if he did something wrong i would say he did but growing up in the east coast ive seen worse...forget that ive seen manu ginobli showboat more than what rafer did
i've watched these vids before, they're cool. thanks for posting them, anywho... yeah, right after the game ended today i went to youtube to look for some skip stuff, dude was the best streetballer ever i think.
They don't do that against other teams. They give that "end of game" token effort at defense I'm talking about. Also the Rockets didn't go hard enough at one person and have them show them up for it and then foul them for no reason. Rafer was making no attempt at the basket it was a frustration foul. If that's in your definition of sportsmanship than I think that speaks for itself.
I like Rafer just fine. You need to read and concentrate when reading my first post. As I said trash talking and show boating are two different things. People don't show boat its an unwritten rule that if you do it expect to be hit (and thats so in all sports). Lastly and most important I said there's a difference when doing something while the game is close and doing something after everything is decided. Doing it (not talking about show boating that's never acceptable) when it is close is doing it to try and win. Doing it after the game is decided is doing it in spite and meant to rub it in. And you ask anyone in pratically any level of sports and they will say trash talking is part of the game and show boating isn't cool.
Don't you think the reason why they've done so well is because they play all 48 minutes? They lay everything out on the line there. That's a big difference from some bench player trying to man up his guy with FORTY FIVE seconds left AND HIS TEAM'S BEST PLAYER IS ON THE BENCH. I don't condone Rafer wanting to go after Vujacic but to say that Sasha wasn't at fault is pretty baseless. He wanted to play tight defense? The end result is that he got chopped and had to resort to fouling...which would have been the correct move to do if he wanted to stop the clock (which I would assume is the only reason why he fouled Rafer in the first place) Then again, I'm not the one that got chopped.
That is why I said the Lakers were doing what they should be doing. Playing till the end. Rafer was essentially giving Sasha a big middle finger by show boating.
You DO realize that when your team is down by 13 and your coach and best player already threw in the towel, you can actually play a little bit looser since the game is pretty much done right? Phil Jackson is not going to give Sasha a scooby snack for any "suffocating" defense he does AFTER THE FACT. Kobe isn't going to commend him on a job well done post game. So why bother? This is a good question to ask since Sasha wasn't the type of player to get up on anyone before this game unless he had a bone to pick w/ Alston.
If think it was for no reason then you must be one biased fan who is blind. Yes Rafer made no attempt at the basket. Good for him but spinning and bouncing the ball fancily between his legs is much worse then going down and scoring. Its much more personal and spiteful.
If he truly was playing to the end he would have fouled earlier. He was just playing hard defense on Rafer because he and Rafer had been going at it earlier. If he backs off Rafer and lets the clock wind down there is no altercation.
The Fun Police have officially arrived. What Rafer did was fine. Sasha was playing "chippy" defense on the previous possessions. It was not good, competitive defense it was overly physical defense that most guys play when they have let their emotions get the best of them. Rafer took offense to it (which is the type of grit this team needs but doesn't get from it's superstars) and clowned the guy. I think Rafer going after him once the foul was committed was wrong but the fancy dribbling was ok IMO. I would have preferred for him to walk away laughing but who knows what was going on between these two during the course of the game. This squad is on a historic winning streak and if Rafer or anyone else needs personal competition to keep sharp that is fine by me. I don't question 22 in a row or how these guys motivate themselves to have gotten this far. And for the record, I would have loved to see Scola pick up his dribble and hand Odom the ball in the waning seconds of the game since Lamar was hell bent on finally playing some defense for the first time in his career.
So let me get this straight you praise th Rockets saying it is what has allowed the streak for playing all 48 minutes but when the Lakers do it they are wrong? As I said the possession before (maybe two) all the announcers were praising the Rockets for playing such tight defense despite being up I believe 15 with a little over a minute to go.
levin my friend, you must not actually be reading the posts, just quoting and replying to them so let me ask you this way: A) would you prefer rafer going 8-11 on 3pt and winning us the game B) or would you prefer rafer be the kind of guy who's patient with pissy opposing guards and shake hands with him when he is unnecessarily aggressive to him? because the thing that let him step up and do A is toughness. and toughness is also what precluded him from doing B I dont have to ask anyone. I'm no superstar but did play varsity level sports until I graduated from college and I'm telling you that you cannot just turn it on and turn if off, especially in the middle of the damn ballgame. that's even IF rafer did anything wrong. and he did not. go back and watch the game from 3:30. you see the lakers pressing every possession. watch the previous TWO altercations between rafer and vujacic including the one where rafer breaks him down and scores on him coast to coast. watch the last possession the lakers have when they're fully pressing when the rockets are walking up the ball and that p***y vujacic runs over and grabs a lazy pass and lays up with it good luck with the rest of the responses in the thread because you either: - didn't actually watch the game and just watched that youtube clip - dont like rafer - are on vujacic's jock for some reason - are just plainly in full thread-hijack mode
Whether to foul or not is a coach's decision but any coach will tell his players to play hard defense all 48 minutes. And for all you who say let him wind down the clock you do realize the Rockets still had to attempt a shot. There was too much time left for them to keep it. Now if I was a coach I would want my players to play tight and not just give up an easy shot.
I'm biased and blind? Hey maybe I am blinded Rocket Red but I look at it my own way. So do you. I saw Vujacic playing more aggressive than the "unwritten" rule of playing only token defense at best in the waning moments of a decided game. So I saw Rafer Alston protecting the ball a little more showboatingly than the "unwritten" rule of just keep the ball away. If you want to ask players about sportsmanship and showboating, ask them about playing aggressive when the game is decided. It's only fair. I guarantee you they will say it's not cool, as well.
Yes because the Rockets do that for all 48 minutes. Mr. Machine decides to do this when the game is done. Why couldn't he have done this all game? Hell, why couldn't the whole team have done this all game? You're taking a little bit too personal I think. Maybe you've gotten crossed over one too many times? What Rafer did is because he had a dude on his back with less than a minute left trying to make SOMETHING OUT OF NOTHING. What's Sasha trying to prove? That, for 48 seconds, he can turn into one of the most feared defenders in garbage time? And what Rafer did isn't even all that bad if you already know what he's capable of doing when Skip comes out. It's like if you're defending Jordan and he blows past you for a layup. Yea that's a good move but it could have been A LOT worse.
Your argument goes both ways. Not just your point of view. Players DO NOT play D like that when the game is out of reach unless your trying to aggravate someone which is exactly what Vagine did. Vagine was playing D on Rafer like it was a 2 point game. If Vagine would have just laid back and just made sure Rafer didn't try to get by him and shook hands with him like most players do in the winding seconds of a hard fought battle everything would have been cool. I'm sure Rafer would have been content to hold on to the ball and let the clock run out.
It wasn't like that. It was obvious he had an axe to grind with Rafer and he was trying to get physical with him. It ended up blowing up in his face, because Rafer made him look like a fool.
Earlier in the game(a couple minutes) Vujacic was ALL OVER Alston(Kobe was still in) and Skip burned him and took it all the way to the basket. Apparently Sasha didnt like it. Sasha was at fault. Skip was NOT trying to "rub it in" by taking him to the rim again, he was going BACKWARDS. Skip was just trying to run out the clock. Vujacic crossed the line when he fouled Rafe intentionally, and was straddling the line by playing hard D on a guy who is trying to run the clock out. Its very different than playing hard D on a guy trying to score. All out D on a possession where the offense isnt trying to score and the game is over is not needed. Think of all the times T-Mac yo-yos it at the end of the game and the defender just kinda stands there as if to say "OK, you can run clock, but only because you arent trying to show us up."
