Will someone explain to me the Rafer Alston love affair?

Let's see if Alston has Span's trade value.

 

Rafer did a better job beating the press than anyone else on our team. If dribbling and reading traps is so simple, then we have alot of really dumb people on our team. Rafer was also able to keep opponents honesty by pushing the ball after a defensive rebound. Tmac walks it up which allows opponents to setup defensively and gamble for offensive boards.

I don't think anyone is arguing that he was a top PG in the league, but he certainly was our top PG and had alot of value while on the court with us (more so when we had Yao and Tmac on the court).

People argue Tmac created the offense, but that keeps him from using his full talent on the offensive end. I think Tmac is at his best when he has the opportunity to come off screens and play the wing, instead of dribbling against double teams or trying to pick and roll with Yao.

 

i agree with the original poster. you gotta hit your shots especially when you shoot 15-20 shots a game sometimes. otherwise, all that fancy ball handling is worthless. i'd like to keep him if he can limits his shots to under 8 per game, but i don't see that happening.

 

I posted this in another thread:

My friend called me up and said he heard the radio in Dallas said something about James Posey, Jeff Foster, and Mobley are on Morey's workings right now. He's talking to all kinds of teams, New Jersey and New Orleans are also being talked to about John Lucas III and Justin Reed for something from New Orleans and they are talking about Chuck Hayes for Boki to New Jersey. Details really weren't much on those, but on these deals below they had more details.

Luther Head and Chuck Hayes re-signed to Indiana for Jeff Foster is being discussed and Rafer Alston, Bobby Sura and cash to the Clippers for Mobley is being discussed, and talks to about James Posey re-signed then traded to the Rockets for Rafer Alston is being talked with Miami.


He said Dallas radio is talking about Morey is the talk of the league, making more moves than any GM people can remember, that around the league everyone is talking about it, he's non-stop trying to make moves.


He said the Dallas radio was talking about how Houston is trying to get better while the Mavs aren't doing anything.

This would pretty much confirm that Morey is going to keep making the team better.

 

Because he is a pure pg. Say what happened when he was rejected in H-NO game. He is no ball-hogger and can be effective without shooting. It is very important because Rockets have two big scorers. Rockets' problem in last season is other role player. Other than R.A. and S.B., nobody can score.

 

Since Rockets ALREADY had the worst offense last season, our "old shooting talent" were wasted last season, Alston is clearly not "a skilled pass first PG" we need.

people, We ALREADY had seen the worst offensive product from Rafer Alston. Alston has proven that he was unable to run any good offense that benefit our superstars. Alston is not even a good fit to JVG system! he got his daddy fired for gods sake.

Why do you still think he is good?

 

Rockets was a mess. It only tells us that PG is an important position. It does not warrent anything about Rafer.

Again, clearly, we all agree that Alston was better at PG than Head. So what? Anybody can play better PG than Head who is actually an SG.

 

Beautiful.

So to say Francis is good at getting to the line, we compare him to Rafer and T-Mac, both of whom are constantly criticized for not going to the line enough.

It's complete trash that you used career numbers as well, because you and I both know Francis can't get to the line the way he used to. He's 30 years old now.

Why did I not mention Rafer's age? because Rafer's age doesn't have the same effect on his game that Francis' age does. If Francis loses athleticism, he loses his eniter game - rebounding, energy, dunking.

Like I said, Francis is a good pickup if we can trade Rafer for a big. But at the same price, who would I like to keep as a 2nd PG? Defintiely Rafer. He brings passing, which is way mroe important than rebounding from our PG.

At this point in his career, I don't think Francis's best asst/to ever is better than Rafer's worst ever.

 

Alston was the best amonst a group of JLIII, Head, Vspan.---> mean little.
Alston had value on court-------------> any PG should have some value, again, nothing special.

TMAC had to create offense-----------> because Alston cannot, can he?

 

Y does everyone want a pure pg? Adelman never has "pure pgs" in his system.

 

What the heck is a pure pg anyhow?

