Who's better, Lillee or Hadlee?

[silentstriker]

I would say, at his peak, Imran was the greater bowler but Wasim was a world class bowler for longer time.

For all sportsmen, particularly fast bowlers in cricket, we should assess their greatness when at their peak because how long that peak lasts is not necessarily a measure of their skills/caliber/genius etc.

Fast bowlers, of all cricketers, are most like field athletes and we do not take out the average speeds of the great sprinters of the world over all the races they ran in their careers.

PS: I know this(the comparison with a sprinter) is an imperfect comparison so please lets not deviate into this. I am just trying to make a point with the closest parallel from another sport I can immediately think of - nothing more.

I understand your point, but I think there is a lot to be said for sustained excellence. Sustained excellence means you performed in many countries over a long period of time. It also minimizes bad or good luck that you may have had over a series or two, and it shows how you adapted after other players made adjusted to you. It also tells how you performed after playing in varied conditions, instead of having a couple series in a row where you may have only played on helpful pitches, or with weakened lineups, or something like that. So while I think a peak tells us a lot, sustained excellence really tells us a lot more.

 

[SJS]

I understand your point, but I think there is a lot to be said for sustained excellence. Sustained excellence means you performed in many countries over a long period of time. It also minimizes bad or good luck that you may have had over a series or two, and it shows how you adapted after other players made adjusted to you. It also tells how you performed after playing in varied conditions, instead of having a couple series in a row where you may have only played on helpful pitches, or with weakened lineups, or something like that. So while I think a peak tells us a lot, sustained excellence really tells us a lot more.

When I said peak, I obviously did not mean a series. rather a few years in a career. For Hadlee those years came later in his career, for Botham very early, for Imran somewhere in the middle. It varies.

The sustained excellence has a lot to do with other factors like sharing of workload, luck/badluck with injuries, the need to play on for lack of alternatives in the side and so on.

The only thing where I think the sustained excellence bit is a real criteria is where a player adjusts his skill sets to the changing physical conditions and age as done by McGrath and Walsh for example. But then again, I was very clearly talking of 'fast' bowlers. Not of medium pacers who used to be fast. But still, it is a clearer indicator of skill.

 

[Richard]

500-odd wickets to one but not the other would suggest he didn't do it more often

That's explained by the fact McGrath played 121 (legit) Test-matches and bowled 4801.3 overs. Donald played 72 and bowled 2586.3 overs. When I say "more often" I mean "more regularly as a percentage of balls bowled" not "a larger number of times".

In any case, I'd venture to suggest McGrath probably got more wickets with nothing balls than Donald did.

Edit: Which things could Donald do that McGrath couldn't just out of interest?

Donald was better, IMO, at use of the crease, and the slower-ball, than McGrath (though McGrath developed this later in his career too, copying Dilhara Fernando's split-finger tactic). These are two very small things compared to, for example, use of the outswinger and the Yorker, which both excelled at (though Donald used far more).

About the only thing McGrath had over Donald for mine was he was better at hitting a hard-to-score-off length, whereas Donald generally bowled fuller and hence conceded a slightly higher economy-rate as the margin-for-error is a little smaller on a fuller length.

 

[Richard]

He was like hell bent on proving that Imran ,Donald are better than Wasim in a rather unpleasant way .Like Wasim is not in the ''class '' of Donald . Hmm.....i don't know ,i found that a hateful comment than a sensible comment .

Dominic Cork is not in the class of Angus Fraser, never mind Anderson Roberts or Courtney Walsh. And these two aren't in the class of Michael Holding or Dennis Lillee. Yet Cork is my favourite bowler, ever.

"Not in the class of" is hardly a hateful term.

 

[Richard]

I can't really disagree with you on the former, but I rate Donald very highly, as a second tier bowler in the all time stakes (e.g, between 7-12 or something like that). He could certainly make a case for himself in the second all time XI. I would say him and Wasim are very close in terms of bowling ability - Wasim may get in front of him due to being a left armer, but otherwise I'd say they are similar in ability. I'd take Imran over both though, personally. And of course, McGrath & Marshall over Imran and the rest.

