Sir Donald Bradman

[TestMatch]

Bradman also played only a handful of countries (two?). What he did is similar to Sanga averaging 95 vs Bangladesh, Andy Flower averaging 95 vs India, Sehwag 91 vs Pakistan, Yousuf 101 vs West Indies and Atapattu 95 vs Zimbabwe. If faced with more conditions and attacks, it is arguably likely that such unfamiliarity would plague him as it does modern batsmen.

 

[Daemon]

It took 41 posts, not too bad imo

 

[_00_deathscar]

Bradman also played only a handful of countries (two?). What he did is similar to Sanga averaging 95 vs Bangladesh, Andy Flower averaging 95 vs India, Sehwag 91 vs Pakistan, Yousuf 101 vs West Indies and Atapattu 95 vs Zimbabwe. If faced with more conditions and attacks, it is arguably likely that such unfamiliarity would plague him as it does modern batsmen.

It might be sacrilege, but I do wonder if there is something in that.

Then again, I think of the fact that you could list 4-5 people with high averages. Most teams around Bradman's time only played against limited teams and in those nations (so limited conditions) anyway...but no one else had anything close to such an average so...

 

[vcs]

He did manage to average 95 over 234 FC matches.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

I assume there's an element of trolling going on here, but anyway The Don played 37/52 matches against the strongest opposition of his era. Hardly "similar" to Sanga flogging Bangladesh schoolboys for a dozen matches.

 

[Chrish]

I would take the opportunity to ask the questions I wanted for a long time. What was the nature of the wickets like in those days? These days we got rank turners in Asia, bouncy wickets in Australia/ SA, or seaming decks in England; what kind of wickets did they have back then?

Also what are the estimated speeds of guys like Larwood, Voce, Allen, Farnes etc. if it was ever measured ?

Thanks

 

[OverratedSanity]

I would take the opportunity to ask the questions I wanted for a long time. What was the nature of the wickets like in those days? These days we got rank turners in Asia, bouncy wickets in Australia/ SA, or seaming decks in England; what kind of wickets did they have back then?

Also what are the estimated speeds of guys like Larwood, Voce, Allen, Farnes etc. if it was ever measured ?

Thanks

Probably one of the friendlier eras for batting. The 30s and 40s are generally considered to have had very good batting decks on average, with the random sticky because of rain thrown in there from time to time.

Have no clue about the speeds but Larwood genuinely looks very quick in most videos so I reckon he could've been 85+mph with the occasional burst of 90, although this is just pure guesswork. Think I've read somewhere that some people had somehow used video evidence to estimate some of his quicker deliveries at 98mph, which might or not be totally accurate. The rest all look a step or two slower.

 

[Burgey]

Agree with Engle here. Ability to pick length and even line early is what seperates the ATG level batsmen from the rest but when it comes to Bradman, I feel the factors Engle mentioned is what made him better than the other ATG bats. Its one thing to pick the length early, another to be able to choose the most risk free stroke possible to score off that delivery.

What if he picked it even earlier than those guys?

There's no doubt a multitude of factors which made him so much better, and we'll never know for sure. I suspect he picked up the ball jist that fraction earlier than anyone else, which gave him that bit more time than everyone. But we're talking tiny fractions of seconds in difference

 

[TestMatch]

I assume there's an element of trolling going on here, but anyway The Don played 37/52 matches against the strongest opposition of his era. Hardly "similar" to Sanga flogging Bangladesh schoolboys for a dozen matches.

Wasn't trolling, and I agree it's not like Sanga flogging Bangladesh. But it is a bit like Sehwag flogging Pakistan. Maybe the Don was a kind of alpha predator who had the measure of England like Sehwag had the measure of Pakistan. Would Sehwag average more if he played 3/4 of his career vs Pakistan?

Anyway, it's interesting that old sporting records tilt toward Australia. A lot of tennis records which stand to this day, for example, were set by the Aussies before the sport became more professional and commercialized. Think Aussie Margaret Court, who still holds the record for most women's titles, Chris Evert who holds the French Open record, Ken Rosewall's finals record, or Rod Laver, whose 200 singles titles are still the most in history.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Wasn't trolling, and I agree it's not like Sanga flogging Bangladesh. But it is a bit like Sehwag flogging Pakistan. Maybe the Don was a kind of alpha predator who had the measure of England like Sehwag had the measure of Pakistan. Would Sehwag average more if he played 3/4 of his career vs Pakistan?

Anyway, it's interesting that old sporting records tilt toward Australia. A lot of tennis records which stand to this day, for example, were set by the Aussies before the sport became more professional and commercialized. Think Aussie Margaret Court, who still holds the record for most women's titles, Chris Evert who holds the French Open record, Ken Rosewall's finals record, or Rod Laver, whose 200 singles titles are still the most in history.

That legendary Australian Chris Evert.

 

[Starfighter]

 

[TestMatch]

That legendary Australian Chris Evert.

