sager didn't say "hang onto those shorts."

The Celtics, Heat and reputations

In a great article about the prowess of Rajon Rondo, it was pointed out that the Celtics are incredibly efficient in crunch time, especially as compared to the Heat.

I cringed as I read it.

The Celtics have created a huge bundle of great late-game plays, and run some of the league's most beautiful sets. But our eyes deceive us on these things all the time, and though people hate to hear it, the numbers almost never support the persistent idea that the Heat are terrible at much of anything.

Sure enough, as it happened the Celtics closed a game last night with some of the poorest execution imaginable.

Which, it turns out, is not as out of character as you might think. NBA.com's new stats site, tells us, essentially that the Heat crush the Celtics by every relevant measure late in games. In games either team was tied or trailing closely with 3 minutes left, the Celtics finished this season with a 5-11 record, which is not good by any measure, even compared to the Heat, who were 9-8. The Heat had the league's fifth most efficient offense, with the second-best true shooting percentage late in those games. The Celtics, meanwhile, had the 26th most efficient offense, with the 27th best true shooting percentage.

And as it happened, with the game on the line against the Hawks, Boston's big opportunity ended with the opposite of efficient execution. Rondo went on a dribble-odyssey to nowhere, capped by a too-late desperation pass that was tipped and sailed out of bounds at the final horn.

None of that proves anything, other than that every team, even the veteran Celtics, has miscues late. So why do the Heat seem to have no clue? Just maybe people make a bit bigger of a fuss out of the Heat's flaws, not because they are more common, but because they fit a certain narrative.

Kobe Bryant and hotness

Speaking of certain narratives, Kobe Bryant hit four straight late 3s to turn a blowout into a squeaker, which had the broadcasters and everybody else saying the words "on fire" again and again. And four 3s ... that is a "wow" moment. I wonder how many players have ever done that, let alone late in a close playoff game.

But we also see what we want. Nobody, for instance, described JaVale McGee or Andre Miller as "on fire" in this game, because they take easier shots, I guess, and because that's not what we expect from them.

The truth, however, is that Miller and McGee finished the period a game-changing, scorching eight of 11 from the floor in the fourth quarter. Bryant's fourth included that stretch of four big makes, but in keeping with the bigger odds -- he's a pretty average 3-point shooter, and nobody is very good shooting with hands in their faces -- he ended the game with three straight misses. His final fourth quarter tally was five makes, seven misses, and still, somehow, a monopoly on claims of a hot hand.

Pick one: Andre Miller or Ty Lawson

The Nuggets have a problem. Arguably their best player is Ty Lawson. But so many of their other good players, especially the freakish athletes -- McGee, Kenneth Faried, Corey Brewer -- get so much out of playing with Andre "lob" Miller. There is simply no way McGee could have had his great Game 5 without Miller looking for him. George Karl has been playing Lawson and Miller late in games, but that seems to be more of a concession to the team's pecking order -- both "deserve" to play -- rather than the best possible lineup. Without the ball, neither is terribly useful. On late defensive possessions, although it happens Miller was guarding Bryant for his key late miss, it's a cinch to make the case that either or both should sit for defensive standouts Arron Afflalo or Brewer. Not to mention the magnificent Faried sat for the entire final period.

Short rotations

In the playoffs coaches shorten their benches. Play your best players. And for all I know it's right. But watching players like Andrew Bynum and Spencer Hawes, it's undeniable to me that fatigue plays a role in the playoffs. You sure you don't want Jordan Hill in there a bit more? Is it a lock that Nikola Vucevic would be of no use?

There are spells of the game when it seems anyone who had had a cup of coffee in the last 24 hours would do better than those exhausted players -- players who are blatantly excellent when not so tired.

And then consider players like the Bulls' Ronnie Brewer, who played 13, 13 and zero minutes in the first three games of the playoffs. A year ago, he got consideration as an all-NBA defender. But he was the odd man out as the Bulls shortened the rotation for the playoffs. In Game 5 he finally got some meaningful time, 29 minutes, and was blatantly fantastic, bringing precisely the kind of high-energy toughness the Bulls have been lacking since injuries to Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah.

And as it happens, Brewer's in a crew of three Bulls bench players, along with Taj Gibson and Kyle Korver, who are the only Bulls with positive plus/minus numbers in the playoffs. Even on the most injured playoff team, all three have seen their minutes drop compared to the regular season.

Statistical support provided by NBA.com.

