Strike-rates of some famous batsmen from year's past

[Days of Grace]

Charles Davis of z-score has his own blog where he re-scores and, where possible, does ball-by-ball analysis of test matches from 1877-the early 1970s.

In my analysis for my eventual top 100 test batsmen list, I have used the z-score blog to ascertain the career strike-rates of batsmen from pre-1980. There were some surprising results. Batsmen from the post-war ever who have a reputation for attacking play actually have low strike-rates.

GL Jessop 110.00
VT Trumper 67.00
IVA Richards 66.00
ED Weekes 59.00
C Hill 59.00
CG Macartney 57.00
RG Pollock 55.00
CL Walcott 53.00
GS Sobers 52.00
JB Hobbs 51.00
RB Kanhai 49.00
ER Dexter 48.00
WR Hammond 45.00
GA Headley 44.00
AD Nourse 43.00
KR Miller 43.00
FMM Worrell 42.00
AR Morris 42.00
DCS Compton 41.00
KF Barrington 41.00
PBH May 40.00
MC Cowdrey 39.00
L Hutton 38.00
H Sutcliffe 37.00
G Boycott 35.00
Hanif Mohammad 33.00

Miller, Compton and May's strike-rates really surprised me. Ken Barrington, a batsmen with a dour reputation, actually has a very similar strike-rate.

The records are not 100% complete, hence the rounding-up of numbers, but I doubt they would change much with more data.

 

[stephen]

Trumper would have been amazing to watch.

 

[mr_mister]

Yeah that's awesome from Trumper and acts as a counter weight to his low average (relative to ATGs)

 

[bagapath]

for how many of Denis compton's/ Keith miller's knocks do we have ball by ball information?

 

[Magrat Garlick]

Jessop. Poor chap was born in the wrong century

 

[Days of Grace]

for how many of Denis compton's/ Keith miller's knocks do we have ball by ball information?

About half

Almost the entire remainder have minutes batted info. Thus an estimate of balls faced can be done quite easily.

 

[Borges]

Yeah that's awesome from Trumper and acts as a counter weight to his low average (relative to ATGs)

If Trumper is not an All Time Great, then no one is an ATG. Not even Bradman.

 

[mr_mister]

Well I consider him one but I understand the argument against him being one

 

[the big bambino]

Jessop probably constrained by the demands of test cricket would have played a more natural game if the Golden Age had T20.

 

[Days of Grace]

For a lot of Jessop’s innings hits over the boundary only counted for four. One had to hit it out of the ground to score six.

 

[trundler]

Hobbs higher than my perception. Hutton, Sutcliffe, Boycs and Hanif at the bottom. Unsurprising. What about Gavaskar?

Clem Hill is criminally underrated.

 

[trundler]

Well I consider him one but I understand the argument against him being one

Well he certainly had X factor and an uber impressive average for the era. As well as ATG knocks. Like Viv IMO.

 

[mr_mister]

Hobbs did make his average look a little sub par though and he was nearly from the same era

Though I'm lead to believe there were massive changes to pitch conditions which made batting easier right around that time, I'm not sure it quite allows us to puts Trumper on Hobbs level.


And if he's not on Hobbs level he's not on several others level either

 

[OverratedSanity]

Yup, Hobbs career overlapped with Trumper's for quite a few years and he was statistically far ahead. Probably just goes to show how amazing Hobbs was but still.

 

[trundler]

Nah. I'd say Hobbs exceeded his contemporaries in a manner only matched by Bradman and Grace. To illustrate my point, on matting wickets where Barnes took 49 in a series, Hobbs averaged 66+. Over twice the next best. Harsh on Trumper. Hobbs played little before the war though. Bulk of his runs came after. Plus, Trumper was an impact player and all that. Scored very high on chasingthedon's impact measure.

 

[mr_mister]

Well I mean he didn't drastically exceed Sutcliffe people just underrate that guy

 

[trundler]

Sutcliffe is weird. No real holes. Bossed it in Ashes tests also. Maybe low SR is a clue but Hutton and Hammond are rated very highly. Maybe it's because there was an emphasis on dazzling stroke play in those days. Or maybe it's simply because he had Hobbs at the other end.

 

[fredfertang]

If Trumper is not an All Time Great, then no one is an ATG. Not even Bradman.

Trumper would be an All Time Great just for that image of him jumping out to drive, even if he'd never made a decent score

 

[Howe_zat]

All these post war stars with sub-45 strike rates should be remembered the next time someone complains that over rates aren't what they were in the 50s.

~

Pre war, all tests in Australia were timeless, and in the rest of the world it was generally limited to the 1920s and 30s. That's had an impact on the strike rates here, but apparently not for Trumper.

 

[trundler]

Tests in England were played over 3 days before WWI. Many batsmen from that era have high strike rates as a result.