I was on the Lakers Ground message board today, and someone asked who was the better player...Chris Kaman or Kendrick Perkins.  Now, it was a Lakers board so the majority of folks said they hated the Celtics and would rather have Kaman.  Most fantasy owners would probably agree, as Kaman is a roto starter (19.8 points, 9.0 boards, 1.3 blocks, #74 on Y! rater by average) while Perkins is a flex/role player at best (12.1 points, 7,8 boards, 2.1 blocks, #110 on Y! rater).  When you look at the advanced stats, though, the case can be made that Perkins has more impact on the game in real life.

Here is a direct statistical comparison of Kaman and Perkins this year.  The box score stats are as stated above, but the first hint that maybe it is a closer matchup is the per-36 minute stats.  Per-36, it becomes clearer that while Kaman is the better volume scorer (19.4 points vs 15.8 points) Perkins is more effective on the glass (10.2 reb vs 8.9), shoots more efficiently (64|PERCENT| FG vs 50|PERCENT|), and blocks about twice as many shots (2.7 blocks vs 1.3).

Then, when you get to the actual advanced stats Perkins starts to dominate the matchup.  Perkins has almost twice as many win shares (2.7 vs 1.7) despite playing many fewer minutes, Perkins dominates the offensive (108 ORT vs 101 ORT) and defensive (97 vs 107) ratings, and even edges him in the scoring-heavy PER stat (17.9 vs 17.7).  And just to make it a clean sweep, Perkins even has an advantage in the on-court/off-court +/-  stat as measured by 82games.com.

I have felt for a long time that the box score stats are becoming an outdated way of measuring player quality.  This is yet another example showing that.  Give me Kaman on my fantasy team, but if I'm an NBA GM I take Perkins every day of the week.