Not on defense (Where JVG makes his decisions)....Lucas is too darned small....if he was stronger then maybe.... DD
I don't know if you're basing this on his European play, but there's a lot less of an emphasis on the NBA style playmaking PG there and many good passers in Europe have not shown their form in the NBA. As a historical example, there's Kukoc. A very good passer in the NBA certainly, but in Europe, his nickname was The Waiter since they said he just served up the assists. A recent example is Sarunas.... He looked to be a great passer in Euroleague and was arguably the best player in Europe, period. He also singlehandedly destroyed the US Olympic team in the final minutes. Where is his NBA career now? Struggling to get off the bench and disliked by a good number of Pacer fans. I think VSpan will end up better than Sarunas, but European/International credentials are hardly a true measure of a player's ability to succeed in the NBA and what VSpan has shown on the NBA court is that he's fearless and a great competitor, but also possesses a lot of flaws that we can't have on the court (TO's, slow help defense, poor shooting, etc.) Give the guy some time.... he has to adapt to the culture and language, never mind JVG's playbook.
VSpan is a project and probably won't get real time until next year. There's already going to be a minute crunch once everyone is healthy if you don't include JL3. It's going to be real interesting to see how JVG distributes the time, and I honestly see Rafer averaging 25 mpg (at most 30mpg) once everyone is healthy. If he's at 35-40mpg, I'm going to be pissed. I already did the math in this post: http://bbs.clutchfans.com/showpost.php?p=2663491&postcount=142 Rafer is going to continue to start and play solid minutes. I have no problem with that. I'm pretty sure my math is correct (check the thread) in that there's only going to be about 75-80 minutes available per game spread out between Rafer, Luther, Bonzi, Snyder, and JL3. It's possible that when healthy, only 2 out of the 3 (Bonzi, Snyder, and JL3) would get time on a particular night depending on match-ups. Even if the 75-80 mpg is divided by 4 on a a nightly basis, Rafer still shouldn't be getting 35-40mpg. In my opinion when the team is healthy, Rafer should get a solid 25mpg, Luther a solid 20mpg, Bonzi 20mpg, and Snyder 15mpg. When the team is healthy, Lucas should only play in blowouts, garbage time, and when the match-ups are needed. Snyder can handle the ball decently enough (he played PG in college-not sure, but I think he did), and his defense and athleticism are more valuable than Lucas' speed on a daily basis. Bonzi is the legit scorer the team needs when T-Mac and/or Yao is off. Edit: I'd like to add that in the other thread I challenged anybody to disagree with me and point out why. One dude came in and I never responded (holidays vacation). Anyhow, that dude said something to the effect of Me saying Luther should be the primary PG playing 35+ minutes. That is obviously something I never said. My point still is that when the whole team is healthy, how many minutes should Rafer play? I say 25 to 30 at most. If you disagree with me, check my math in the other thread and then write out not only Rafer's minutes, but also for every other player. It is virtually impossible for Rafer, Head, Bonzi, Snyder, and Lucas to all get minutes in every game. There has to be an odd man out, for at most those five will split 80 minutes (and that's the high end of the estimate)...some games those 5 will have to split 75 or less minutes. If you believe Rafer is a 35mpg player on a fully healthy Rockets team, how should the 40-45 minutes be divided amongst Head, Bonzi, Snyder and Lucas?
Head cannot control the ball watsoever Lucas is trigger happy and cant pass the ball watsoever Vspan cant shoot the ball watsoever Tmac cannot play long minutes Rafer is better than Head at controling the ball, better than lucas at distributing the ball and better than Vspan at shooting the ball and can play long minutes Hence we need him ( for now)
That is damn short sighted. We are beating SCRUB for teams, do you think rafer shooting 15-20 bricks in a game vs. SA or Dallas we would even stand a chance? We are winning because we played the Sonics, and the Grizzlies, and the Hawks. If we can fix our problem in those kind of games (Give more minutes to other people slowly), in the big games it will show.
I'm aware of the records of the teams we're beating, but we're also playing without our (arguable) best player, and still winning. To say that rafer needs to be benched is just ludicrous. I highly doubt that any person on this forum is seeing something that the coaching staff is not, I'm pretty certain if they wanted him to take less shots he would be taking less shots. being a forum coach is very easy to do when you don't see the entire picture, I'm fairly certain these things are brought to rafer's attention daily, and if they aren't maybe I should be making millions of dollars to coach the rockets too. hell, maybe they should hire you and everyone else here while they're at it.
