While watching the Clippers/Thunder game Tuesday night, I heard something interesting. Clippers color commentator Michael Smith made the quip while watching 82games.com:

Almost across the board, the Thunder are better with the small lineup. The only places where the Starting Five excels are reducing turnovers and allowing slightly less points. Strangely, the five without Perkins rebounds better, picking up 1.5 percent more of the available rebounds.

One could make the argument that the Martin-infused lineup is only solid due to the opponents they're facing - since Martin is not part of the starting five, he's often not facing the other team's best players. Plus, one could ask whether Perkins plays specifically because of matchups. Those are valid... to a point. Given a large sample size this season, these lineups have played against a variety of different opponents. In addition, playing 51 percent of minutes does not make Perkins a situational player - it makes him a go-to guy, inexplicably. Especially given the distance between the two sets of five, I believe it's statistically significant data that the Thunder would play better with Martin over Perkins no matter the opponent.

The Verdict

Why exactly is Perkins playing significant minutes, again? He's nowhere near the same player that he was with Boston, and he's not gelling with the rest of the team. In fact, without him on the court, the Thunder not only score more, but they also rebound more. Letting Durant and Ibaka play down low rather than keeping Durant outside and pairing Ibaka with Perkins seems like the way to go.

Unfortunately, salary concerns means that OKC is stuck with Perkins for a while. He is signed for two more years past this season, each at over $8 million per year. The old wisdom goes that if you're paying a guy, then why not play him?

But the conventional wisdom won't win your championships. If Sam Presti wants to have the statistically optimized roster play the majority of minutes, he'll bench Perkins. Now.