The 10 greatest Nuggets in history, ranked by Player Efficiency Rating (PER)
By Ben Handler
There’s nothing NBA fans love debating like the greatest players of all time, of different eras, and for their favorite teams. One thing that makes these conversations fun is that there are no set parameters and it’s all subjective at the end of the day.
However, several modern-day advanced statistics have tried to capture a player’s overall impact and help paint the whole picture. One of the more popularly heralded stats is PER, player efficiency rating.
PER was invented by John Hollinger, the former President of Basketball Operations for the Memphis Grizzlies, and current NBA writer for The Athletic. Hollinger created a formula combining many positive and negative impact metrics, with multiple adjustments in an attempt to create one catch-all number to capture an NBA player’s performance.
A PER of 15.00 is thought to be roughly league average, while 20.00+ is all-star level, 25.00+ is an MVP candidate, and 35.00+ is historical greatness. The statistic has its flaws (properly analyzing defensive impact, favoring low-minute players, etc.) and doubters, but on balance, it is one of the most commonly agreed upon metrics.
More often than not, it tells an accurate story. Every stat will have outliers and PER is no exception, but it’s a solid measuring stick. With that in mind, let’s focus on our Denver Nuggets and take a look at the top 10 players in Nuggets history according to PER.