I dont know where to post this but I heard earlier around 10:30 that Rafer alston will be a guest on 104.9 tommorow. They didnt say what time though. Just thought Id let yall know
exactly. tmega, there's really not much u can prove to defend rafer. his job is to distribute first, shoot second? then why does he jack more 3's than dish assists...esp when he has 111 to finish for him? the only thing rafer does well is bring the ball up the floor and hand it off to tmac or yao. any good this form of 'distributing' does, as you call it, is pretty much offset by his consistently pathetic shooting. rafer apologists: 'well rafer hits the big threes in the clutch, so he's more important than the stats show" no. he's not. not only has he had his fair share of costly turnovers in the clutch, these 'clutch' shots wouldnt be so necessary if he wasn't clanging the wide open looks he got earlier in the game. sadly, rafer is the best pg we have on this team, but that doesn't change the fact that he (and the position as a whole) is a weakness.
Just giving Yao and TMac the ball in the right spot doesn't always get them a basket, it forces the opponent to double to which the ball is kicked to the open man. But if Yao isn't given the ball in a dominating position the opposition doesn't even have to double him. And yes Luffy his teammates do want him to take the shots he gets b'c they're primarily wide open. If he got 30 wide open shots I'd want him to take all of those b'c he's a good enough shooter to atleast make 1/3.If the rockets get about 100 possesions like in a usual game and rafer took a wide open 3 everytime down chances say he that he would get right about 99 points...not too shabby. You can't pass up open shots, it f*cks the offense all up. Me comparing TMac and Rafers shooting was just to show you how stupid the stat was that was proposed. If I can favorably compare the two its a stupid stat because in no way shape or form should they be close to each other. Its like a test telling you that blue and pink are almost the same color, you'd throw that test out and call it stupid, thats what I'm doing with the stats proposed.
Wow rafer apologists will never back down on his shot selection. He can do no wrong in their eyes cause the shots are wide open so he should take them. Did you stop to think why rafer is so wide open all the time? Cause other teams know he can't shoot and leave him open! I could go out there and brick wide open shots too, but hey I'm wide open so they're good shots!
Actually yes I have thought about why he's wide open. Lets explore the options when TMac drives to the hoop. A) Leave Rafer open at the top of the 3 pt arc/Wing area B) Leave Battier open in the corner for 3 C) Leave Juwon open 16 ft. from basket D) Leave Mutombo open 3 ft. from basket ---Rafer hits 38.2% from deep and on the wings ---Battier shoots 43.7% from the corner on 3 ptrs ---Juwon is a 48.7% shooter on mid range jumpers and always has the option to drive from which is percentages only go up ---Deke scores at a 63% clip from inside the paint With this information known...who would you double off of? So Rafer hits only 38%, by far the lowest of the options but definetely not bad by NBA standards. Like I said, the Rockets would win most games if Rafer Alston took a 38% jump shot everytime down the court from 3 pt range. Not that its a good idea but you see the concept that it is NOT a bad shot. If he gets that open look we WANT him to take it, chances are you will not get a better look during any given possesion. That is roughly equivalent to getting a 57% shot from inside the arc. Now don't read me wrong, I dont want Rafer dribbling into 3 ptrs from the top on a regular basis, I'm speaking about if the ball is swung to him and he is standing open at these spots. This is when he is effective, if the opposition continues to double off of him I want him to shot ALL night long. So does JVG, TMac, Yao and every other member of the Rockets and so should all of the fans. Imagine if we shot 57% every game...think we'd win???
Why, in god's name, didn't we pick up a backup point before the deadline? We have no one to back up Rafer when he has a bad game. Sure, one can argue that Tracy is one of the best points in the league, and they'd get no argument from me, despite the turnovers. The guy is amazing, but he's not our point guard. Alston is, and there's NO ONE behind him. No McGrady? We're screwed. No Alston? We're screwed, regardless of his sucky tendencies, because he's the only point we have. We should have made a ****ing move. Just for a backup, if we couldn't replace the guy. We're as shallow as Britney Spears at the position. Hell, at least she has her boobs, real or not. Alston is just a boob. One boob on the flat chest of the Rockets lineup at that position. Better than nothing, but not even a handful.
not to mention that even the bricked shots are part of the plan to a certain extent. when the team does well in regards to offensive rebounds this contributes to the flow of the offense when the open three doesn't go. I agree that Rafer shoots too much. I think alot of these things would be negated if Rafer would drive to the hoop more. Same with Luther. Luther is by far our best finisher around the basket and lately he has been driving more. That boy needs to do even more in regards to attacking the basket.
