Rafer Alston Appreciation Thread

Shabi__5 · Post #1 » by **Shabi__5** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 2:52 am

Thansk you Rafer!
I really hated you and I still curse a lot when you miss open 3's but you by far the best we got.
Rafer really stepped up the most in T-Mac's abscence and we need to learn from mistakes and give him more ballhandling and creating duties.
He proves he can do it well , he can't shoot so the big guy never goes out and if his defender doesn't go under the screen he can drive it in on every pick n roll.
Keep up the good job Rafer , make us proud.
And T-Mac get back soon , we need to turn this season around.

Baller 24 · Post #2 » by **Baller 24** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 2:59 am

Rafer has been great. Im really liking what hes doing, and hes been playing great this season. He should be and will be our starting PG for this offense.

Post #3 » by **TMACFORMVP** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 2:59 am

Yeah he's really played well, running the offense and frankly stepping up as a second option with Yao out. Hopefully he continues that play.

RoxFan08 · Post #4 » by **RoxFan08** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 3:00 am

I just want to say that I CALLED IT in the offseason that Rafer would and should start. I'm pretty sure Jove9 was about the only other person who agreed with me.

etopn23 · Post #5 » by **etopn23** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 3:02 am

You know the drill: Over/Under - 3 days?

McTracy · Post #6 » by **McTracy** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 3:08 am

He's been phenomenal, superb last few games.

Thank you Rafer. But you know what, he may struggle but we struggle without him. Great ball heandler, very quick and can finish around the basket. He's great now cause he's usin' that. Earlier it was all about 3..

MaxRider · Post #7 » by **MaxRider** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 3:15 am

i heard bill worrell said something (from boston game) about alston been learning how to finish from cynthia cooper
is this true?
i was watching the game at work so i can't turn up the volume

Iggyemu · Post #8 » by **Iggyemu** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 3:21 am

He has been good all year. Shooting is still pretty bad but point guards have the luxury of being able to score in other ways and what Alston is doing is he is finishing...something he did not do last year or the year before.

Post #9 » by **TMACFORMVP** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 3:40 am

Yeah I read somewhere, Alston is nearly shooting 50% on inside shots opposed to around 37% last season. His three point shot seems to be coming around as well.

Shabi__5 · Post #10 » by **Shabi__5** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 3:46 am

Alston is shooting over 40% from the field , thats what happens whn you make an effore to get all the way to the rim amd not settle.

BaYBaller · Post #11 » by **BaYBaller** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 4:39 am

RoxFan08 wrote:I just want to say that I CALLED IT in the offseason that Rafer would and should start. I'm pretty sure Jove9 was about the only other person who agreed with me.

I've been saying that since pre-season.

compucomp · Post #12 » by **compucomp** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 4:42 am

His shot is coming back around, but the main difference is that he is finishing layups, and his floaters are going in.

If that's happening on a consistent basis he is a very serviceable starting PG, because he takes care of the ball and distributes it well. I never thought I'd say that at the beginning of this season. Props to Rafer.

HTown_TMac · Post #13 » by **HTown_TMac** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 4:48 am

I never thought Rafer would be this good, but I DID say that he would beat out Francis and James because he's a better playmaker..

ballinforkeeps · Post #14 » by **ballinforkeeps** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 6:04 am

wow, rafe w/ 3 strait games of over 45fg%, actually over 47. not only that, 4 tos total in all 3 games, 12 asts. intersting how all the sudden hes capable of playin like he is. first 2 seasons we had him we didnt have another pg other than rafe, now we got steve, james, brooks. we shoulda always had an actual 2nd pg on our team all this time, cuz then maybe rafe wouldnt of played so **** horrible. **** rafer, hello oj mayo.

DraftBoy10 · Post #15 » by **DraftBoy10** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 6:07 am

o lawdy blues.

rafer has been tremendous lately, but i think it's cause we are giving him more responsibility and he can't keep on sucking, cause what other team would he start for? he knows if he's getting benched, that'd suck, and he knows if he were to be traded, he'd be getting benched again wherever it'd be.