• Bob Kravitz of The Indianapolis Star: Give Bird and his front office credit. Give Frank Vogel, who needs to have the third year of his contract guaranteed (and now) credit. And give these players credit for turning themselves into the type of team -- emphasis on team -- that this city and region can embrace without hesitation. With a bit more than a minute left in the Pacers' 105-87 series-clincher over the Orlando Magic, the chant went up from Area 55: "Beat the Heat! Beat the Heat!'' Then the rest of the crowd joined in. "There have been a lot of nights when it's been kind of silent in here,'' Roy Hibbert said with a smile. "But not tonight. Not this series. I think we're giving fans something to be proud of. We didn't do this the easy way. It took time. But Larry Bird and (general manager) David Morway drafted well. We got D(avid) West. We got George Hill, Leandro (Barbosa) and Lou (Amundson) for almost nothing. We didn't do this by signing a couple of superstars.'' ... What's next? The Pacers are taking their talents to South Beach.
• Mike Bianchi of the Orlando Sentinel: Thank you, Indiana Pacers. Thank you for what you did Tuesday night. Thank you for beating the Magic 105-87 and doing what should have been done long ago. Thank you for putting an end to the suffering of Orlando players, coaches and fans. Thank you for closing the book on this distressing, depressing season. It is over. Finally. Convincingly. Mercifully. Now we wait … wait to see what happens with Magic head coach Stan Van Gundy, who said after the game he wants to come back but has no idea if Magic management wants him back. Judging by his body language, I believe Van Gundy has a pretty good idea he will be sacrificed as the Magic desperately try to convince Dwight Howard to sign a long-term extension. ... If Van Gundy were being completely candid, he would admit that there is a part of him that will be ecstatic if he is fired and his Magic tenure is over. He likely feels much like Magic fans feel about this season. Seriously, has there ever been a playoff team where its fans seemed more relieved than bereaved that the season was over? Let's face it, the Magic had no chance in this series — none. The Pacers had the advantage at virtually every position. And that is a clear indictment of a roster that general manager Otis Smith has put together. Even with Dwight, the Magic would have been ousted in the first round by the Pacers, much like they were by the Hawks last year. ... Thank you, Indiana Pacers, for the incredibly humane gesture Tuesday night. Thank you for putting the Magic out of their misery. But the saddest part of all is this. The season may be over, but another Dwightmare is just beginning.
• Jeff Schultz of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: But hey, the Hawks won 87-86. They live to play another game. That’s probably more than most saw coming after self-immolation two days earlier in Boston. The Celtics still lead the best-of-seven series 3-2. They certainly will be favored to close this out Thursday night. But speculate at your own risk. As for Drew’s lineup decisions, try this: Horford, back from a torn pectoral, finished with a team-high 19 points, 11 rebounds, three assists and three blocked shots. Williams made three of six three-point attempts — the rest of the team was 4-for-10. On a night when Smith and Joe Johnson started dreadfully but finished strong, Horford was the difference. Horford was expected to play 15 to 20 minutes. He ended up playing over 41. “I didn’t want to bring him back that early in the fourth, but it was a close game and you could feel the momentum shifting,” Drew said. “He was a superman for us down the stretch.” So was this: After making only 4 of 16 shots to open the game and shooting 35.7 percent in the first half, the Hawks shots 61.3 percent in the second half.
• Steve Bulpett of the Boston Herald: Rajon Rondo has had better games than last night. You need only go back two nights to find one. But he actually came within a breath of single-handedly winning Game 5 at Philips Arena. In the final seconds, however, Rondo wasn’t able to pull the Celtics [team stats]’ keister from the fire one last time, and the lasting image of this one will be of the point guard coming up empty. The Hawks inbounded the ball with an 87-86 lead and just 10.9 seconds on the clock, and Rondo intercepted Josh Smith’s pass for Joe Johnson at 9.9. But with no timeouts left, he couldn’t find another moment of magic, or even another shot for the Celtics. Rondo dribbled up the left sideline, guarded by his friend Smith. Kevin Garnett set a pick, and the 6-foot-10 Al Horford switched onto him. Rondo was caught in the corner, and the clock ran out as he tried to get the ball back out to Garnett. Too nothing, too late. “I felt awful that the game ended the way it ended, because I thought Rondo willed us back into the game,” said Doc Rivers, whose team will try again to close out the Hawks in Game 6 tomorrow night at the Garden. “He really did at the end of the third quarter in that little stretch. It kind of gave us life again.” Had the Celtics been able to come up with a final bucket — or had they made one fewer silly mistake earlier — the focus today would have been on Rondo’s nine-second barrage late in the third quarter, nine seconds that nearly clinched the series.
