Rafer can bring the ball up without turning it over and run an offense. In these things he is better than MJ or SF. What he lacks at is creating offense for himself or others. His 3pt shot is nice, I dont know if it is much better than MJs though. He had some good games last year and some really bad ones. Last year he often couldn`t run the offense because he gave the ball to TMac almost instantly, and he was our 3 weapon on offense. This year he could just be in there, bring the ball up, run the offense and shoot his open threes. He is well suited for this offense with these players.
I've heard from a few different people recently that the Rockets had a deal in place for Mike James at the deadline, but Van Gundy specifically got cold feet and backed out. Ultimately cost him this job. Adelman has more weapons at point to turn to. If Rafer tosses bricks, as he's prone to do, he can turn to James and Steve Francis for significant time. I don't think we'll have the raging Rafer arguments that we did in the past. Bottom line: When you have that many weapons at his position, Rafer just can't hurt us as badly as he did last season. But if people are hopping on a bandwagon for Rafer to play ridiculous minutes again and expecting him to shoot lights out as he has done in the first two preseason games, get ready for a bloodbath because that bus will crash.
The Rafer I remember actually tried quite a few times in games to take the offense over. I can remember countless times when Rafer would rush a shot before the offense was settled (missing it) or would try to take his defender off the dribble and drive in for a bricked teardrop. As far as his defense, it was terrible. Now I don't blame his lack of effort b/c clearly he tried on the defensive end, but he isn't fast or strong enough to guard a decent PG. I think ideally he would move the ball up the court and wait for an open shot, but he never really accepted that role and tried a lot to create his own shots, which he was terrible at doing.
Rafer has the pure point guard abilities that Stevie and Mike don't possess. I mean Stevie and Mike are basically the same kind of pg who shoots all the time. Rafer can be used coming of the bench or more likely the starter facilitating the offense.
Never have and never will be on his bandwagon. The guy still sucks and I say trade him while his stock his high - I think I'm giving too much credit there...
On the flip side, sometimes players get into a system that fits their style and they get much better results. Maybe Adleman's style fits Rafer....if that happens I am sure no one will complain..... But, I don't think a leopard will change his spots. DD
I agree. If Cleveland is smart, they had some scouts at the game since they are in most need of a pg, also Miami.
It's not about personal preferrence, It's about who will fit best in the new offense system. I don't think even coaches knows that for sure now. There are alot of pre-season games left, let the games speak themselves.
Adelman's system will fit Rafer, really... Last year he sucked of course but I know why. The pirst reason was JVG but the main reason was his role on the team. We had Tracy Yao and...Rafer was our 3rd scorer - he had to be. Now there are a lot of guys around him. He doesn't have to think about scorin'. He just has to think about temmates. He doesn't have to score a lot of points. I'm nor Rafer's lover but I like him. I know he's a really good playmaker and hopefully under Adelman he'll be a great playmaker.
If that is what you remeber you need to see a doctor, because that might have happened once or twice a game, TAKING OVER a game means coming down on multiple possesions and shooting out of the flow of the game.
I have never been on the Rafer bandwagon, and I won't get on now. Nice guy. I have always said that. Certainly a decent bench player, but as a starter that takes millions of shots, no thanks. Rafer is a preseason wonder and a regular season blunder. Excellent ball handler, brings it up well, and passes it off. He doesn't really "run" the offense all that well. He doesn't finish well, shoot well, defend well, but he does protect the ball. I say keep him, but don't start him or play him majority minutes.
I'm sorry. I meant that in crucial times in games Rafer would dribble the ball down the court and either shoot a bad jump shot or would drive to the hoop in traffic and miss a tear drop. This happened a lot.
I would go as far to say there's a Rafer bandwagon. Its more like a Rafer public bus, since the casual fans seem to get on and off between alternating good and bad performance games, which happen multiple times in a span of a week. This guy made so many bonehead plays last year and missed so many wide open shots and layups. Completely unexcusable. Two preseason games does not grant him complete exoneration.
I'm expecting him to play light rotation minutes (~22), shooting maybe 4 shots a game at about 35-40%, with low turnovers and hopefully strong assists. That's the bus I'm on.