Post #16 » by **King Roosk** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 6:44 am

RoxFan08 wrote:I just want to say that I CALLED IT in the offseason that Rafer would and should start. I'm pretty sure Jove9 was about the only other person who agreed with me.

Don't forget me

moofs · Post #17 » by **moofs** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 9:45 pm

RoxFan08 wrote:I just want to say that I CALLED IT in the offseason that Rafer would and should start. I'm pretty sure Jove9 was about the only other person who agreed with me.

I am standing here waving my arms wildly with a neon sign behind my head.

TMACFORMVP wrote:Yeah I read somewhere, Alston is nearly shooting 50% on inside shots opposed to around 37% last season. His three point shot seems to be coming around as well.

That would also be me

(last season was closer to 41% iirc, this season has hovered between 45-50% and his 3p% has been rising like mad since the pathetic 3p% he had at the start of the season.)

The easy way to figure it is subtract 3p fgm from fgm, then 3p fga from fga, then divide the former by the latter. Unless someone else is up to writing a program to provide stats on demand from NBA.com (an html parser), it takes about 2-5 minutes to do it with calc.exe. I'd have to need to do this a couple hundred times before I'd see any time savings though (oh wait, crap, I have already, maybe i should write it after all... anyone up for a joint project?)

p.p.s. Right now Rafe's shooting 50% 2p / 32% 3p, which means that he's been shooting close to 40% over the last 15 games, consider he shot around 21% for the first 15.

(if anyone can find my posts from around that point detailing that he was shooting great from inside the arc even while everyone continued to scream he was bricking all his shots because they were looking at his FG% like it was his 2p%, I'd be happy to know the actual numbers. is realgm ever going to fix the archived posts browsing bug? I've never been able to see more than 2-3 pages back in my post history without creating the URL myself

FOR MODS OR SOMEBODY
Generated URL on Post History IS: http://www.realgm.com/boards/search.php ... &start=108

Generated URL on Post History SHOULD BE:
http://www.realgm.com/boards/search.php ... &start=100

These links come from the number picker [both the type-in number AND linked numbers] at the bottom/top of the post history page. Don't know why the former breaks since that looks like it should work, but it does.)

Links to some of my past posts about Alston and Battier
http://www.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic. ... =#14670011
http://www.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic. ... c&start=60
http://www.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic. ... =#14593896
(.272 on Dec 10)
http://www.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic. ... e34fea566f
(.183 after 3 games)

And a gratis "LOL" thread.
http://www.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic. ... sc&start=0
(Hey! Let's have a 10 page argument about words I didn't even say when I have proof I didn't say them and all you can do is twist an article around to sound like it was from me!! I'd almost say Compucomp should be a politician. "Al Gore 'said' he invented the internet" anyone?)

MaxRider · Post #18 » by **MaxRider** » Sat Jan 5, 2008 11:53 pm

wow look at all the Alston supporters (or bandwagoners) coming out the surface now

Baller 24 · Post #19 » by **Baller 24** » Sun Jan 6, 2008 1:04 am

MaxRider wrote:wow look at all the Alston supporters (or bandwagoners) coming out the surface now

Lol, yeah hes really impressed me this yr.

moofs · Post #20 » by **moofs** » Sun Jan 6, 2008 2:22 am

MaxRider wrote:wow look at all the Alston supporters (or bandwagoners) coming out the surface now

That's why i reposted all my past posts. I've been supporting Alston since last season when i signed up

(granted he wasn't playing anywhere near this good last year and may well have been more suited for backup, but he definitely didn't suck)

I posted that last post
a) show some of who's flopped (there were nowhere NEAR as many Alston supporters, even early in the season, as there are right now)
b) remind anyone who was somehow not aware of it that I haven't been one of the floppers.