Block %
The share of an opponent's two-point attempts that a player or team blocks while on the floor. A measure of rim protection.
What Block measures
Raw block totals lean heavily on minutes. A center who plays 30 minutes will out-block one who plays 18, whoever is the better protector. Block % fixes that by counting blocks against the shots that can actually be blocked, opponent two-pointers. It is the cleanest read on how well a team denies and deters shots at the rim.
How Block is calculated
BLK% = Blocks ÷ Opponent Two-Point Field Goal Attempts × 100
BLK%: Block Percentage / BLK: Blocks / FGA_opp: Opponent Field Goal Attempts
The catch
Blocking a shot is not the same as protecting the rim
A center who blocks a lot but gives up the putback after does less than the number says. Some of the best protectors deter rather than block, opponents just stop challenging them. True rim protection shows up in the opponent's two-point percentage, not only in blocks.
It only counts two-pointers
You cannot really block a three, so the math leaves them out. Teams that force a lot of threes face fewer blockable shots and can post a low block rate despite strong interior defense. Read it next to where the opponent's shots come from.
Seen in a game
Real Madrid blocked the most shots in the league in 2025–26 at 3.9 a game, and one man drove it: Walter Tavares alone averaged 1.8, the top individual mark in the competition. That protection held up a 111.6 defensive rating, fourth-best in the league, on the way to 28-16. The number understates him, though. The real effect of a shot-blocker is the shots the other team simply stops taking, once they know who is waiting.
Common questions
- What is block percentage?
Block percentage estimates the share of opponent two-point attempts a player blocks while on the floor. It measures rim protection adjusted for minutes.
- How is block percentage calculated?
Divide a player's blocks by the opponent two-point attempts during his time on court, as a rate. This isolates shot-blocking from how many minutes he plays.
- Why use block percentage instead of blocks per game?
Blocks per game favor players with heavy minutes. Block percentage shows how often a player actually deters shots when he is out there, a truer read on rim protection.