Hey I hope they do hire me thatd be sweet ass. I would be making loads of cash. Maybe I could even pull an Isiah Thomas (LOL). Yea just saying. Well this shooting problem, they can't be blind so they need to fix it or just tell him to stop shooting so much, I know I dont know all, but its obvious something is wrong with his shot and he shouldnt shoot so much.
Lucas only drives to the right. If he starts, teams begin better preparing for him, and he gets shut down immediately. Lucas is what he is, a good 10-min/night high energy back up.
He had a very sweet drive last night where he started right, was cut off, and flipped around and went left for the finish. John John can go left. Every player has their "pet" moves and spots on the floor that they like to get to (except for Adonyl Foyle). John is a very good offensive player. He's got those moves down and then he works off them and creates secondary offense off them. I really like what he brings to the table. Just wish he would do a little better defensively. He doesn't need to be a great man defender, just learn how to funnel his man where he needs to go and play the passing lanes better and understand when to double, switch, and rotate.
About Lucas: I thought last night he really showed a level of offensive prowess we had not seen before (at least not in a meaningful NBA game). *Effective* dribble penetration, the teardrop, the turnaround fadeaway shot over what was practically a doubleteam. It's nice to know that we finally have a point guard who can contribute some offense off the bench. Now back to Rafer ... JVG continues to really impress me with his coaching this season. He seems to continually disprove every argument that skeptics have about him, and the latest example seems to be Rafer. JVG went out of his way to profer unsolicited praise for Rafer last night (and again this morning on 610 radio). Apparently Rafer has struggled a lot in the past with mental toughness when going through a slump. Instead of putting him on a short leash and/or benching him like many people here are demanding, JVG chooses to offer him support and encouragement. So much for the "Mr. Negative" "can't-handle-personalities-and-has-no-people-skills" stereotype. And you wonder why his players love him?
lol JVG offering Rafer support haaaaaaaahhahahah Rafer needs to be benched and start working on his shot he missed way to many, and if he had been benched long a time ago, we probably would have won at least 3 more games Rafer needs mass, sometimes he plays like a wuss, even tho guy is 30 years old....he runs the court well, but anything else is suspect.... yesterday he starts driving to the basket "correctly" and makes few points, I thought it was interesting, because the drives he took were smart and secure....but then again he starts with his stupid jump shot and makes everything go down the drain
Does anyone think that Rafer would start over V-Span on the Greek national team if they were both eligible? Me neither.... Rafer....you are the weakest link !! Goodbye ! DD
Rafer had a bad game...ok, he had a horrible game. He's not usually that bad, c'mon. Rafer drives when the play seems to be broke (entry passes denied, denying TMac the ball, etc.), or when the defense is sleeping and he can get to the hole. I'd like to see less teardrop and more just going up with a shot other than a tear drop hahaha. I think he puts it up there with the hopes if he misses, he's got a big man down there to crash the boards. JLIII, even though I cheer the guy on, is not a good starting solution at the point. If he can't get the initial pass to start the offense, he'll just end up driving, and like someone else said, he doesn't look to pass at all. He's great coming off the bench to bring the ball up and provide some energy. The lineup is working so far. It's more than we could have hoped for with Yao out to have a 4 game win streak at this point.
Just read this in another post: RAFER ALSTON (on his bouncing back from a rough start shooting) “I’ve struggled like that shooting the ball before in my career. It’s always frustrating. You feel like you’re letting the team down and you feel like you’re not contributing. In the back of your mind, you know that you’re contributing in other ways. Sometimes when you continue to get open looks and you continue to miss them you’re like, ‘Oh, man, I’m hurting the team with my shooting.’ But the team has encouraged me to continue to be aggressive offensively and they continue to give me the ball and Coach (Van Gundy) continues to call my number.” Just found it interesting, that's all.
Lucas' size isn't why he sucks so much on defense. He's a matador defender (yes, even worse than Alston), and he tends to foul guys when he tries to play catch-up. He has a lot to learn on that end. He also takes some very questionable shots, IMO, but they keep going in... so I still gotta give him the nod on offense. If he keeps playing like that, I don't think it will be long before I'll have to agree that he needs to take Skip's spot... but not just yet. Let's not jump the gun on a tiny handful of good performances.
I agree. He has the quickness to be a very pesky defender. The only time his size should come into play on defense is when he is having to go up against a post up point guard like Chauncey for instance. His quickness needs to be used much more effectively on the defensive end. He does have a lot to learn there.
