I am with you. I would rather keep Alston for a bit and trade Head, Sura's expiring contract and maybe Snyder for another big. I would actually love to keep Snyder, but the minutes just won't be there.
Why would anyone really want Rafer still? It simply makes no sense. The team has a starting point guard (Francis), a backup point guard (James) and a 3rd string point guard (Brooks) that are all better than Rafer is, at least on offense in Brooks' case. Francis is so much better than Alston it's ridiculous. It's just unreal to me that so many fans here actually want Rafer Alston. JVG is no longer the coach, it's no longer a team that will simply play a point guard if he dribbles up court, passes it to T-Mac, stands at the 3 line, then bricks a shot off a Yao pass, meanwhile JVG won't play any other type of point guard. It's not happening anymore. Rafer Alston needs to go to a team that he fits better on, he just does not fit with Yao and McGrady, it's just strange to me that fans want him, when he doesn't fit Yao and McGrady. To play with Yao or McGrady you have to be able to penetrate, draw fouls, finish, score, etc. And one-dimensional shooting like Luther doesn't cut it either. Van Gundy is the only coach I know of that had these offensive strategies. I think a lot of Rockets fans have forgotten what NBA point guard looks like other than just this idea of a robotic do whatever coach says, then brick a 3 play. In fact Rafer Alstoin himself would have better stats if he went to a system where he could run more instead of having to shoot 3's, with Yao and McGrady it hurts Alston's game too. Rockets fans are stuck in JVG mode, JVG wouldn't play dribble penetration guards over Rafer, where every other coach would have done the opposite. So many fans here are showing that they have bought into a failed offensive philosophy of Van Gundy. Alston does not fit Yao and McGrady right. His only real plus for Yao was decent post feeding, but with Francis and James and Scola now T-Mac, Battier, Hayes, Scola can post feed and this coach will actually play guys like this and Bonzi based on who should play, not based on his own personal whim. That means Alston wouldn't even play, unlike with Van Gundy where ONLY he would play. Right now Rafer Alston needs to be traded. The truth is the only coach in the NBA that would have chosen that point guard combo of last year with Alston/Head/Lucas was Van Gundy, the Rockets fans seem thoroughly stuck in believing basketball = the Jeff Van Gundy school of hoops 101. Adelman and Morey are doing exactly what is needed. Luther Head and Rafer Alston along with Bobby Sura, John Lucas, and Justin Reed should net something pretty good in a trade so I am 100 percent behind Morey. He's got to be the god send to Houston basketball IMO.
Co-Sign ball scientist. I don't think many people here are over Assistant coach yet. This team does not need a guy who was worse than Smush Parker and got completely exposed in the playoffs.
Lets send Rafer, lucas to Indy for jeff foster and were set. Francis/James/Brooks Mac/Bonzi/Head Battier/Snyder/Wells Scola/Hayes/Butler Yao/Foster/Deke Damn were deep.
Quick question: How many here WATCHED Francis play in the last two years? If you did and still think he's capable of running this team as the primary option at the one, then I'd like whatever the hell you're on.
Can he do any worse than Rafer Alston did last year? And Francis wasn't exactly playing on a team with a mentally stable coach. It seemed like Zeke was tweaking his lineup for every game. Got to have some semblance of consistency to have some success
Thinking about even Rafer can "run" the lesser team into the playoffs, I , for one, believe SF (or James, Vspan, Brooks or all other PGs) can be a starting PG and will do much better than Rafer "no game other than dribbling" Alston.
What amazes me is how many of you are so dead set on handing the starting PG role over to Francis or James when neither managed to start for their prospective lottery teams last year.
Zeke actually did his best to forge a stable rotation. Unfortunately, the Knicks had tons of injuries to key players (Q-rich, David Lee, Steph, Crawford..) and don't forget that Stevie also faked ankle injuries and was in and out of the lineup as a result. The blueprint for a Francis play was: dribble dribble dribble probe defense try to drive realize he doesn't have the legs pull up for a 15 foot jumper--BRICK. I swear it was painful. Every time he had the ball I wanted to start crying. The most hilarious part was when Francis started the season shooting something like 92% from the stripe, convincing Isiah that he was the team's best FT shooter and their designated technical taker. I think from then on he shot like 70%. I'm sure that Francis is coming here with a vengeance and every intention of proving himself; however, I seem to remember that even in his prime the blueprint was the same. Unless he dedicates himself into becoming a more cerebral player, I would much rather have Rafer manning the point.
Also you should have been amazed when you saw the smooth offense run by Alston and some of great offensive records set by our team last season. yeah, Alston is all what we need.
Exactly. They had injuries up the wazoo. That is NOT stability or is it consistency. And lest we forget, Starbury had that PG position on lock (which leads to the questioning of their acquisition of Francis from Orlando ONCE AGAIN) Who was he going to pass it to? Cuttino "Black Hole" Mobley? Eddie "I can't shoot a 3 for my life" Griffin? Mo "I can't elevate because the elastic band on my shorts snapped" Taylor? Besides, he could only alley-oop to Cato so many times before it wouldn't work. Of course, when Yao came, the guy was still learning the nuances of the game. And it's not as if Francis didn't get the ball to Yao (re: Lakers overtime game when both did pretty well). Because Rafer is one hell of a play maker himself.
It's cool to have Francis, since we have other options if he fails. Francis had Dwight Howard and Grant Hill in Orlando. Francis didn't get the ball to Howard either.
I guess you didn't pay attention to the way we looked when Rafer was on the bench much? The lack of a quality back up was much more of a problem than Rafer. No question Alston shouldn't be playing 44 minutes a game like he was forced to in the play offs, but neither Francis nor James exactly had record setting season's last year either. As a scorer James and Francis are no doubt better at creating their own shots. We can use players like that. They are also unquestionably worse than Alston at being pass first point guards.
if you saw last year's games when rafer was not playing, our offense really dragged. now i'm not saying that will happen this year, especially with guys like francis or james, but to say alston did not make plays and run the offense responsibly is ignoring the facts.
That's because his primary backup was Luther Head who has absolutely no point guard skills. I'm sure most point guards would look better than Luther running the point.