• Mark Kiszla of The Denver Post: During a 102-99 victory that saved Denver from NBA playoff elimination, the great Nuggets' experiment in team basketball worked to perfection. Kobe Bryant scored 43 for the Lakers, but Denver stole the show. ... Patience is a virtue in Ujiri's mind. But there's something even a smart Nuggets executive probably can't fully appreciate after fewer than two full years on the job. The fatigue and frustration of the Denver ticket-buying public extends back more than a decade, before the time when first-round playoff exits became the norm to a time when Denver was laughably inept as an NBA franchise. As the Nuggets built a 15-point lead early in the fourth quarter, it wasn't funny to comedian Larry David and the beautiful people in the Staples Center who came out looking for a celebration but had to curb their enthusiasm. The crowd booed the home team. The Lakers responded with a furious rally. Bryant and Ramon Sessions both missed field-goal attempts from three-point range that could have tied the score in the final seconds. "Thank God," said Karl, appreciative for the divine intervention. Without superstars on the court, the Nuggets will take help anywhere they can get it.
• Jill Painter of the Los Angeles Daily News: Mike Brown was using his big smile to denounce a popular theory that's going around. It seems ridiculous, the prospect of the Lakers throwing Game 5 on Tuesday to push the series to six games so Metta World Peace could play in Game 1 against Oklahoma City in Western Conference playoffs. Brown's reaction? A smile, followed by laughing. "I thought it was funny," Brown said before Tuesday's game. Actually, Brown would rather get through the series quickly, even though that would mean Metta World Peace has to sit out the first game - serving the final of the seven-game suspension - of the next series. The Thunder is resting after their sweep over Dallas, and the San Antonio Spurs are waiting following their sweep over Utah. More rest would be beneficial for Kobe Bryant, who surely would have fresher legs after a five-game series than seven.
• Rick Morrissey of the Chicago Sun-Times: The United Center was all abuzz Tuesday night as the weary Bulls fought to remain among the living. It shouldn’t have been easy to watch for anyone, but when the Fan-O-Meter starts encouraging the crowd, Omer Asik dunks and the 76ers can’t hit an open shot on a rim lowered to 5 feet, people have a hard time helping themselves. They cheer. Wildly. Others are still trying to decide between denial and anger in the Derrick Rose grieving process. It’s why watching the Bulls beat the 76ers 77-69 brought on shrugs among those of us who like their basketball to be, you know, good. Yes, there will be a Game 6 in Philadelphia on Thursday and, yes, the 76ers might be feeling just a tad nervous with their 3-2 series lead. But is it asking too much for there to be one high-level basketball game in this playoff series, with two teams showing skill and will? If you can get high off the fumes of any kind of Bulls victory, even one as offensive as Tuesday’s, bless you. You’re a better person than I am. You see hope. I see a team that still has fight, doesn’t have much to fight for and might want to think about taking up pacifism. ‘‘Nobody wants to get eliminated at home,’’ forward Taj Gibson said of the Bulls’ resolve.
• Bob Ford of The Philadelphia Inquirer: Perhaps it was just the last gasp of a team that didn't want to leave the season with a loss on its home floor. Tuesday night's 77-69 win by the Chicago Bulls to avoid elimination by the 76ers could have been nothing more than that. The Sixers better hope so, and they better hope their offense returns from the land of the missing when the series continues Thursday in the Wells Fargo Center. It wasn't as if the Bulls were terrific in narrowing the Sixers' lead to three games to two. They were the same crippled team that lost three straight to the Sixers to get themselves into this predicament. But the Sixers were just awful. They took bad shots, didn't take care of the ball and couldn't match the Bulls' muscle in what became a very physical contest. The only question now is whether the game was a harbinger or merely the final act of defiance by a team that would prefer to end its injury-induced misery somewhere else. Whichever is the case, the series has changed. We find out Thursday night how much.

