Rockets Trade:
Shane Battier

Rafer Alston

Luther Head

 

 

Bobcats Trade:

Ray Felton

Matt Carroll

Nazi Mohammad

 

 

Battier seems like a Larry Brown type of player while Rafer can be a decent backup to their lottery pick Augustin. Rockets acquiring Artest makes Battier expendable and the need for a PG who can take the playmaking duties off TMac is crucial. Felton is a solid young PG. 

I never understood why the Bobcats have been so unhappy with Felton as a PG. Don't like the trade for the Bobcats, but it's not like they seem too attached to Felton, so who knows!! 

No. Felton isn't that large of an upgrade over Rafer, if at all. Battier, who will still be valuable to the team as a starter or 6th man this year, being thrown in just makes the trade worse. Even if it's for Nazr. Why give up a player like Shane to solve a relatively small problem like the back-up C position when you can do it through free agency or a smaller trade?

 But he is an upgrade. He is 8 years younger. And he does seem to have a more solid head on his shoulders.

 

It's never a bad idea to add a solid starter you know could be around for a good 10 or more years.  

He's younger, but Houston's trying to win now.  I can see a Rafer+fillers/draft picks for Felton if CHA would be willing to do that, but I don't think Felton is worth 2 starters. Carroll isn't going to ignificantly increase Houston's chances of winning it all, and Nazr isn't enough to get Shane when we could just get a back-up C through free agency or small trade.

Felton put up better scoring, assist, ast/to ratio and efficiency numbers than Alston last year and all while playing for a much worse team.  Add in the fact that he is also a lot younger should likely improve while Rafer is much less likely to do so and I would say it is a pretty big upgrade.

That being said I'm not sure I would make the move if I am the Rockets because I think Felton still comes with some risk and this move would bassically cash in all their chips.

 "...and all while playing for a much worse team." -- There's no evidence that playing on a worse team increases or decreases your overall #'s.

Felton had a PER of 14.0 last year to Rafer's 13.4

Felton had a TS% of 50% to Rafer's 49.2%. 

Felton had an AST-r of 30.1 and TO-r of 11.0 to Rafer's 25.5/10.4.

Felton played more minutes than Rafer last season, but they both scored 15.3ppg-per-40 minutes, so no Felton did not have a scoring advantage.

That doesn't look like a big upgrade at all.
 

There's also chemistry Houston has to worry about. Take Shane out of the trade and it might be doable. But Rafer+Shane makes it borderline retarded. 

Because Yao is injury prone, I'll agree. Scola, Artest, Battier, T-Mac, and Rafer might be a pretty tough squad to deal with.
 

I still think it's hard not to jump on a deal that will net you a quality building block that will be around for a very long time. Especially when dealing with very movable pieces like Rafer and Battier (just because having Artest makes it tougher to give him significant playing time).

B-balltm:

 "...and all while playing for a much worse team." -- There's no evidence that playing on a worse team increases or decreases your overall #'s.

Felton had a PER of 14.0 last year to Rafer's 13.4

Felton had a TS% of 50% to Rafer's 49.2%. 

Felton had an AST-r of 30.1 and TO-r of 11.0 to Rafer's 25.5/10.4.

Felton played more minutes than Rafer last season, but they both scored 15.3ppg-per-40 minutes, so no Felton did not have a scoring advantage.

That doesn't look like a big upgrade at all.
 

There's also chemistry Houston has to worry about. Take Shane out of the trade and it might be doable. But Rafer+Shane makes it borderline retarded. 

In comparing most players, you might be right playing on a worse team won't necessarily increase or decrease your numbers.  In comparing Alston and Felton though you have to consider how much easier it is to get assists when feeding the ball to Yao in the post instead of Okafor.  The Bobcats have no real post presence on the offensive end of the floor which makes a PG's job a lot easier, either by getting easy assists or drawing attention in to the post and creating space for perimeter players.

As I said before, I don't know that I would do this deal either but at the same time there is no way I would do a Rafer-Felton deal without a fair bit of sweetner if I were the Bobcats.  Rafer is a 32 year old bellow average PG, though he has matured since going to the Rockets he hasn't really gotten any better and will likely only get worse over the next few years.  While Felton was only a little bit better last year, the fact that he is only 24 would make him a significant upgrade because he will likely be improving while Alston declines over the next few years.

If that's true then why did the 2 best passing seasons of Rafer's career come on teams that won just 33 and 34 games, then saw his APG go down as soon as he played with more talent?

B-balltm:

If that's true then why did the 2 best passing seasons of Rafer's career come on teams that won just 33 and 34 games, then saw his APG go down as soon as he played with more talent?

I can't really speak to why he had the year he had in Houston in 05-06 but I watched almost every game of his 04-05 season in Toronto.  That year the Raptors tried to play up-tempo despite not having the talent to really do it.  They started the season with Sam Mitchell setting the goal of 100 FGA/game and when it didn't work at all he slowed it down slightly.  They also had a team full of spot up shooters who didn't care to pass all that much, they finished the season 11th in pace, 5th in 3PA and 3rd in 3PM.  Milt Palacio who was Alston's backup and also had the best assist year of his career (3.5 apg) for much of the same reasons.  After those 2 guys the next highest in apg was Vince Carter at 3.1 apg in his 20 games with the team then Jalen Rose at 2.6 apg.

 

 This is strictly from an Insider point of view, though I must admit that what Gm Daryl Morey and VP Sam Hinkie say have a tendency of forming my own opinion.

Shane Battier is absolutely untouchable - and anyone who says he won't start doesn't understand that Artest misses 30 games every season for one reason or another.

The Rockets are also extremely happy with Rafer Alston's play. I'm not convinced Ray Felton - who I like very much - is an improvement. More like a lateral move to me.

Luther Head is on the block and I'd love to have Matt Carroll, so let's cut a deal on that note.