What exactly is PER?

Amare_1_Knicks · Post #1 » by **Amare_1_Knicks** » Sat Jun 23, 2012 6:04 pm

I'm not 100% on what exactly it's measuring. Is it like who can average a high number of stats, and do so efficiently, has a high PER?

If someone could explain it to me ?

nikomCH · Post #2 » by **nikomCH** » Sun Jun 24, 2012 12:40 am

To be honest if you can read a box score and interpret it properly there's no need for PER as that's all it really is. An interpretation of the box score and summing it up in one nice little number.

Amare_1_Knicks · Post #3 » by **Amare_1_Knicks** » Thu Jul 19, 2012 11:04 pm

I mean, I guess. But it seems like it favors some players more than others. Like Michael Jordan's best PER seasons and Lebrons best PER seasons are extremely close. Same thing with Magic and Kobe, but to a lesser extent because their respective PER never went as high as Lebron/MJ's.

Is it taking into account defense btw?

Post #4 » by **Doctor MJ** » Fri Jul 20, 2012 12:07 am

PER is one of a family of stats that's basically taking everything in the individual box score, attached weights to those things, and giving a rating. By it's nature then, it underrates defense.

Other quirks to note:

-It is meant as a per possession stat rather than a cumulative productivity stat. Both kinds of stats are good to have, but you need to know which you are looking at.

-It makes the league average in any given year 15, so you can't figure out a guy's PER without using all the league stats for that year. On the plus side, you immediately have a sense of how a guy doesn't compared with his contemporaries.

-Most hard core folks (which I'll include myself in), think it overrates volume scorers and underrates distributors. Some insist that different weights would make it better (and I do agree), but no matter what you do, there's a fundamental truth that there's more going on than you can get from the box score. Volume scorers by definition are taking opportunities that could be given to other players while distributors are systematically trying to maximize the opportunities of others on all possessions (not just the few possessions they get credited with assists).

-Also of note is that you will see PER for guys like Wilt Chamberlain sometimes. You should note that they had less detailed box scores back then, so PER for such players isn't as good of a measurement as it is for current guys.

CBB_Fan · Post #5 » by **CBB_Fan** » Fri Jul 20, 2012 12:07 am

Amare_1_Knicks wrote:I'm not 100% on what exactly it's measuring. Is it like who can average a high number of stats, and do so efficiently, has a high PER?

If someone could explain it to me ?

It is an offensive efficiency stat that combines several stats into a single number. Doesn't take into account defense. Nothing more, nothing less.

Post #6 » by **Doctor MJ** » Fri Jul 20, 2012 12:12 am

CBB_Fan wrote:
Amare_1_Knicks wrote:I'm not 100% on what exactly it's measuring. Is it like who can average a high number of stats, and do so efficiently, has a high PER?

If someone could explain it to me ?

It is an offensive efficiency stat that combines several stats into a single number. Doesn't take into account defense. Nothing more, nothing less.

To be really anal:

-It's not just offense. It factors in the defense it can, but defensive box score data just sucks.

-It's really not an "efficiency" stat despite the fact that it's name proclaims it as such. I don't want to get into the details of it because some get defensive of the stat here, suffice to say that there's a lot more complexity to PER than there are in any true efficiency stats we have, and that's not really a bad thing. Those of us who get pedantic on "efficiency" do so because other statisticians have taken pains to separate out volume and efficiency into different stats which is very useful, and it's pretty common for n00bs to then get confused between everything that's out there. Simply put: If you're doing a volume/efficiency approach, you're talking about a two-number system, whereas PER is a one-number system that really combines everything together.

CBB_Fan · Post #7 » by **CBB_Fan** » Fri Jul 20, 2012 12:18 am

Doctor MJ wrote:
CBB_Fan wrote:
Amare_1_Knicks wrote:I'm not 100% on what exactly it's measuring. Is it like who can average a high number of stats, and do so efficiently, has a high PER?

If someone could explain it to me ?

It is an offensive efficiency stat that combines several stats into a single number. Doesn't take into account defense. Nothing more, nothing less.

To be really anal:

-It's not just offense. It factors in the defense it can, but defensive box score data just sucks.

-It's really not an "efficiency" stat despite the fact that it's name proclaims it as such. I don't want to get into the details of it because some get defensive of the stat here, suffice to say that there's a lot more complexity to PER than there are in any true efficiency stats we have, and that's not really a bad thing. Those of us who get pedantic on "efficiency" do so because other statisticians have taken pains to separate out volume and efficiency into different stats which is very useful, and it's pretty common for n00bs to then get confused between everything that's out there. Simply put: If you're doing a volume/efficiency approach, you're talking about a two-number system, whereas PER is a one-number system that really combines everything together.

I'm just saying not take much stock in it. It is a nice measure, but it just one more tool to use.