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There are a babillion other complicated and possibly quite valid advanced NBA stats out there that I could drone on and on about ad nauseum. But this is RaptorBlog, not PoindexterBlog — and I'm beginning to bore myself so I can just imagine how some of you feel. Before we wrap up the stats primer with "the mother of all advanced stats", I will briefly address some of the ones I've chosen to ignore. Assist Ratio: The theory behind this stat is that you can measure a player's passing ability by the percentage of his possessions that result in an assist. The problem with this is that just because somebody gets a ton of assists, that doesn't mean he's one of the top playmakers in the NBA. Maybe the guy's surrounded by great scorers and he's just reluctant to shoot. There are too many mitigating factors. According to KnickerBlogger's stats page, Jose Calderon led the league in Assist Ratio last season. Now, I'm a Calderon fan, but I can't make the case that he's anywhere close to the league's best playmaker. Top 10? Maybe. BLK% and STL%: Block percentage is the percentage of opponent two-point field goal attempts blocked by a player while he's on the floor, while steal percentage is the percentage of opponent possessions that end with a steal by a player while he was on the floor. Blocks and steals, while obviously good things, can be misleading in showing defensive ability, so I don't really see the point in breaking down those stats to that level. I'm satisfied to stick with Per 36 averages for those stats. Win shares: Dave Berri claims to have created a stat that can attribute how many wins a given player contributes to his team's total. I won't go into the math of this one, but I will say Berri made the case that his stat proved that Jerome "Junkyard Dog" Williams was a more valuable player than Allen Iverson. Now I know this is theoretically a matter of opinion, just like you might find some people who think that Brooke Hogan is more attractive than Jessica Alba... but COME ON! Win shares in an example of a stat that doesn't pass my "smell test". It may not be completely without merit, but it has too many abnormalities to be taken seriously — much like the way Brooke Hogan's broad shoulders and mannish face render her less than a classic beauty (unless that's your thing, I guess). John Hollinger's Player Efficiency Rating is more complicated than Chinese Algebra (that reference isn't for you, Jose) but it passes my smell test. Mainly, the players who rate highly in this stat are obviously good players, while the players who have low PERs usually suck. In a nutshell, here's what you need to know about PER from the man himself, John Hollinger: "The Player Efficiency Rating (PER) is a rating of a player's per-minute productivity. To generate it, I created formulas that return a value for each of a player's accomplishments. That includes positive accomplishments, such as field goals, free throws, 3-pointers, assists, rebounds, blocks and steals, and negative ones, such as missed shots, turnovers and personal fouls. Two important things to remember about PER is that it's per-minute and pace-adjusted. It's a per-minute measure because that allows us to compare, say, T.J. Ford to Jose Calderon, even though there is a disparity in the minutes they played. I also adjust each player's rating for his team's pace, so that players on a slow-paced team like Detroit aren't penalized just because their team's games have fewer possessions than those of a fast-paced team such as Golden State. Bear in mind that this rating is not the final, once-and-for-all answer for a player's accomplishments during the season. This is especially true for players — such as Bruce Bowen and Jason Collins — who are defensive specialists but don't get many blocks or steals." That's pretty much the shortest explanation you can give for this stat that covers all the bases. The other main thing you should know is that the league average for PER is set to 15 every season. Going back to KnickerBlogger's stats page, here are last season's PER rankings. As you can see, Chris Bosh made the top 10 and Jose and T.J. are back-to-back at 24th and 25th. Some of you might be surprised that Manu Ginobili is seventh, but you shouldn't be. He really is that good.
When you look at the PER numbers for the Raptors, three things stand out. 1. Kris Humphries is under-appreciated by Raptors fans. His PER has gone up every season after his rookie season and he's only 23 years old. 2. Andrea Bargnani was freakin' horrible last season. 3. Jamario Moon isn't just better than Jason Kapono, it's by a sizable margin. Kapono is obviously a much better shooter, but Moon makes up for it by being better at pretty much everything else — especially defence, which isn't really measured by PER. So cut it out with the "Kapono should start over Moon" statements because they're idiotic. I'll wrap this up by saying that PER is one of the most useful tools at your disposal in fantasy basketball leagues — particularly in the mid-to-late rounds. Keep an eye out for Carl Landry (21.4 PER in his rookie season), Amir Johnson (18.1 career PER after three seasons) and Ramon Sessions (16.3 PER last season, and he might be the Bucks' new starting PG). If they get the playing time they deserve, fantasy owners will be happy to have these guys on their team in 08-09. |
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