John Hollinger, a fixture of ESPN.com’s coverage of the NBA for the past eight seasons and one of the leaders in basketball’s rising statistical analysis movement in the past decade, is leaving his role as a columnist to become the vice president of basketball operations for the Memphis Grizzlies.

Best known for hatching the formula behind every player’s Player Efficiency Rating (PER) — which attempts to quantify player performance through the use of an all-in-one rating — Hollinger will begin work as a senior executive in the Grizzlies’ basketball department next week.

Sources close to the situation told ESPN.com that the move won’t change the status of Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace but added that Hollinger will be a “prominent voice in the team’s front office beyond providing statistical analysis.”

via Marc Stein of ESPN