You're absolutely right and it's why it's not always correct to just go one way or the other and "stack the batting" and "pick your 4 best bowlers" as blanket approaches are unlikely to yield the best results. In a lot of cases, the differences in batting/bowling between two options will be pretty marginal either way, whichever one you'll pick, you'll see plenty of cases whichever suit you compromised on looks to be what you're lacking in and you'll never really know which is the best choice unless this ATG team plays a lot of other ATG teams a very large number of times.
What I don't agree with is that "even at 11" batting doesn't matter. Runs count equally wherever they come from, and I'll re-iterate that it's the parternships that matter, a relatively decent #11 being able to hang around with Sobers or someone could make a huge difference. They might get out first ball anyway, but you could pick the #11 solely on bowling and they could bowl an awful spell.
If a real test team wanted to have semi-competent batting all the way down to #11, they'd usually have to massively compromise on the quality of the bowling available. But from the pool of ATG players, you can fill your tail with reasonable batsmen and still have an exceptionally good bowling attack, though not the literal best avaialble. I'm not saying it's necessarily the best way to build an ATG team, but it's a legitimate option.
Yes, And equally you can comprise your bowling and stack the tail and they get out first ball as well, and still even more likely to bowl an underwhelming spell.
It's about how much you prioritize which skill and how much you're willing to compromise the primary skill to fit into a secondary narrative.
Everyone is saying that even an incremental increase in batting can make a difference, but insinuate that even though you are choosing slightly inferior bowling, there would be no drop off. Both can't be true.
There is one possible exception, and that's one that most persons can accept, that being Hadlee over McGrath. Both are unarguably top 4 fast bowlers, occupying that top tier and both had almost exactly the same modus operandi. One was a genuine no. 8 and the other a certifiable rabbit. That's understandable, one brings much more with the bat, and at worst you're going from the 2nd best to the 3rd or 4th best bowler and remaining in that same tier.
However, there was recently a thread asking persons to name their top 14 bowlers from the past 50 years. Granted, it was a very small sample size, only 15 persons voted, and not obviously not definitive, but the results were interesting.
If one tabulated the results and gave each of the top 9 an average ranking score, it comes out to the following.
Marshall - 1.3
McGrath - 1.9
Hadlee - 3
Steyn - 4.6
Ambrose - 4.7
Then there's a bit if a gulf, then.
Lillee - 7
Akram - 7.3
Imran - 7.5
Donald - 7.7
So to quote a post earlier. To maximize the batting, let's go. Imran, Hadlee, Marshall, Warne.
Three of the four no problem. Marshall and Hadlee top 3, Warne top 2.
In this very small poll, Imran comes out 8th, or if we were allocating teams based purely on position, he would make the 3rd XI along with Wasim and Donald, not bad by any means.
But why if we are picking a team to play the Klingons would we want a bowler who even we see as a tier below the very best? And there is a top 5 that most agree on.
And even some of the biggest proponents of having Imran in their teams, (granted Smali didn't vote, though even he in the past have ranked Imran behind Marshall, Hadlee and McGrath), voted Imran 7th, 8th and 9th respectively.
So even among those who thinks he should be in a 3 man attack, has him rated an average of 8th.
So basically they would skip over the 2nd, 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th best bowlers in their own rankings to choose one who can bat, when you already have a strong no. 8 in Hadlee, and a strong tail overall till say Steyn at no. 11.
The position for which Imran ended up receiving the most votes, was 9th. 4 votes out of 14. The second most was 3 @ 8th. Half of those voted thinks that there are at least 7 bowlers who are better than him, incrementally or otherwise.
And again, I get it, balance. You want to have different, yet complimentary styles (explained better earlier in this or another thread, but speed and over all package + accuracy and bounce + x-factor and reverse swing) you want some strength to the tail especially a reliable no. 8.
And they are examples of no 11s helping a team to victory. There are two that spring to mind.
Stokes and Leach, Leach scored 1 and isn't a test all rounder by any means and averaged about the same as Steyn.
Lara and Walsh in Bridgetown, and the least said about Walsh's batting the better.
Steyn is a top tier, top 5 bowler, and more than a good enough batsman to bat at no 11 for an ATG team, without weakening the batting enough to be a liability. And the bowling is stacked with 0 weaknesses.
