I have a morning routine of scanning through various statistical leaderboards to stay on top of the trends across the league.

One thing struck me this morning:

The separation between LeBron James' production and the rest of the NBA.

LeBron ranks first in player efficiency rating (PER) and is head-and-shoulders above the competition, or at least those who have played more than five games (excludes Manu Ginobili).

In fact, the difference between LeBron James (33.5 PER) and second-place Kevin Durant (26.5 PER) is the roughly the same difference between Durant and Sundiata Gaines (19.4, 52nd place).

Sundiata Gaines!

To illustrate the separation, I offer you the following chart, which displays PER against minutes per game and colors the players by their age (older the bolder).

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Yeah, I'd say LeBron is off to a pretty good start. (Sincere apologies to Brian Cardinal and Jamaal Magloire).