The NBA a couple of years ago borrowed a statistic from hockey, known as plus-minus, commonly written as +/-. For those who don't know what that means, it's simply the net difference in points when a particular player is on the floor. Let's take last night's heartbreaker against the Jazz for the sake of example. LeBron James played 40 minutes, during which time the Cavaliers outscored the Jazz by seven, so his +/- for the game is +7. Anderson Varejao's, on the other hand, was -12 in 36 minutes off the bench.
(In case you're wondering, I didn't watch it, as it started at 10:30 p.m. here in the Eastern Time Zone, and I have a job. Too bad, because it was apparently a real thriller, in which Jazz rookie Sundiata Gaines hit the first three-pointer of his NBA career at the buzzer to win it 97-96.)
The NBA keeps its +/- stats on this page. And it doesn't just keep one-player +/- stats. You can search for the best two-player combo, the best three-player combo, etc. It's really quite fascinating.
But can you guess what individual player is leading the NBA in +/-? I'll give you a hint: He plays for the Cavaliers. Of course, your first guess is likely to be LeBron James, and that would be a very good guess. But LeBron is actually #2 on this list, behind teammate ... wait for it ... Anderson Varejao.
Even after last night's stinker, the Cavs have outscored their opponents by a grand total of 337 points with Andy on the floor this season. LeBron is next with +332, followed by Kobe Bryant at +319, then Lakers teammate Ron Artest at +299, and the Hawks' Josh Smith rounds out the top five at +292. Naturally, all the top names on this list are members of the NBA's best teams, but would you have expected the #1 guy to be someone who comes off the bench?
This obviously doesn't mean Varejao is the NBA's best player. Far from it. But it does indicate that he's been a huge factor in the Cavaliers' 30-11 record at the halfway point in the season, and he's going to have to continue to play at the same level if the Cavaliers are going to keep winning at the clip they've been.
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1 comment:
Steve, this is the single most relevant statistic in all of sports. What else could be more meaningful than this? Someone like Dennis Rodman would probably have a very high +/- rating, even though he scored relatively few points. Why? Because the team is better when he's in there. Just like Varajeo -- he has intangibles that are difficult to measure using traditional statistics. But not any longer, Steve, now that the NBA has wised up and begun using the +/- rating.
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