Did Rafer Alston do a good job at running the offense?

come on guys...rafer is not as bad as u guys say he is. last year he was put in a situation that didnt fit his capabilities. we all know now that he cannot be a starting point guard...but he can really thrive as a back-up (remember his miami days).

 

As far as running an offence, he did fairly well. Some the time he would run that play where tmac comes off of a screen and he got the ball to ppl where they liked it most of the time, amongst other classic JVG set plays. Otherwise, he would get the ball up court and get T-Mac the ball to run a pick and roll with Yao (during late game).

This was all last year btw.

In adelman's system I thought it was more of a team passing and movement type offense, not just one person passing to get open shots. So is there really a need for a pass first pg if everyone is going to be moving and passing??? I'm not sure. Mike bibby wasn't pass first and the kings were good with him as the point. So it might be better if we had a pg who was capable of finishing near the hoop off cuts (francis), shooting open 3's (james) or both (possibly brooks?) who knows? alston had a hard time doing either on a consistent basis as everyone I'm sure knows ...

But I must say rafer was pretty good at getting Yao the ball in the post if i remember correctly and he is pretty underrated in the defensive department. though he gets abused by stronger type pgs like deron and baron, he had quite a few games where he played pretty good d on the likes of iverson, amongst others like terry.

I personally would like to see Skip in Rockets red again ... But, I would like to see the other 3 pgs play more.

 

When he was with the raptors??? you're probably talking about his best season. And who gives a crap about what he did with the Raptors? Who cares?

lets talk about when he was with the rockets. lets talk about how he shot more three pointers than two pointers. lets talk about the 3 or 4 times he went to the freethrow line all year.

a guy who plays 37 mins and gets to the line twice must be a damn good playmaker in your eyes.

 

him bringing up the Raptors season is just as intellectually honest as you claiming that ALston would miss 10 out of 11 threes he put up.

funny how a man can shoot 36% (or so, I aint bothering looking it up) from three while missing 10 out of 11.

my point?

as long as you are stating "facts" like you use in an obviously biased argument, I dont see where you have any room to call him out on his use of stats.

 

i like how you put in parenthesis 04-05 Raptors and not 06-07 Rockets

as far as im concerned, Rafer did the same thing in toronto. shot the ball too much, shot the same amt. of freethrows, and had 1 more assist...

 

If you call "dribbling the ball across half court and handing it off to Tmac" as running the offense, then YEAH ...

 

Did anyone else notice the huge disparity between the the title of the thread and the question in the poll?

Did he do a good job? We'll never be able to tell fully because most of what he was doing was what van Gundy told him to do. He can't just "skip his loo" to 10+ assists per game unless there is some kinda play being drawn up, you know??

As far as whether or not he was running the offense, it's also tough to say. I'll give him this: along with Battier, he was good at feeding Yao in the post, which is A LOT more than I can say about Head, JL3, and the other people who were supposed to do it. And concerning the other responsibilities of a traditional PG, namely running the break, mixing in post plays with dribble penetration, "taking care of the ball" (read: few TO's), and hitting open 3's, I would only say that he failed in his finishing on the dribble penetration and 3pt percentage. To his credit, his percentage was much better in the 4th quarter. To make a long story short, the space where van Gundy ended and Rafer began will remain unbeknownst to any who choose to criticize that offensive regime as a whole, and criticism it certainly warrants.

Personally, I still believe that Rafer could play good minutes in a championship-caliber club, but probably not as a starter given the studs that he has to face up against night in and night out. Just give him an offense-oriented coach who doesn't try to fit square pegs into round holes (shoot the three, Rafer!! shoot the three, Spanoulis!!) and a reasonable amount of minutes. When other teams' starters are getting 15-20 minutes of rest compared to your 10, you're going to get embarrassed by the end of it one way or another. It's like running a horse into the ground and then asking him to race in the Kentucky Derby.

 

He is a good player, just not good enough for Rocket.

 

I thought you were doing well, not posting about T-Mac as a point forward, but I guess you can't help it.

But to be honest, the only thing Alston was asked to do before the putting up the shot was to bring the ball upcourt, either call a set play (McGrady running around the baseline for the open jumper) or just throw the ball to Yao or McGrady.

 

He certainly did a very good job running the offense. Sometimes things seemed to come undone when Rafer wasn't handling the ball.

 

He did a great job at offensive end, while not so great on defense.
Considering a big part of clutch-time offense is organized by T-mac, Rafer is not as important as many people have thought.
Further more, In the new offense system, the two guard is more likely to attack the basket in the paint, which is not Rafer's style. So just let him go...

 

Rafer did not do a great job. He did a average job at best. He averaged 5 assists a game while playing heavy minutes. I feel like an above average pg could easily average at least 7-8 assists a game for the Rockets, while playing big minutes.

TMac ran the offense. That is why he accounted for the most points. All you have to do is look at the Utah series and its clear.

 

I don't think there were much "offense" need to be "run" under JVG. You just need to bring the ball up the court and give it to Tracy or Big Yao, Let them decide what to do, All other 3 players just need to standing behind the 3pt line and wait for the kickout(There's a term called spread the floor!). It's not Alston's fault, but still, I don't think he did a good job at running the offense.

 

An offense full of jacking up threes is the best way for me to describe it.

Keep in mind that last season, the Rockets lived and died by the three-point shot. A team with Yao and T-Mac should be like that. The team got 26.6 percent of its scoring from beyond the arc, tops in the league. The only reason the Golden State Warriors and the Phoenix Suns didn't get as high a percentage of their scoring from beyond the arc as the Rockets did is that their scoring averages were substantially higher. They were also the only two other teams in the league that attempted more threes than the Rockets as well.

 

How do you define good? I meen he was obviously the best at running the offense compared to the other PG's on the roster but compared to an entire league he was pretty average. He just cant shoot or create for others because hes not a threat offensively.

 

Actually he was good pass playmaker,no doubt.
I don't know why ROCKETS fans hate so much Skip.
Yes,he had terrible games last season but this season there's new coach,new playmakers so expect from Rafer to contribute.

 

Last season he wasn't even playmaker. He was a stupid "shooter" who couldn't even make wide open positions. You can say what you want but he sucked last season...no doubt

 

Ok i cannot edit my posts so let me add something about Rafer.

First when he came to Houston I was very excited. I really liked him and I thought he would be the best option for PG. I still really belive he is a great playmaker and he has the skills. Remember he was streetball player so he has a perfect crossover, ball handlin' and speed.

But I think last season was really bad for him. Why? Well for me it seems like he was too confident. He knew that even if he had sucked he would have played more than 30 minutes per game. The situation was easy cause we just didn't have another player who could be the PG for 15-20 minutes a game. Yes, Luther sometimes played as a PG but we all know he cannot do that.

But now I'm very interestin' to see Rafer next season with all these PG additions. He probably won't shoot that many 3s and he will try to be the passer more cause he know that there is also Mike James, Aaron Brooks and Steve Francis...