On a night when four teams could have ended their first-round playoff series, only the Indiana Pacers claimed a spot in the Conference Semifinals.

After losing the series opener, the Pacers dominated the series against the Orlando Magic. In the clinching game, they outscored Orlando 18-0 in fast-break opportunities and 46-22 in the paint. For the series, they held a 69-13 advantage in fast-break points and outscored the Magic by 76 points in the paint.

Darren Collison dished out 23 assists and committed just one turnover during the series. Since individual turnovers were first tracked by Elias in 1978, he is only the fourth player with 20 or more assists and one or fewer turnovers in a playoff game. The others were John Paxson (1990 Bulls), Fat Lever (1988 Nuggets) and Eddie Johnson (1987 Sonics).

Dwight Howard's injury doomed the Magic before the series started. Including the playoffs, Orlando finished 5-12 without their starting center and 33-21 with him in the lineup. This was the fifth time in the last 20 years that a team was missing its leading regular-season scorer in the playoffs – all five teams lost in the first round.

The Boston Celtics had a chance to eliminate the Atlanta Hawks, a team against which they had won nine of 10 previous playoff series. According to Elias, that .900 series winning percentage is the highest for any team against another in NBA history (with a minimum of six series played).

This was the 12th time under Doc Rivers that the Celtics had a chance to close out a series on the road; they have only succeeded twice. They return to the comforts of TD Garden on Thursday, where they are 7-3 under Rivers in potential close out games.

The key for the Hawks on Tuesday was Al Horford. In the 41 minutes that he was on the court, the Hawks outscored the Celtics by 10 points and grabbed eight more rebounds. While he rested, they were outscored by nine.

With a chance to finish their series against the Chicago Bulls, the Philadelphia 76ers couldn’t even match their nickname in the point column. Philadelphia was held under 70 points in a playoff game for the second time since the shot clock was introduced in the 1954-55 season. The franchise low was 68 points against the Magic in the 1999 playoffs.

With the win, the Bulls avoided becoming the first No. 1 seed since the playoffs were expanded to 16 teams in 1984 to win fewer than two games in the playoffs. The four previous top seeds to lose in the first round all won two games before they were eliminated.

The Los Angeles Lakers were looking to win their ninth-straight potential series-clinching game, but lost at home to the Denver Nuggets. It was their first loss in a potential close out game since Game 6 of the 2009 Western Conference semifinals against the Houston Rockets. According to Elias, that was the fourth-longest such streak in NBA playoff history. The Lakers also own the longest, 12 straight from June 2000 to May 2004.

Kobe Bryant scored 43 points in the loss, the 84th time in his career that he reached 30 points in a playoff game. The only player with more was Michael Jordan, with 109. It was the 12th time that he reached 40 in the playoffs and first since the 2010 Western Conference finals.

INDIANAPOLIS -- Those who look at the box score will never know how hard it was. Casual observers will never understand how important it was. The Indiana Pacers rode their starting-turned-backup point guard Darren Collison and a 36-16 fourth quarter to a 105-87 win. With it, came a 4-1 first-round series win over the Orlando Magic, and Indiana moved on to the second round for the first time since Reggie Miller wore the blue and gold.

“A huge step for our franchise,” Pacer coach Frank Vogel said after the game. That it is.

The clock wound down, and a sellout crowd chanted “Beat the Heat." Something more had been accomplished than just a playoff series win. A beleaguered franchise with attendance problems finally re-established a connection with its fan base that had been broken by so many misdeeds so many years ago.

“It was amazing when they started the chant,” Danny Granger said with a laugh. “We couldn’t hear. The other team couldn’t hear. I think the floor was shaking.”

It wasn’t easy. It wasn’t pretty. Heavily favored against a Magic team without Dwight Howard, the Pacers spent sizable portions of this series looking both young and flawed. Tuesday night’s win was no different. A 10-0 Magic run late in the second quarter left the Pacers up by only three points heading to half. Then, when Jameer Nelson’s 15 points usurped Indiana’s series-long third-quarter dominance, the Pacers entered the final stanza trailing 71-69.

Enter Darren Collison.

Collison, who had lost his starting job to George Hill late in the regular season, delivered an absolutely stellar fourth-quarter performance.

With the score tied 73-73, the third-year point guard scored or assisted on the Pacers’ next 12 points in a 12-5 run that left Indiana up 87-80. From there, the Pacers continued to push as the Magic seemed to finally run out of bullets. By the time Collison stole the ball and went in for an uncontested dunk with just less than the two minutes left, the Pacers' run was 27-12 and their lead was 100-85. Collison finished the quarter with 15 points on a perfect 7-for-7 from the floor, three assists and a steal.

“I just thought he had a different gear,” David West said. “Everybody else wasn’t at that gear he was tonight. I thought it powered us down the stretch.”

For Indiana, this win meant something.

"You’ve got to feel good about this, because there are a lot of guys who never make the playoffs," West said. "There are a ton of guys that never won a series. From that regard, you’ve got to be thankful.”

But not satisfied.

“There is an eagerness,” West said of his teammates, “because of the youthful nature of the group, to test the unknown.”

While Vogel and others weren't willing to assume that the Miami Heat, up three games to one on the New York Knicks, would be their next opponent, there's a strong possibility that it will be. And with the Heat, the Pacers will face a much stiffer challenge. No doubt, many will be predicting the “gentleman’s sweep” or worse. If that happens, it happens. For this franchise, in this time, there are stakes that aren’t measured in wins and losses.

“You just don’t know what’s going to happen," West said. "You don’t know what the next step or phase could be. While we’re in this moment, we’ve just have to take full advantage of it. Prepare to the best of our ability. Give it our all.”

Tim Donahue covers the Indiana Pacers for 8 Points, 9 Seconds, part of the TrueHoop Network.