RealGM

Although it was a small sample, I thought it might be interesting to examine the PER each player amassed in the playoffs.

Josh Smith 17.01 (10 in PF)
Joe Johnson 15.83 (9 in SG)
Al Horford 14.96 (11 in C)
Josh Childress 13.63 (15 in SF)
Acie Law 13.04 (16 in PG)
Marvin Williams 11.55 (20 in SF)
Mike Bibby 7.93 (26 in PG)
Zaza Pachulia 3.00 (24 in C)

The numbers are to be low as expected considering the margins of defeat on the road. I think the numbers still show a few things.
1) Although Josh Smith and Joe Johnson had some great outings, they had some really bad outings as well that tempered their overall results.
2) Bibby had a horrible series.
3) Marvin had a pretty bad series as well.
4) Zaza had more of an emotional impact than an impact on the court.
5) I would not have guessed Acie's numbers were that high.

Just wanted to post it as food for thought. Remember PER is not the end-all be-all stat, it is just an attempt by John Hollinger at ESPN to quantify performance.

Similar numbers can be found from 82games.com

Factor in defensive PER, and I think you get a much different picture.

Too bad "defensive PER" is a flawed stat...

PER is calibrated to have an average of 15 every season, I'm not sure what the playoff PER is averaged against but you can look at this and see the impact of a great defensive team like the Celtics.

I think Smith's huge stats and games 3 and 4 really helped him out here, as well as his high number of blocked shots and FTs.

@ Bibby, 26th in the playoffs among pgs and Zaza with a PER of 3. Wow

tontoz wrote::rofl: @ Bibby, 26th in the playoffs among pgs and Zaza with a PER of 3. Wow

The worst thing is that Bibby's PER probably overstates his impact because he got lit up so bad on the road.