New Zealand fast bowlers who are 'definitely' better than Kapil Dev

[trundler]

Why would he be?

Because of peer reputation. Every batsman from the 70s and 80s would rather not face Lillee than Hadlee and same is the case for Akram.

 

[Zinzan]

Because of peer reputation. Every batsman from the 70s and 80s would rather not face Lillee than Hadlee and same is the case for Akram.

Huh? Of course Akram's peer reputation is great, he's a top 10 ATG pace bowler & in his case I think his peers admire his style even more than his pure potency with the ball, but no more of a peer reputation than the likes of Marshall, Hadlee & Lillee if that's what you're trying to suggest.

 

[Flem274*]

Honestly when discussing not just Bond but Harris (who I love), Shoiab etc I kinda realised for at least 18 months now I'm starting to value conventional past player discussion less and less.

If NZ magically had every player in their history to choose from and brought into 2021* professionalism and training, there is no way Bond is missing out on the 15 man squad. He's just not. It doesn't matter how many more wickets and games at a respectable average the hypothetical 4th or 5th pacer might have, they're missing out.

Furthermore, if someone like Tom Pritchard made himself available and we allow for turning a 1950s "fast bowler" into the 2022 version, the selectors might well take a chance him despite him never playing a test if he looked the hype.

Real life selectors do not care about your quantity, they care about winning games. Ryan Harris is never in danger of missing out on selection to Peter Siddle, Brett Lee or whoever. I pick him in the Australian side of my lifetime with McGrath and Cummins though Hazlewood is rapidly making his case and I see the appeal of Johnson.

So when real life selectors pick to win, and we pick historical based on arbitrary cut offs for various factors (don't pretend picking Bumrah, Tyson and Shoiab is empirical but Bond and Harris are unknowns), I think it makes our ATG debates look pretty irrelevant.

That's not to say I don't have opinions on who the GOATs are and that we shouldn't be gigantic nerds rating players, but I don't think the selection criteria conventional wisdom applies to ATG discussion is in any way relevant to winning real cricket games. If you apply real world selection to ATG sides, you're making some ruthless calls and switching players in and out all the time depending on your opponent and the conditions. The temptation to sub Davidson for Johnson at the WACA would be overwhelming and probably the intelligent decision.

I've probably described this criticism extremely badly in a thread where we're all having a lend, so anyway.

 

[Flem274*]

Honestly when discussing not just Bond but Harris (who I love), Shoiab etc I kinda realised for at least 18 months now I'm starting to value conventional past player discussion less and less.

If NZ magically had every player in their history to choose from and brought into 2021* professionalism and training, there is no way Bond is missing out on the 15 man squad. He's just not. It doesn't matter how many more wickets and games at a respectable average the hypothetical 4th or 5th pacer might have, they're missing out.

Furthermore, if someone like Tom Pritchard made himself available and we allow for turning a 1950s "fast bowler" into the 2022 version, the selectors might well take a chance him despite him never playing a test if he looked the hype.

Real life selectors do not care about your quantity, they care about winning games. Ryan Harris is never in danger of missing out on selection to Peter Siddle, Brett Lee or whoever. I pick him in the Australian side of my lifetime with McGrath and Cummins though Hazlewood is rapidly making his case and I see the appeal of Johnson.

So when real life selectors pick to win, and we pick historical based on arbitrary cut offs for various factors (don't pretend picking Bumrah, Tyson and Shoiab is empirical but Bond and Harris are unknowns), I think it makes our ATG debates look pretty irrelevant.

That's not to say I don't have opinions on who the GOATs are and that we shouldn't be gigantic nerds rating players, but I don't think the selection criteria conventional wisdom applies to ATG discussion is in any way relevant to winning real cricket games. If you apply real world selection to ATG sides, you're making some ruthless calls and switching players in and out all the time depending on your opponent and the conditions. The temptation to sub Davidson for Johnson at the WACA would be overwhelming and probably the intelligent decision.

I've probably described this criticism extremely badly in a thread where we're all having a lend, so anyway.

ok

 

[trundler]

Huh? Of course Akram's peer reputation is great, he's a top 10 ATG pace bowler & in his case I think his peers admire his style even more than his pure potency with the ball, but no more of a peer reputation than the likes of Marshall, Hadlee & Lillee if that's what you're trying to suggest.

Lillee and Akram have a peer reputation far greater than Hadlee at least.

 

[Zinzan]

ok

okie dokie

 

[h_hurricane]

maybe don't take random snipes at other posters for no reason chief

The irony is that you have a reputation of doing exactly this.

