This is a column that should never have to be written. If it weren't going out in cyberspace, the Sierra Club would be up in arms for the utter and useless demolition of trees.

	Can Jermaine O'Neal and the Pacers sneak into the playoffs?

The Indiana Pacers are fighting to hang on to the No. 8 playoff seed in the Third World Eastern Conference -- and there's no reason why they should still be among the rudderless. (Well, actually, there could be a reason. They made a trade with the Bulls and now have gotten some of Chicago's flotsam and jetsam and, well, look what's happened. But that's not really it.)

Weren't the Pacers supposed to have risen above and beyond this mediocrity stuff awhile ago? Weren't they supposed to be among the challengers instead of the challenged at this point? The answer is an unequivocal yes -- and if you go back a bit, you'll hear their own people say just that. Give us time and we'll be fine.

We were told to cut them some slack so their kids could develop -- and we did. We rolled our eyes and shrugged our shoulders at comments by coach Isiah Thomas, who said he thought it was somewhat miraculous that his team even made the playoffs last year. That was when he could throw Reggie Miller, Jalen Rose, Travis Best and Jermaine O'Neal on the floor at the same time.

But we're now almost through Thomas' second season -- and the Pacers are exactly where they were a year ago. That might be acceptable for the folks at Enron, but it cannot and should not be for the Pacers. They should be better, a lot better by now. The one saving grace for them is that the conference is so bad that no one would be shocked if playoff teams 5-8 emerged victorious in the first round, Indiana among them.

Yes, the Pacers have had injuries. They can join the club. Think Philly hasn't had injuries? Orlando? Charlotte? But the Pacers were around .500 when Al Harrington went down and, guess what, they're still around .500.

Yes, they made a mid-season trade which saw the departure of Rose, who wasn't a happy camper. They were around .500 when they made the deal with a roster most teams would kill for. It wasn't working so they made the deal. Thomas loved the trade. The additions of Ron Artest, Brad Miller, Ron Mercer and Kevin Ollie would make them deeper, tougher, more defensive and allow O'Neal to move to his natural position of power forward.

So we were told. They were around .500 when they made the deal. You know the rest.

Yes, they've gone most of the season with a rookie at point guard, a decision made by the coach, who also had Best at his disposal until the trade came down in February. Jamaal Tinsley has been a pretty good rookie. It still doesn't matter.

In almost two full years as a head coach, Thomas is still winning as much as he is losing. The Pacers have gone from a team of promise to a team of predictability. While the Pacers weren't necessarily everyone's pick to roll over the rest of the East, they were, by virtually unanimous consent, a lock for a playoff spot. But where have they been as the supposed heavies of the East have collapsed like Eastern European bloc countries in the 1990s?

They're still where they've always been.

Boston, Detroit and New Jersey, three teams that finished behind the Pacers last season, all took advantage of the carnage at the top and moved into the vacuum. Indiana should have. It did not.

You look at the roster and you shake your head. Thomas has an All-Star center in O'Neal, arguably the second best center in the league after Shaq, even if he wants to be a power forward. Whatever position he plays, he is developing into a full-blown terror at both ends. The power positions in the Eastern Conference are, shall we say, limited?

There's Brad and Reggie, the Miller boys, both of whom are valued commodities. Brad isn't as smooth as Sale & Pelletier, but he doesn't back down and can score and rebound. Reggie is getting on, but he's still one of the league's most efficient scorers. Artest is a bit zany, but he plays hard and can defend. He came close to a quadruple-double last weekend against Miami.

The Pacers are lucky Michael Jordan went down when he did and that Toronto started to implode when it did. Otherwise, they might be looking up at the No. 8 spot.

Then there's the much-ballyhooed Jonathan Bender, now into Year 3 of a career that has everyone wondering if he's ever going to be the real deal. We keep hearing he is. We keep wondering when we'll see it.

In their third years, Tracy McGrady, Kevin Garnett and Kobe Bryant were all putting up big numbers and were key members of winning teams. Bender is putting up average numbers for an average team and struggling for playing time.

It's understood that patience is a non-existent commodity in the NBA. Coaches don't like to wait, feel they can't afford to wait, and players want everything yesterday. Having said that, if you're a Pacers' diehard, aren't you a bit tired of waiting for the NBA's version of Godot?

No, this isn't the team that Larry Bird took to the NBA Finals. We get that. We understand that it does take time to rebuild on the fly and that trying to rebuild, get young, and keep winning is a very hard thing to do in the NBA.

But we also see a team that has depth, size, youth, talent and has no business being where it is, especially in a horrible conference. The Pacers are lucky Michael Jordan went down when he did and that Toronto started to implode when it did. Otherwise, they might be looking up at the No. 8 spot.

If that were the case, we'd be certain of one thing: They'd be doing it with a record of around .500, because that seems to be their unavoidable fate.

Peter May, who covers the NBA for the Boston Globe, is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.