Steve Nash? Jason Kidd? Chris Paul? Deron Williams?

They all dish, but they all score as well, and consistently at that.

Rafer Alston is terrible at both, inconsistent and has nothing to offer but bring the ball up the court and pass it?

Let him go, it's not worth the money.

 

Agreed. Forgot to mention it was the Heat that originally sent Rafer packing.

 

man, we will need to hype Rafer's value up...

I hope this afternoon, SF will say : I am proud to be a backup PG for Alston.

 

You didn't really look at any numbers did you? You're just thinking that since he's 30, Francis can't get to the line as much. Well, surprisingly, his FT attempts per 40 minutes hasn't dropped off much from his time with us.

FTA per 40 mins from oldest to last year:
Francis: 5.3 5.5 7.2 7.2 5.4 8.1 6.7 6.8 Career: 6.5 Playoffs: 7.2
James: 2.4 3.3 2.3 2.3 3.9 3.0 Career: 2.8
Alston: 0.4 1.8 1.9 2.2 2.1 3.8 2.4 2.3 Career: 2.5
McGrady: 3.8 5.7 6.4 7.6 7.6 9.8 7.5 7.0 7.8 7.7 Career: 7.4 Last playoffs: 8.1

Conclusions: Francis' FTA haven't dropped off all that much. Alston does not get to the line very much. McGrady gets to the line plenty of times despite the criticism.

The criticism I have of McGrady is not taking it on himself to score during clutch situations.

 

Not going to happen. Francis expects to start or get significant (i.e. 20+) minutes per game. Francis will fight for the starter position, and I'm happy for that. Anybody who is happy to be behind a mediocre player like Alston is a complete scrub and not worthy of a championship bench.

 

It seemed like only yesterday people were demanding Francis be replaced by a pass first point guard and rejoicing when he finally left. Now people are calling for him to be our starting point guard. Oh the irony.

At best Steve should be our sixth man off the bench. He's not a point guard...never has been. He'll be much more valuable to this team coming off the bench and providing a spark. Depth was probably our biggest weakness last season. Just watch the Jazz series if you don't know what I'm talking about.

 

I hope you're wrong, or we're in for a season of distractions (i.e., players complaining about their playing time to the media).

 

I think the thread title is borderline preposterous. Very few people have a "love affair" with Rafer. The problem last year is he was asked to do much more than he was capable of doing. As a result, he failed miserably. In a backup role where he belongs, Rafer could do quite well. As a 35-40 mpg starter, he was in way over his head which was not his fault. If the Rockets at least had a capable backup, Rafer would gotten more bench time during his worst stretches, like most players except superstars.

At the same time, I won't miss those crazy runners that went in about 20% of the time. SF, MJ or AB aren't afraid to finish and draw contact. If Rafer weren't so deathly afraid of contact, his FG% would have been a lot higher last season and he would have shot more FTs.

 

Reading through this everyone's big critique on Rafer is his shooting percentage is low. Ok, fine - granted. But you have to remember a few things. JVG was the one to keep telling him to shoot more often - under Adleman I'd think Rafer would shoot less. Plus we've stocked the team up with offense. Yao and Tracy are always offensive threats. James and Francis are better known for scoring than for defense. And the early reports on Scola are that he's great offensively, but needs work defensively. We also have a lot of good passers on the team which is a plus. But with so many people scoring on the team I want a point guard who will look to get them the ball instead of taking his own shot. I know Mike James is a self-proclaimed "playmaker", but he is NOT a pass first point guard. I'm excited about having Steve back - but I'm not ready to give him the starting job yet.

So I think we'll probably get rid of Rafer - but I'm disappointed by that. He's not a great shooter and I won't try to say that he is, but he's good at running the offense, handling the ball, and making the right passes (even if its not an assist he made a lot of "hockey assists") I hope Mike James and Steve prove me wrong - but I'm concerned that with either of them manning the point, they'll look to shoot first and pass second - and frankly with the scoring prowess we have on this team, it needs to be the other way around.