 

[Shady Slim]

The irony is that you have a reputation of doing exactly this.

who?

 

[trundler]

who?

You've unfairly pigeonholed him as a terrible poster in the past and taken shots at him because of Burgey shitposting. He's the nicest guy and never gets into shitfights.

 

[Shady Slim]

You've unfairly pigeonholed him as a terrible poster in the past and taken shots at him because of Burgey ****posting. He's the nicest guy and never gets into ****fights.

nah man who ****in asked

 

[Shady Slim]

sorry you had to become a civilian casualty in there trundler but as the first replier i had no choice

 

[Zinzan]

Lillee and Akram have a peer reputation far greater than Hadlee at least.

Based on a few anecdotes? I'm not actually so sure about that.

There is some truth to the plaudits Lillee received from English batsmen in particular, but that was more limited to 1975 -1981 at which point Lillee was clearly miles better a bowler than Hadlee, and more advanced in his career. Then as Lillee declined somewhat in his last few years before retiring Hadlee went on to take 327 wickets at 19 in the 1980s, so theirs is 70s vs 80s hence apples vs oranges.

Don't know what evidence you have for Akram being rated more highly amongst peers than Hadlee as a better test bowler either. I know many cricketers loved Akram's style, and who wouldn't, but let's not conflate that with effectiveness and as an overall Test performer when talking about peer reputation. The two things aren't the same.

 

[Socerer 01]

Honestly when discussing not just Bond but Harris (who I love), Shoiab etc I kinda realised for at least 18 months now I'm starting to value conventional past player discussion less and less.

If NZ magically had every player in their history to choose from and brought into 2021* professionalism and training, there is no way Bond is missing out on the 15 man squad. He's just not. It doesn't matter how many more wickets and games at a respectable average the hypothetical 4th or 5th pacer might have, they're missing out.

Furthermore, if someone like Tom Pritchard made himself available and we allow for turning a 1950s "fast bowler" into the 2022 version, the selectors might well take a chance him despite him never playing a test if he looked the hype.

Real life selectors do not care about your quantity, they care about winning games. Ryan Harris is never in danger of missing out on selection to Peter Siddle, Brett Lee or whoever. I pick him in the Australian side of my lifetime with McGrath and Cummins though Hazlewood is rapidly making his case and I see the appeal of Johnson.

So when real life selectors pick to win, and we pick historical based on arbitrary cut offs for various factors (don't pretend picking Bumrah, Tyson and Shoiab is empirical but Bond and Harris are unknowns), I think it makes our ATG debates look pretty irrelevant.

That's not to say I don't have opinions on who the GOATs are and that we shouldn't be gigantic nerds rating players, but I don't think the selection criteria conventional wisdom applies to ATG discussion is in any way relevant to winning real cricket games. If you apply real world selection to ATG sides, you're making some ruthless calls and switching players in and out all the time depending on your opponent and the conditions. The temptation to sub Davidson for Johnson at the WACA would be overwhelming and probably the intelligent decision.

I've probably described this criticism extremely badly in a thread where we're all having a lend, so anyway.

The trouble with this rationale and filtering is that you go from picking players based on their career and accomplishments and what they showed to natural talent and potential and I'm not sure if that really is the best way to go about it

For example by applying this logic of applying current era professionalism and training to any player in Indian history a player like Vinod Kambli will always make this hypothetical squad of 15 and be a key player in the XI too. His career fell apart due to mental struggles, poor backing and mismanagement as iirc he belonged to one of the more backward communities in India and that may have played a subtle part in it too compared to today's world. He was outrageously talented and as good as Tendulkar

Even Kohli wouldn't make it in ahead of Rohit Sharma as the latter was always more talented and had more potential than the former but struggled to bring it internationally back then owing to his own consistency issues until he started opening in all formats. There is a reason why he was backed so much despite averaging only like 30 in nearly 100 international games once. Even in your Aussie example I would take Pattinson who was more talented than Cummins and had the misfortune of having a worse bowling action that wasn't corrected and the comparative lack of backing

At the end of the day I understand this is all a subjective process but with your rationale many ATG sides will probably be subject to massive changes just based on who was the biggest wunderkid back then rather than measuring them based on what they achieved and brought to the field

 

[trundler]

Based on a few anecdotes? I'm not actually so sure about that.

