By JME | Universe-J
HooperIndex brings together metrics from across the HooperLabs ecosystem into one place. It gives each player-season a Player Index (PLI) grade and a Potential Index (POI) grade, plus badges for peak seasons, prime seasons, Lookout (A or better POI in year 2), and season rankings (#1 PLI, #1 POI)—so you can quickly see how valuable a player is to a franchise, how high their ceiling is, and where they ranked that year.
The Player Index (PLI) is a measure of how valuable a player is to a franchise given the player's contract value, production, availability, and overall impact both in the regular season and postseason. It is expressed as a single grade from D- to S+ for each player-season.
PLI blends ingredients from HooperLabs tools and win burden:
| Weight | What it is | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| 30% | How they stack up vs. similar players | NBA Comparison Tool (overall score) |
| 20% | On-court impact (production share) | HooperImpact (RS + PS PCP) |
| 20% | Impact minutes (RS + PS) | HooperImpact (RS_PIM, PS_PIM) |
| 15% | Not overpaid (inverted overpay index) | HooperROI (overpay index) |
| 15% | Share of team wins | Win burden % (adj. win shares ÷ team wins) |
When overpay data is missing, the 15% is redistributed across the other components. A small season-based bonus (from the season year) can add up to 5 points. So peer comparison and impact (PCP + PIM) carry the most weight; contract context (overpay) and win burden are included in the grade.
The Potential Index (POI) is a measure of how high a player's PLI can be—think of it as the player's projected PLI ceiling if they continue their current trajectory next season. It is a 0–100 score (also graded D− to S+) shown only for players under 30.
POI is the maximum of two sub-scores, so we capture both "proven upside" and "projected upside":