Paul George says he has to 'get back to that old Kobe, T-Mac, 25-shots-a-night kind of guy'

Given the way their season ended, and having lost a key cog in Lance Stephenson this offseason, it's easy to be pessimistic about the Indiana Pacers next season.

But don't count Paul George among the haters. Rather, the budding superstar is quite bullish about the state of his team. 

In speaking to Marc Spears of Yahoo Sports, George confidently boasted:

If we had the same mentality that we had to start the year off, we would have won the championship. We were playing the best ball of all of our careers and Pacers history in general. For us to not finish the year where we started is tough

George does have a point. Before the Pacers imploded in the first week of March, the Pacers held the league's best record at 46-14. However, they did finish the remainder of the regular season with an ugly mark of 10-12.

According to George, it wasn't off-court drama or chemistry issues that broke the team's momentum. Rather, it was the fact that teams were "amped" to play the Pacers.

The Pacers' issue towards the end of the season was not defense, of which they ranked as the league's best. Rather, it was their offense, which was borderline unwatchable to end the season and into the playoffs. They finished 23rd in terms of offensive efficiency, and figured to have gotten worse having lost their main ball-handler in Stephenson this offseason.

But George has a solution to that too. "Coming into next season I need to be in the 25-30-point mark. I got to get back to that old Kobe, T-Mac, 25-shots-a-night kind of guy."

If George, who averaged 21.7 points per game on 42.4 percent shooting from the field, can score at the volume and efficiency as Kobe Bryant or Tracy McGrady did in their primes, the Pacers' biggest issue being offense would likely be solved. Only five players averaged more than 25 points per game last season, those being Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony, LeBron James and James Harden.