Per-Minute Statistics

What is Per-Minute Statistics?

A metric that takes standard NBA statistics, and instead of breaking them down by production per game, breaks them down by production per minute. This calculation can be done for most of the official statistics that are kept by the NBA.

Sporting Charts explains Per-Minute Statistics

The concept of per-minute statistics is a basic building block of statistical analysis in basketball. While looking at per-game averages gives us some information about the productivity of a player, per-minute averages tells us a great deal more about how well, or poorly, that player is actually performing.

Basketball statistician John Hollinger has said of per-minute statistics, "It's a pretty simple concept, but one that has largely escaped most NBA front offices: the idea that what a player does on a per-minute basis is far more important than his per-game stats. The latter tend to be influenced more by playing time than by quality of play, yet remain the most common metric of player performance."

Let's say a player averages 12 minutes of playing time per game, and scores 8 points per game. He is scoring at a rate of 0.67 points per minute. One can then look at what his rate projects to for any given amount of playing time, such as 36 minutes per game. Using our example, this player scores 24 points per 36 minutes of playing time.