Typo. Im reading wiki hockey, cricket, rugby and tennis records and looking for analogous patterns (and the flag next to her name looked Australian).

My Margaret Court example is actually bad too, because I thought she was dominant a few decades before she was (she set her records in the 1960s). My initial theory was that these sports migrated to the British colonies in the late 1800s, and that the Aussies dominated the pre and immediate post -war years because of cultural and environmental reasons (more sun!?) and because competition was less fierce. Then the Americans come on the scene and start dominating everyone (but they don't play cricket, so Aussie dominance continues there).

There is no "analogy" of Bradman's "100 average" in other sports (a modern sprinter isn't that much faster than a pre war sprinter), but different types of old accumulative records might be useful in studying.

 

[Burgey]

Would Sir Donald Bradman make Jimmy Anderson's First XI?

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Much of the Bradman legend isn't just about what he did himself, it's about the fact that no one else came anywhere near him.

 

[the big bambino]

Wasn't trolling, and I agree it's not like Sanga flogging Bangladesh. But it is a bit like Sehwag flogging Pakistan. Maybe the Don was a kind of alpha predator who had the measure of England like Sehwag had the measure of Pakistan. Would Sehwag average more if he played 3/4 of his career vs Pakistan?

Anyway, it's interesting that old sporting records tilt toward Australia. A lot of tennis records which stand to this day, for example, were set by the Aussies before the sport became more professional and commercialized. Think Aussie Margaret Court, who still holds the record for most women's titles, Chris Evert who holds the French Open record, Ken Rosewall's finals record, or Rod Laver, whose 200 singles titles are still the most in history.

Bradman played most of his tests against England and averaged 89. Against his other opponents he averaged 140. If he played his test match opponents in the same proportion as modern players his test average would have been well over 100.

Given that India then encompassed Pakistan the only modern test sides not playing in his era were Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. Its hard to think which of those teams would have "stopped" him.

Btw tennis was popular in the US and Europe in the eras you talk about, and if anything, Americans (of whom Evert is one) held most tennis records.

 

[the big bambino]

My initial theory was that these sports migrated to the British colonies in the late 1800s, and that the Aussies dominated the pre and immediate post -war years because of cultural and environmental reasons (more sun!?) and because competition was less fierce. Then the Americans come on the scene and start dominating everyone (but they don't play cricket, so Aussie dominance continues there).

There is no "analogy" of Bradman's "100 average" in other sports (a modern sprinter isn't that much faster than a pre war sprinter), but different types of old accumulative records might be useful in studying.

Well more of an error than a theory. Americans were proficient at tennis throughout most if not all of the C20. Europe was too (4 musketeers, Perry, the Germans ...) So Australia's success in tennis was achieved against the same continents that provide most of the best players today.

Neither does "batting conditions" explain Bradman's success as decadal averages have been fairly consistent since the 1920s. If you remove Bradman's distorting influence the 30s has one of the lower averages.

 

[honestbharani]

What if he picked it even earlier than those guys?

There's no doubt a multitude of factors which made him so much better, and we'll never know for sure. I suspect he picked up the ball jist that fraction earlier than anyone else, which gave him that bit more time than everyone. But we're talking tiny fractions of seconds in difference

Yeah, he could have. Obviously its just opinions and perceptions at this point, but for me, I find it easier to attribute why he was so much better down to the other attributes than just picking length even earlier than every other batsman. I just find it more plausible that a lot of great batsmen pick length early but then there are other attributes of batsman-ship where The Don was so much ahead of everyone else.

 

[Burgey]

The trouble with Bradman is you watch all these other great players and it's hard to comprehend there is someone who's between half to one third better than even them. Blokes like Richards, Chappell, Gavaskar through to the later great players like Lara, Tendulkar, Ponting etc. It's pretty hard to imagine someone as being that much better, but it just seems that for whatever unidentifiable reason or reasons he just was.

You go back and remember someone like Ponting averaging about 70 over his best 52 tests in his career, or over 60 after 100 tests. I remember watching him and the likes of Richards, Tendullkar and Lara and thinking no one could bat better than those guys when they were at their best. Smith has been like a run machine the past 3-4 years, but his average just shades Bradman's worst ever series average. It's hard to believe someone could be better than those blokes at their best, and could do it for 20 years. You almost don't want to believe it, because you feel like you've been robbed of something in not having seen it. Anyway, I know I wish I'd seen him bat in his prime (cue age joke etc).

 

[watson]

Bradman himself during an interview (might try and find it) admitted that his skill was probably due to spending numerous hours hitting a golf ball with a stump up against a corrigated iron water tank when he was a child.

So basically if you want to create another Bradman you take away a child's XBox and instead give them a highly repetitive task that takes enormous hand-to-eye co-ordination. Then once they've practiced the highly repetitive task non-stop for several years you then hand them a cricket bat and tell them to grip it a specific way before entering them into a highly competive cricketing environment. Remove all of life's other distractions until they are averaging 100 and famous.

Easy.

 

[watson]

Brian Lara on making big scores.....