So therefore why even joke about Donald being the several hundred miles behind McGrath that Sehwag is behind Hobbs?

 

[Richard]

Didn't Richard accuse SS of hating Donald too ? How did you miss that ? Did it accur to you that SS rates Mcgrath very highly too.

Next time you jump in to defend your pal make sure that you show 'Consistency'.

Didn't occur to you, of course, that I was exaggerating in my comment to ss. No, no, of course not.

 

[Richard]

I understand your point, but I think there is a lot to be said for sustained excellence. Sustained excellence means you performed in many countries over a long period of time. It also minimizes bad or good luck that you may have had over a series or two, and it shows how you adapted after other players made adjusted to you. It also tells how you performed after playing in varied conditions, instead of having a couple series in a row where you may have only played on helpful pitches, or with weakened lineups, or something like that. So while I think a peak tells us a lot, sustained excellence really tells us a lot more.

Both 12 and 15 years (the respective times Imran and Wasim were churning-out excellence) are easily long enough for me to consider them equal. Once you get past a certain point, length is near enough irrelevant. It's all about how good.

And Imran for me was good enough to be considered notably superior to Wasim.

 

[Ikki]

Donald was better, IMO, at use of the crease, and the slower-ball, than McGrath (though McGrath developed this later in his career too, copying Dilhara Fernando's split-finger tactic).

McGrath showed he dropped his index finger on the follow through for his slower ball.

 

[Migara]

McGrath showed he dropped his index finger on the follow through for his slower ball.

And I tjink he developed at a time when Fernado first picked up a cricket ball too.

 

[Flem274*]

Why would anybody want to copy Fernando?

 

[Migara]

Why would anybody want to copy Fernando?

Yes that's why I said Pidge would have developed it by the time Fernado first picked up a cricket ball.

 

[Richard]

Why would anybody want to copy Fernando?

He might be one of the most useless bowlers in history in many respects, but that slower-ball is a damn superb one. Never yet seen a batsman pick it out of the hand (a few sometimes pick it in the air and adjust their shot, but that's it).

Seen him get more batsmen out with that slower-ball than any other bowler, and by a fair bit too.

 

[Top_Cat]

He might be one of the most useless bowlers in history in many respects, but that slower-ball is a damn superb one. Never yet seen a batsman pick it out of the hand (a few sometimes pick it in the air and adjust their shot, but that's it).

Seen him get more batsmen out with that slower-ball than any other bowler, and by a fair bit too.

Highly doubt McGrath picked it up from Fernando. Craig McDermott was using it years ago so considering they were team-mates and McGrath looked up to Billy.......

 

[vic_orthdox]

Yup, McGrath's been using it for years. At first, he used to have a massive difference in speed; in later years it would only drop about 10km/h or so, and seemed to be a fair bit more effective.

 

[archie mac]

2-1 what a disgrace

No more checking this poll

At least Imran is doing a little bit better

 

[bond21]

Tanvir the pakistani has a good slower ball aswell.

 

[Richard]

Highly doubt McGrath picked it up from Fernando. Craig McDermott was using it years ago so considering they were team-mates and McGrath looked up to Billy.......

Maybe not then, but I only saw McGrath bowling it for the first time in about 2004, a couple of years after Fernando had first displayed it.

Did McDermott seriously use that exact same technique to bowl slower-balls?

 

[Richard]

2-1 what a disgrace

Not neccessarily. The fact that Lillee has so far been outvoted 2 to 1 doesn't neccessarily mean most people consider Hadlee far and away better. In fact I doubt many do.

 

[archie mac]

Not neccessarily. The fact that Lillee has so far been outvoted 2 to 1 doesn't neccessarily mean most people consider Hadlee far and away better. In fact I doubt many do.

I suppose

 

[Top_Cat]

Maybe not then, but I only saw McGrath bowling it for the first time in about 2004, a couple of years after Fernando had first displayed it.

Did McDermott seriously use that exact same technique to bowl slower-balls?

The exact one. First time I saw him use it would have been around the mid-90's. the commentators made a big deal out of it and teh fact he picked it up off his baseball friends.