Not if we didn't get to the line and get some free throws. You see, you ain't going to shoot 57% by just coming down and firing up jumpers. You are going to shoot 57% after you come down, penetrate, draw fouls and get the defense to playing tentatively, off balance. If all you do is come down and fire up a jump shot, the defense will adjust and shut your 57% down to about 41%, because they know they don't have to worry about any penetration. All they have to do is D-up and body up on the perimeter. Basketball is an inside out game. It always has been. It always will be. You have to create contact, draw fouls, soften up the defense, and then you can get those shooting percentages up.
It was a hypothetical situation...obviously the defense would adjust if we figure d out Rafer was shooting a 3 every time down, but in theory the shot is a 38% shot for him from up there and I dont think that the majority of the people realize what a 38% 3 pt shot means over the course of the game. Just to showcase a point. As I pointed out these are shots created by TMac driving to the basket and the ball getting kicked out or swung around to Rafer.
But if they go to it every time for the 38% 3 ball, if TMac kicks it out every time, the defense will adjust and shut it down. Rafer is shooting 38% within the scheme. And defenses constantly force the ball to him because they know the odds are that the more shots he puts up, the more inefficient our offense is because Rafer is not a shooter.
i guess for some people on here it goes Arenas Nash Kidd Paul Parker Davis Billups Williams Heinrich Alston asking for a better pg is asking for those guys. Alston must be the 9th best pg out there
HYPOTHETICAL haha its not real...if Rafer was hitting that 38% shot over and over they would have to rotate over on him and leave one of those better options open that were discussed earlier. That was in response to a guy saying that Rafer should pass up those shots when open for 3. I simply say no because he hits them at a reasonable clip no matter how often they are given to him he should take it because it's a good shot for the offense. If he performs up to his season numbers so far alot more options will open up
What are YOU talking about...I guess this thread has surpassed your basketball knowledge, I suggest taking a seat on the sideline and just observing for a while and watch some people that actually know a little bit about the game discuss a legitimate issue other than this rafer sucks, no he doesn't pissing match you wanna engage in
I'm wasting my time responding to you individually, if you cant read this thread and come up with something more concrete than that then you can take your pissing match elsewhere, i refuse to participate.
The thing is the rockets pg at full strength does not need to be a great distributor. That is why you can have scorers like james with point guard skills play the position if need be. The role is exactly the same as Fisher had in LA or kenny smith had here with dream. They need to have simple dribbling/passing skills, be proficient at hitting open shots, play D and protect the ball along with the ability to penetrate and finish/kick on occasion. It's much more like the role of the spot up shooter. And rafer alston is much more a penetrator type player than shooter. What baffles me is how so many fans are using this stretch without yao to say, yes we need a pure pg, when that is not the team you should be planning on seeing come may, when it matters. Yes, this very minute, we need alston's drive/kick/ballhandling to take some of the load off tracy, and create shots for others. But when yao and t-mac are on the floor together, they are the primary facilators and alston's main jobs will be hit open looks and play respectable defense. I don't like the idea of my pg whose main role will be spot up shooting being an inconsistent below average shooter/average 3pt shooter.
Very reasonable opinion, I just disagree with the Rockets need at the point. Yao Ming needs the great passer to assert his dominance. I don't think it was a coincidence that he really came into his own last year when he got comfortable with Rafer during the 2nd half of the year after they were both injured throughout the first half. Rafer is also the key component to any fastbreaking the Rox might have, he runs a break 3x better than anyone we've had in a long time. As far as the Mike James type player, the only issue I have with that is them taking shots away from who should have the ball. I honestly don't ever want to see our PG trying to take somebody off the dribble and creat their own shots. It pisses me off when Rafer does it and its just completely the wrong direction to go in when we have 111 on the court. I do like Derek Fisher though, I haven't watched him enough in the last couple years to comment on his ability to get the ball in tight spots passing but besides that I think he would be a very good fit for the Rockets system.
Yao doesn't need a great passer to assert his dominance. Would it be nice to have to help make him that much better? Sure. But Yao has gotten to the point where you give him the ball wherever and he'll do the rest. He just needs the ball where he is most effective. Now you may say, that shows a great passer. Not really. Anyone can talk to him and learn where he likes the ball. Sure it would be great if we could have a pure point who can shoot the rock well, but if I have to choose between the two for this team healthy, it's the more average passer/great shooter variety. As far as the fast break, i'll grant you that. But that does not make rafer a good fit for the Rockets at full strength. His shooting deficiencies are way too much to have him start for this team. Esp when we do not need his primary skill as much as most teams: penetration/dish. Lastly, on Mike James. In any scenario where I have discussed his value to the Rockets, i'm presuming he would accept playing the role of spot up shooter knowing where his bread is buttered(yao/tracy). When he played here last time, his role was that of instant offense off the bench and he played that way. Point is, if he would accept such a role, his skill set is far more suited to play pg next to yao/t-mac at full strength than alston.
