Who would I rather have take an open shot? Battier, Rafer, or T-Mac? ..... I'll get back to you on that.
rafer must've been onto something. when artest and mcgrady return to the lineup next week, it will be critical to the team in terms if if they can seamlessly play into the team rhythm. we shall know by allstar weekend or the trade deadline.
rafer can say all he wants, but hes preaching to the choir. all i know is when the ball gets to t-mac, it's going to STAY with t-mac. he's not going to start cutting or running on fast breaks. his game is holding the ball and shooting it.
I think I watch the same games everyone else does, but I just don't get the Rafer hatred. Have I wanted to strangle the guy some times? Sure. But, historically, since Rafer has played with the Rockets we win when he is the starting point gaurd and lose when he's not. He runs the offense well, plays decent defense(although it can be inconsistent), is tough minded, and a floor leader. Unless your talking 1st tier superstar pg, Rafer is as good as a team can get. There are other 2nd tier guys that are arguably better, but none that are for sure better. They may have different and more appealing skill set, but that doesn't make them a slam dunk ideal replacement for Rafer. Rafer's weaknesses? He is very inconsistent in his shooting, and he can get lit up at times by the opposing pg. Both weaknesses can be incredilby irritating for fans but to talk about him like he's some sort of scrub, I just don't get it. That said. If I have to choose between a full strength T-Mac running the offense, versus Rafer running it. I'd choose T-Mac. But, the T-Mac of this season versus Rafer. I'd choose Rafer.
Rafer may be full of it, but his first sentence if absolutely right. I don't see anything wrong with that. The key word is "us", not "me". Isn't that most of us wanted to see: when T-mac and Ron come back, play within the flow, instead of holding the ball and going iso all the time?
Precisely. Rafer sucks when all he does is bring up the ball, hand it off to T-Mac (or dump it off to Yao) and then wait for an opportunity to get a wide open shot. Rafer rocks when he's up and down, directing traffic and taking an active role on offense. He gets the freedom to do that when one or more of our main offensive weapons is down, and that's when he seems to go on these "streaks" where he looks like he's an all star caliber point guard. It's an adjustment that will have to be a work in progress, but I think Solomon is right in that it's probably more productive/effective for McGrady to spend more time in his traditional SG role than to force Alston back into the spot up shooter/last-ditch-drive-and-floater role, which tends to magnify his weaknesses every time. And frankly, the entire offense just seems to run much, much more fluidly when Alston is running around directing traffic compared to McGrady trying to create in the old half court sets we've been used to. There is a place for that, especially in crunch time or whenever McGrady gets hot and the team wants to ride him for a bit, but I'm in favor of the majority of the point guard role being left in Alston's hands at the moment.
Alston is the typical NY point guard who has a couple of good games and then forgets about the fact that he is what he is. A poor shooter and finisher. Team will let him drive and shoot all day. A majority of the time it's an L for the Rockets PLEASE DO NOT GET BLINDED BY HIS HOT STREAK. WE ALL KNOW THAT RAFER WILL RETURN TO CLARK KENT ANY MOMENT.