Nowadays, especially with hardcore sports/NBA fans advanced stats are brought up in almost every argument, instead of leaving the casual fan hanging I thought I take the time and enjoyment to put together an evergreen post on what each most commonly used advanced stat means…
True Shooting % – True shooting percentage is a measure of shooting efficiency that takes into account field goals, 3-point field goals, and free throws. So instead of just comparing shooters on who has better Free Throw %, 3P%, and other shooting stats, True Shooting percentage take it all into one stat to truly show who the more complete scorer/shooter is in certain aspects.
Example When Helpful: Comparing who is a better scorer between Melo and Kobe
Example When It Become A Crutch: Comparing LeBron to Kyle Korver, because Korver is a much better shooter, but LeBron’s paint presences and scoring out weights anything Korver does as a whole, so in that situation best to use individual shooting stats.
Player Efficiency Rating (PER) – John Hollinger’s all-in-one basketball stat/rating. PER measures a player’s production to the team as a whole based on minute production.
Total Rebound % = TRB% is an estimated percentile of how many rebounds that player or team grabbed that was available when he/they were on the floor.
Assist Percentage – Assist % is the amount or percent of the field goals made assisted by that particular player when he was on the floor/court.
Example: If LeBron’s assist % is 50%, and 10 field goals were made, on average 5 of them ere assisted by him.
Win Shares – Win Shares is the statistic which attempts to give a certain amount of credit for team success towards a single individual. In a sense if LeBron has 20 win shares that season, that team would be 20 wins worse than they are with him. Now this isn’t always exactly correct it may be more or it may be, less but it is considered a gauge.
Per 36 Minutes – While looking at per-game averages gives us some information about the productivity of a player, per- 36 minute averages gives a better gauge of a player who maybe plays too many minutes (upwards of 40+ if they aren’t a superstar and doesn’t deserve those minutes) or what a bench player would look like if he was a starter which is considered the 36 minute gauge give or take. These stats are tho often skewed because there is no way math can take fatigue, cold and hot streaks into consideration.
Per 100 Possessions – This one is rather simple, its just how many of that stat a player has every 100 possession or every 100 opportunities. These stats are the most useful in my opinion of any of the advanced stats.
Reminder: Advanced stat nor are the stat in the general the end all be all, and neither are accolades. But both give you a pretty good job of doing so and can aid your argument.
