Does Any One Contender Have as Big a Weakness as Houston at PG?

But the question is if they can do as normal when they face an elite team.

 

No, actually Mike James is better than Derek Fisher in pretty much every category. Plus, Derek Fisher has never had the reputation of being a great ballhandler or a playmaker -- at best he's Luther Head with a couple of championship rings and nice leadership qualities.

 

I like Rafer Alston as the Rocket's Point Guard. The only problem is with Coach'A' who obviously has been neglectful to tell Alston that he should NEVER shoot the ball without someone else setting him up for the shot Which means he should only shoot when the ball is passed to him in an open position . Likewise he should never shoot near the basket unless the same circumstances have occured
If this is enforced the scoring of the Rockets could increase by at least 10 points a game!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Coach 'A' Get off your seat and Coach!!!!!! :

 

as i see it, other teams will have an advantage in that specific matchup against us (PG), but we will have an advantage in a specific matchup against them (C).

so whats the dif?

 

I agree that Rafer is a liability with shooting and defense, but I also remember Game 5 last year when he turned it up because he knew we would lose otherwise. He kept Deron Williams in check for that game and did a better job on him for the most part for the rest of the series. We are a much deeper team this year, and he should not have to play as many minutes. So to make the answer short, yes he is our weakness, but I also feel like we're good enough to beat teams this year even with him as our starter.

All this of course leads to much anticipation of seeing what Francis can do, whether or not he can play defense and shoot a decent % without turning the ball over too much. If he can ride in on that white horse and do something as simple as that, look out NBA, we will be unstoppable.

 

My take is that PG and Center are the 2 most important positions. Our weakness in PG is glaring. We are one PG away from being a championship team. Cant believe I am saying this again after adding James and Francis. I wish we could have a pg knows how to setup, knows how to pick spots, how to control the tempo, and when to take shots when opptunity presents itself.

 

tempo of the game, getting easy shots. When a good PG running the show, he can score and dish making others look like Yao or Tmac. Of course, if Yao or Tmac were such dominant forces, we wont be talking about this right now.

 

Rafer does most of what you say pretty well, especially with his experience with the players and adaptability at playing the PG role for any system. His major and glaring problem is that even when he takes the open shot, "the right play", it's still 65% a brick and that is unacceptable when 80% of your shots are open. Rafer takes far less bad shots as people think, T-Mac takes much worser shots then Rafer, difference is T-Mac can make those shots, Rafer just needs to stick his ass in the gym until he can hit over 40% on open 3s.

The biggest arguement on taking bad shots and making them would be looking at Kobe and Arenas' game. Both take crazy amounts of bad shots but still manage to make alot of them. Obviously forcing a bad shot is a notion of bad basketball player and obvious bad team player, but then why is Kobe so highly regarded as perhaps the best basketball player in the world, probably because he can force those bad shots and still make them on a regular basis. However I would rather have the entire team getting lots of open looks, something which the entire Rockets squad is on the same page on (except maybe for Mike James and Francis). Players jsut need to knock down these open looks, and Rafer's FG% considering the amount of open looks he get is unacceptable.

_ Blues

 

Not true.

Under JVG, all the Rockets' PG needed to do was to bring the ball up, and either handed it to TMac, or dumped it to Yao, and Alston has done a good job with very low TO. Yes, Alston didn't shoot the ball well, but none of our shooters did last year, except maybe Head, so that's not a PG issue.

Under Adelman, PG's function is pretty much the same. The system doesn't rely on PG to create, rather just initiate. With a low TO guy like Alston, the Rockets is in a good hand.

 

That's why Rafer is starting and finishing for us. He has a good handle, but since he is scoring ability is so limited, it hinders his confidence of being a good PG. Our offense could be so much better if we have a tony parker kind of guy, and we wont need him to score much actually.

I am very disappointed in Francis after watching him running the show in those preseaon games and got aboused by opposing PG on defense. I thought he was our answer at PG.

