I've heard this quite a few places over the years and I don't know which nincompoop came up with it but they were clearly innumerate. If you use 5 WPM as a cutoff for bowlers with more than 200 test wickets it leaves you with a very short list: Hadlee, Lillee, Murali, Ashwin, Grimmett. Wasim, Lindwall and Walsh didn't even meet 4 WPM.
Waqar has well over 4. Akram just barely misses out by 2 wickets over 104 matches though.
Of course I meant the other one you nitwit.
That's a very sensitive response to being corrected.
I was doing calculations and typed in one, changed my mind about what I was going to write and had the wrong name in. I edited it before I ever saw Trundler's post. You should pull your head in your accusations.
Be careful....be very careful.
Your use of the word 'we' is inapposite considering most here seem to consider you a mere annoyance.
You keep going and watch as the mob gathers at your door.
WPM / WPI is a combination of effectiveness and fitness of a bowler. It should not be the sole criteria for a ATG bowler. WPM doesn't make much sense as well. WPI is a better measure.
Neither are good measures because they're contextual on team composition, tactics, conditions and last of all how defensive the batsmen are (which is why I don't like the big weighting people give to strike rate either).
More affected by other factors out of the player's control though, hence why it is a rubbish measure. You're right that WPI is better than WPM, but still neither should be seriously considered as meaningful in any but the most niche of circumstances
The problem NOT considering WPM would be suddenly trundlers and non full time bowlers will become true all rounders. Walters 48 with bat 29 with ball but less than 1 WPM, Jayasuriya 40 with bat, 34 with ball (<1 WPM), Asif Iqbal 39 with bat, 28 with ball (<1 WPM), Eddie Barlow 46 with bat, 34 with ball (1.3 WPM) suddenly becomes as good as the elite all rounders. Those average differences are as good as in some top class allrounders.
Of course they won't, because of common sense. The same reason people don't think Andy Ganteaume is the best batsman of all time.
Most stats are affected by those things. Wpi/wpm is definitely the most clearly affected by team composition though,yes. Since your primary contention is how defensive the batsmen are (which is more a reflection of the era in which the player plays in), then strike rate is still useful as long as you standardise for the era. I always keep that in mind and defend spin bowlers from the 60s who had poor looking strike rates by modern standards. For example, Steyn's WPM and Sr are pretty amazing even accounting for the usual arguments against those stats (bowling competition for wpm and Era for SR). Not sure why that should receive pushback tbh.
You recognize the need to apply common sense to stats, even the most basic one, averages. (Which could be rephrased, more objectively, but potentially more problematically, as the need to apply multiple statistical filters).