NBA

The 7 Best NBA Performances From Last Week: The Greek Freak Goes Hard

Brett Oswalt  —  @bRo14thekid Dec 19th, 2016
Could anyone rival Giannis Antetokounmpo's big Friday night?

During the course of an NBA season, we see countless standout performances. For each week, we get quite a few. We get them almost on a nightly basis.

But, which were the best of the best -- or the perfect ones?

In case you're not aware, numberFire Live is our very own platform that tracks each NBA game, its win probability, and player performances -- among many other features. Here, we focus on the player performances in order to find the best ones of the week.

Each player performance is rated on a scale of 1 to 100, according to production and efficiency. We are concerned only with 100 scores here.

The lone seven perfect games from the past week are listed in order of their nERD (a measure of a player's total contribution, based on efficiency) for the given games, from least to greatest.

7. James Harden vs. New Orleans Pelicans

If there's one thing we know, it's that James Harden is playing at an MVP level so far this NBA season. That type of pace didn't stop this week either. In the Houston Rockets' 122-100 win over the New Orleans Pelicans at home Friday night, Harden tallied a triple-double of 29 points, 13 assists, and 11 rebounds.

This triple-double performance amounted to a nERD of 50.18, with a true shooting of 73.1%. He led all Rockets players with an offensive rating of 147.8 while using 29.1% of his team's possessions. He's been a master of efficiency and volume in Mike D'Antoni's point-guard-friendly system.

6. Kevin Love vs. Memphis Grizzlies

He's not playing at a caliber worthy of MVP consideration, but Kevin Love is playing at a super level high this season. He's averaging a double-double through 24 games and has had many nights like Tuesday night.

Against the Memphis Grizzlies, Love put up 29 points and 13 boards in 34 minutes of action. From that stems his nERD of 53.23, his offensive rating of 139.9, and his outstanding defensive rating of 85.0.

5. Wesley Matthews vs. Denver Nuggets

It hasn't been a great year for the Dallas Mavericks, but in the team's 20-point win over the Denver Nuggets, Wesley Matthews impressed yet again. With 25 points on 10 of 14 shooting from the field and 5 of 7 from three, he was the Mavs' biggest threat.

He led the team with a nERD of 53.45, as he earned an offensive rating of 175.1 points per 100 possessions. Matthews converted for a 89.3% true shooting while he added 4 rebounds and 2 steals on the other end of the court.

4. DeMar DeRozan vs. Milwaukee Bucks

Since getting off to a scorching hot start early on this season, DeMar DeRozan cooled off a bit -- until last Monday's game against the Milwaukee Bucks. In the Toronto Raptors' 122-100 home win, their star shooting guard totaled 30 points on just 7 of 11 from the floor.

It seems insane, but DDR was that efficient. He amassed a nERD of 53.49, shooting a perfect 15 for 15 from the charity stripe, which amounted to 85.2% in terms of true shooting.

3. Ian Clark vs. Portland Trail Blazers

Ian Clark has averaged just 14.1 points per game for the Golden State Warriors this season. He only gets in for a few minutes a game, unless the Warriors are up by so much that he gets a long run in garbage time. This Saturday's 45-point win over the Portland Trail Blazers was one of those games.

In just 21 minutes, Clark accounted for the best performance of the game, with a nERD of 53.95 and 23 points. He took only 11 shots, but he converted on 9 of them, including 3 of 4 from beyond the three-point arc. He was on fire and ended the game with a team-high offensive rating of 195.2!

2. Kevin Durant vs. Portland Trail Blazers

In that same blowout game, Kevin Durant, in a flat 30 minutes, had a game of his own. He finished the game with more points (34) than minutes while also grabbing 11 rebounds in somewhat limited action.


That's a very distinguished stat, but what's more striking is Durant's efficiency in such a stat-line. He posted a higher nERD than Clark, at 54.41, while also shooting a 97.7% true shooting percentage on a 30.8% usage rate. If you can't tell, that's good.

1. Giannis Antetokounmpo vs. Chicago Bulls

In back-to-back wins over the Chicago Bulls this past week, Giannis Antetokounmpo showed why he's now at superstar status. In game two in Chicago, the Greek Freak filled up the box-score to the tune of 22 points, 11 assist, and 7 rebounds in 34 minutes.


In that same amount of time, Antetokounmpo amassed the week's highest nERD, 70.10, by over 15 points. He, his offensive rating of 164.2, and his defensive rating of 75.1 were instrumental in the Bucks' blowout win over Bulls.