 

So was RA, for that matter. That is a good reason why Francis is now in RA's doghouse.

 

I think its important to understand that we are not going to have a matchup advantage at all five positions. The key is ensuring that the advantages we have at sg and c are large enough to overcome the advantage that other teams have at pg against us. Ex, the gap between yao and okur is greater than the gap between williams and our pg platoon. Thats what we need to hope for.

 

I dont agree with the gap theory. I think a MVP PG like Nash functions a lot more than a MVP wing like Kobe on a team. Of course someone is going to bring up Jordan or Shaq of old, but again if Tmac and Yao are dominant like that, we wont be talking about it right now.

 

do the Rockets really have such a superior advantage at SF? maybe if T-Mac displaces Battier at SF, and Bonzi gets the start at SG where he can really cause a mismatch for other SGs, but Adelman seems to be afflicted with the same man-crush on Battier as Van Gundy did. Battier is very good, but he's no top 10 SF. but he makes his teammates better somehow...

anyway, the answer to your original question:
no, but one contender has a superior advantage at SG/SF/PF. heck, sometime in the near future that PF might even become a C, and a point-center at that, and the Rockets won't have any real advantage over the Celtics besides depth and coaching.

 

Rafer is prone to incredible lapses of judgment. His shooting can be a problem, but he also goes mental at the wrong times. Not precisely steady.

Mike James is one of the worst decision-makers imaginable. Great for providing points off the bench. As a game manager? He's atrocious.

The Rockets aren't going to pick up a star at PG. The idea is to get someone who isn't flaky (Alston) or a mere scorer (James). I don't really care who it is. There'll probably be two or three such players available depending on how the season shakes out.

 

Also, note:

I'm not a particular fan of Derek Fisher. I chose his name primarily because he was the PG during the Kobe/Shaq dynasty.

 

You have to be kidding. Dennis Johnson played point for the Celtics and his number is hanging from the rafters of Boston Garden.

 

They both had terrible games shooting the ball. With Alston, it's to be expected, but with James, it was an off night. The problem with James tonight was shooting too quickly. He should have been setting up the other guys. Sure, he was getting open looks, but go into the freakin' offense, Mike, don't toss 'em up. It's very early in the season and everyone is getting used to Adelman's system, except for Bonzi, who is eating it up and asking for dessert.

Another thing about the point guard play tonight. Before going off on James, you might note that he had 5 assists to 3 for Rafer (in fewer minutes), and one less turnover. The Rocks were +4 with Alston in and +12 with Mike. http://www.nba.com/games/20071109/MILHOU/boxscore.html

Could we use a better point? Hell yes. Maybe Francis will help with that at some point (no pun intended), but until I see him do it, I'm not going to worry about it. We'll be fine with who we have. I'd prefer to see James get more minutes than Alston and to see him start, but as long as we're winning, I'm not going to lose sleep over it.

 

Ad nauseam

 

San Antonio - They can't guard the post especially if you get physical with them. Shaq owned them back in the day and just the other night Yao showed late in the game that they can't stop a dominant big man. Even a physical guy like Bonzi gives them nightmares. Spurs want you to play face up and take jumpshots. Post them up and pound the ball and they have problems guarding anyone.

Dallas - Their backcourt is liability on defense ie Baron Davis lighting them up. Plus the Mavs lack toughness and more importantly a clutch go-to-guy. Dirk is a great player but he cannot impose his will on other teams. No inside game Diop and Dampier are below average big men.

Phoenix - Amare is a finesse PF who needs to be spoon fed the ball by Nash to be effective. Their lack of post-up game is their biggest weakness.

Rockets - Our guards take too many 3 points shots and make only a handful. No playmaker besides T-Mac. Need to have Yao touch the ball on every possession and sometimes we can go for stretches without giving him the ball.

See everyone has weaknesses, it just a matter of how badly someone can exploit yours.