Frequency - yes. Record breaking, historical levels? I would hope not - that's why the Rockets wanted James in the mix two times this year. He surrendered more points, and Minny was not as good a defensive team, and sort of mailed it in early - I don't really see much difference between the two on a performance basis - maybe Rafer goes for more steals but IIRC James tends to stay at home more. Anyway that metric is skewed. I mean Steve Francis was statistically the first or second best defensive PG in the league in 2004. Now I have always said Francis (while in Htown and for a while in Orlando) was not as bad on D relative to his peers as we believed - but if you only use the opposing pts allowed metric it makes the Rox PG's look like stoppers when the truth is somewhere in between. Tthe point is that put James on Houston and Alston on Minny and I doubt there's a dramatic reversal of fortune - I do remember James as being pretty good here on D in 05.
I don't disagree with either point. I think they both are well above average defensive PGs. If it comes down to nothing major or trading for Mike James to bolster the PG spot I am fine with it. Overall I don't see James as a significant upgrade over Alston because I think each has some strengths the other is at best average at. I think the combination with James off the bench might be really strong. But I'd much rather spend full energy on landing Mo Williams because he is significantly younger than either and overall at least as good (in fact in lots of ways like a younger version of Mike James). BTW I don't think Mo W as a Rocket PG would actually be that much better of a player than James or Alston is right now--Mo W would not be a 17PPG+ scorer on the Rockets despite the unrealistic fan expectations of him around here if we did land him, he would maybe a 15PPG scorer--but he is a on the upside of his career, much like a younger version of Mike James.
