Better Keeper - Brendon McCullum or BJ Watling

[Fuller Pilch]

I do think that if NZ had just slotted McCullum into 5 earlier you would've seen those fantastic late-career results start sooner. As mentioned his last couple of years with the gloves saw pretty good returns with the bat. The decision was made that Ryder was too good a batsman to risk up the order, and in a perfect world that probably would be true, but I think a top order of Ryder, Taylor, McCullum, Williamson would've probably been the best mix for NZ during a difficult era.

We also had Brownlie as a pretty solid middle order option, so McCullum opened. Ryder actually batted 3 in the Doug Bracewell test vs Oz.

 

[thierry henry]

ok but consider this

i don't care

hey that was really mean

 

[NZTailender]

hey that was really mean

wasn't directed at you, i jus don't want to concede anything to baz

like 3 or 4 centuries as a specialist batsman have been identified as being good or great, which means he didn't turn up on like 80 occasions.

 

[Zinzan]

Watling was a consistent gloveman, but McCullum more talented with both the gloves and with the bat.

In Watling's favour he did play some great match-saving innings, but overall I'd still pick McCullum in my NZ all-time Test team which probably puts me in a minority of Kiwi fans from what I gather.

 

[NZTailender]

Watling was a consistent gloveman, but McCullum more talented with both the gloves and with the bat.

In Watling's favour he did play some great match-saving innings, but overall I'd still pick McCullum in my NZ all-time Test team which probably puts me in a minority of Kiwi fans from what I gather.

Yeah that's ****ing nuts

 

[Howsie]

Watling was a consistent gloveman, but McCullum more talented with both the gloves and with the bat.

In Watling's favour he did play some great match-saving innings, but overall I'd still pick McCullum in my NZ all-time Test team which probably puts me in a minority of Kiwi fans from what I gather.

If I’m being honest I’ve always found Watling a little overrated on CW from the NZ contingent. Which is funny because I can’t remember a player being hated on as much as when he first came into the squad. Those Twatling days feel like decades ago now.

 

[Fuller Pilch]

If I’m being honest I’ve always found Watling a little overrated on CW from the NZ contingent.

Earlier this year (March/April) CW voted Watling the 3rd greatest wicketkeeper batsman of all time behind Gilchrist and Allan Knott.

The top 10 were:
Gilchrist
Knott
Watling
Ames
Healy
Waite
Dhoni
Engineer
Marsh
Sangakkara

 

[Red_Ink_Squid]

It is interesting that the vote is 5-5. We can't see how posters voted, but I guess Watling did better amongst Kiwis whereas McCullum probably got more votes from foreigners (as his style of batting would be noticed by the foreign press and commentators).

My reading of the OP is that the poll is purely for who was better at keeping, not who was the better keeper/bat. (I voted BMac, would've gone for Watling otherwise.)

 

[Howsie]

Earlier this year (March/April) CW voted Watling the 3rd greatest wicketkeeper batsman of all time behind Gilchrist and Allan Knott.

The top 10 were:
Gilchrist
Knott
Watling
Ames
Healy
Waite
Dhoni
Engineer
Marsh
Sangakkara

No Flower or de Villers?

 

[Flem274*]

If you could combine latter McCullum's batting with early McCullum's keeping, he beats Watling.

That player never existed though. It's like taking early Vettori's bowling and his latter career batting. That's a 40 bat 30 bowl averaging cricketer and one of the GOAT allrounders, but it didn't happen like that.

James Franklin would have had a career if you could merge his early bowling with his post-knee injury batting and putting him at #8 instead of injury turning him into a 5th bowler.

 

[Coronis]

Earlier this year (March/April) CW voted Watling the 3rd greatest wicketkeeper batsman of all time behind Gilchrist and Allan Knott.

The top 10 were:
Gilchrist
Knott
Watling
Ames
Healy
Waite
Dhoni
Engineer
Marsh
Sangakkara

As late as the 90’s, people were still calling Ames the best keeper batsman in history. Shame some people think Watling is better.

 

[thierry henry]

Watling was a consistent gloveman, but McCullum more talented with both the gloves and with the bat.

In Watling's favour he did play some great match-saving innings, but overall I'd still pick McCullum in my NZ all-time Test team which probably puts me in a minority of Kiwi fans from what I gather.

I can understand the idea of combining McCullum's overall batting with his peak wicketkeeping and coming to this conclusion. However, the actual McCullum keeper/batsman we got was pretty much a flop compared to Watling. I don't know how anyone would go about rating that guy over Watling. Ok his 30+ average is good by NZ standards but really he did little of note with the bat while keeping.

 

[Zinzan]

I can understand the idea of combining McCullum's overall batting with his peak wicketkeeping and coming to this conclusion. However, the actual McCullum keeper/batsman we got was pretty much a flop compared to Watling. I don't know how anyone would go about rating that guy over Watling. Ok his 30+ average is good by NZ standards but really he did little of note with the bat while keeping.

Fair question, and part of it is based on when considering an all-time NZ Test XI that I'd rather McCullum's clearly superior glovework and swashbuckling attacking batting in spite the fact that he averages 4-5 less than Watling when they are both keeping. That may be the wrong way to look at it, because if I was asked who I'd rather put my life on of the two to survive a session batting it'd be clearly be BJ.