Afternoon Delight: A Grizzly Hire

The somewhat intriguing NBA story yesterday afternoon was the announcement that the Grizzlies have hired former ESPN columnist/stats guru John Hollinger to be their new VP for Basketball Operations.  Best known for drawing up the statistical formula, Player Efficiency Rating (PER) - which defines players according to their statistical contributions - Hollinger will be reporting to GM Chris (a.k.a. The Buffoon) Wallace and will work to upgrade the Grizzlies' analytic department (figures, literally and figuratively).

I've never been a big fan of Hollinger (I prefer Marc Stein's power rankings over his), not only because he ripped the Celts' Jeff Green signing a couple of months ago but also because I think he goes overboard with the stats on his analyses.  Sure, sports involves a lot of stats and record-keeping but it also contains a lot of immeasurable variables like a player's heart and desire.

Rondo, for example, currently has a PER of 20.29 - which ranks him only at 34th-best in the league - while LeBron leads the NBA at 28.91 PER.  You can't tell me Rondo's that far off from LeBron when it comes to overall value but that's pretty much what Hollinger and his PER is saying.

Also, the PER, it seems to me, is skewed in favor of bigs because maybe bigs rake in more stats (points, rebounds, blocks, better FG%) that count toward a better PER.  That's why you'll find Durant (#2), Duncan (#4), Anthony Davis (#7), Andray Blatche (#9), Brook Lopez (#10), JaVale McGee (#11), Tyson Chandler (#12), Anderson Varejao (#14), Chris Bosh (#15), Blake Griffin (#17), Tiago Splitter (#18), Al Jefferson (#20), Brandan Wright (#21), David West (#22), Greg Smith (#23), Marc Gasol (#24), Ed Davis (#27), Dwight Howard (#27), KG (#30), Zach Randolph (#32), Andre Drummond (#32) all ahead of Rondo in the rankings.

At any rate - my rantings aside - good luck in Memphis, John.  Good luck telling Marc and Z-Bo that Andray Blatche and JaVale McGee are better than them.

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About Afternoon Delight: From time to time, Celticslife.com posts an original (most of the time), humorous creation for your delight. View past Afternoon Delight postings.