There is some truth to the plaudits Lillee received from English batsmen in particular, but that was more limited to 1975 -1981 at which point Lillee was clearly miles better a bowler than Hadlee, and more advanced in his career. Then as Lillee declined somewhat in his last few years before retiring Hadlee went on to take 327 wickets at 19 in the 1980s, so theirs is 70s vs 80s hence apples vs oranges.

Don't know what evidence you have for Akram being rated more highly amongst peers than Hadlee as a better test bowler either. I know many cricketers loved Akram's style, and who wouldn't, but let's not conflate that with effectiveness and as an overall Test performer when talking about peer reputation. The two things aren't the same.

When asked about the toughest bowler to face or they best bowler they've faced, batsmen from the 90s say Akram and the previous generation says Lillee. Cricinfo picked Trueman ahead of Hadlee in the second XI. Akram and Lillee made it to the first. Obviously I personally rate Hadlee to be in the top 3 ever but peer ratings don't back that up.

 

[Burgey]

Let's look at this another way. If we polled 50 past Test batsmen who played sometime between 1974-2009 (Kapil and Bond's career span), and we asked them who they'd be more worried facing in a Test match, do you honestly think hand on heart the majority would say Kapil?

Absolutely they would, because test standard players of any quality aren’t worried by pace alone, they’re worried about getting out.

By your reasoning they’d rather not face Lee than military fast-medium Hadlee, which is laughable. They’re not worried about getting hit when they’re that good, they’re worried about getting out.

Kapil Dev challenged both edges, Shane Bond (sadly) challenged both an MRI and an ultrasound. It’s not even a contest.

 

[Zinzan]

When asked about the toughest bowler to face or they best bowler they've faced, batsmen from the 90s say Akram and the previous generation says Lillee. Cricinfo picked Trueman ahead of Hadlee in the second XI. Akram and Lillee made it to the first. Obviously I personally rate Hadlee to be in the top 3 ever but peer ratings don't back that up.

Interesting, If a study has been conducted, please do link it. I'd be interested to see the sample size of players surveyed, when they played, countries they play for and against etc.

 

[trundler]

The trouble with this rationale and filtering is that you go from picking players based on their career and accomplishments and what they showed to natural talent and potential and I'm not sure if that really is the best way to go about it

For example by applying this logic of applying current era professionalism and training to any player in Indian history a player like Vinod Kambli will always make this hypothetical squad of 15 and be a key player in the XI too. His career fell apart due to mental struggles, poor backing and mismanagement as iirc he belonged to one of the more backward communities in India and that may have played a subtle part in it too compared to today's world. He was outrageously talented and as good as Tendulkar

Even Kohli wouldn't make it in ahead of Rohit Sharma as the latter was always more talented and had more potential than the former but struggled to bring it internationally back then owing to his own consistency issues until he started opening in all formats. There is a reason why he was backed so much despite averaging only like 30 in nearly 100 international games once. Even in your Aussie example I would take Pattinson who was more talented than Cummins and had the misfortune of having a worse bowling action that wasn't corrected and the comparative lack of backing

At the end of the day I understand this is all a subjective process but with your rationale many ATG sides will probably be subject to massive changes just based on who was the biggest wunderkid back then rather than measuring them based on what they achieved and brought to the field

There is also a perception bias at play here with what if cases. People take the best possible version of a guy that could've been great and assume that's how his career would've panned out if not for misfortune. It also always favours flashy guys. Boycott's FC career overlapped with Barry Richards's and also stretched to beyond either side of the latter's and he ended up with twice as many tons as Barry at a higher average but Barry Richards makes it to people's all time XIs ahead of Boycott. There's no way to justify it other than Richards was better to watch.

 

[Athlai]

ok

Wrong account

 

[Bahnz]

Lol, rightio... Give me any virtually any players' career stats, batsman or bowler (bar Bradman) and I'll make them look ordinary by omitting a select few games/series. I'm sure I can have Dale Steyn averaging 28 too with a few omissions.

I’d be very impressed if you could do it by subtracting 6 games.

 

[Burgey]

You've unfairly pigeonholed him as a terrible poster in the past and taken shots at him because of Burgey ****posting. He's the nicest guy and never gets into ****fights.

Are you talking about Chrish or h_Hurricane here? Because I can’t really recall interacting much with Chrish in the past tbh.

I’m happy to own calling the other bloke a terrible poster though because, well, he generally is.

i figure you’re talking about Chrish because the description of whoever you’re describing being a nice bloke who never gets into **** fights in no way matches h_hurricane, who’s always up for a shitposting **** fight