Jacques Kallis vs Glenn Mcgrath

[Flem274*]

i cbf checking that stat but if you remove all the minnows from hammonds career (so everyone except australia) he has 36 @ 44.

 

[subshakerz]

The point here is that until Kallis came along, even good batsmen like Cullinan and G. Kirsten struggled... it was not until the arrival of Kallis stabilising the SA top 4; firstly at 3 and then at 4, that allowed the other batsmen to start scoring runs. By 2000 it was generally acknowledged by commentators, opposing captains and anybody that understood cricket that getting Kallis out was half the job done. The team was built twice around him firstly in '98 and then again in 2001 after the Hansie controversy and Cullinan retirement; eventually leading to 2003 when Smith took over. If you actually look at the rise (now heavy fall) of SA Test cricket it was off the back of Kallis. From 2009 the SA team was considered not to rely on Kallis anymore (rightly) with Amla providing huge stability and ABdV endless talent. But since his retirement in 2013 SA have never been able to replace him and it is easily seen how SA cricket slowly disintegrated after he left because he provided a panacea for many of any Test teams problems.

You want to think that Kallis was not the lynchpin around which the SA batting was built for 10 years that's fine, you think that SA had a fine batting unit without Kallis that's fine. All you do is show you ignorance of SA cricket.

No, that is not the point you have been presenting. The point you have been arguing previously is that Kallis shored up a shaky batting lineup.

What you are presenting now entirely goes against your own case, and pretty much confirms what we have been saying.

Basically, all that you proved is that since Kallis was established in the lineup in 98, he almost always had 2-3 other batsmen in the lineup who were scoring well with him, which is what we have been arguing this whole time.

There was no fragile top and middle order largely in that period. On the flipside, SA had the best batting lineup in the world after Australia.

 

[subshakerz]

Hammond took less than a wicket per game. Kallis almost has 300 at a slightly lower WPM than Sobers and Stokes, and scores 20 runs more than Stokes every innings on average. Even if you call the 292 wickets English test spam, he passes the eye test and his WPM is in no way comparable to Hammond.

I watched Kallis play for the majority of his career. The guy bowled. The guy could bowl really well. He moved it at good pace as a young bloke and was a respectable medium fast with a heavy bumper when he got old. He'd be a total guy if all he did was bowl, but he combined guy bowling with being an ATG batsman. He was special. More than special - he was incredible.

Nobody should doubt Kallis' allrounder credentials or discount his bowling contribution.

Kallis the bowler was taking 2 wickets a test for the first 120 odd tests of his career at around 31/32.

His last 40 tests though he bowled a lot less and took only a wicket a game.

The only caveat is that even at his peak he wasn't bowling more than 22 overs a test, hence his bowling load qualifies him more as a fifth bowler than a fourth bowler. I see Stokes as similar.

 

[peterhrt]

As mentioned previously, Kallis was a batting all-rounder. There is not much point comparing him with bowling all-rounders like Imran.

Test wpm of the batting all-rounders with 100 wickets: Sobers 2.5, Greig, 2.4, Stokes 2.2, Shastri 1.9, Kallis 1.8, Hooper 1.1.

The comparison with Hammond is actually a good one. After he retired there was debate about whether or not Hammond should be considered an all-rounder. His wpm in Tests was 0.98 (83 wickets) and in first-class cricket 1.15 (732 wickets). The conclusion was yes in terms of ability, with a question mark around output.

Hammond was an even more reluctant bowler than Kallis and more or less refused to come on at times. Both in their younger days could bowl fast when the mood took them. Between 1998 and 2004 Kallis opened the bowling in seven Tests and 34 ODIs.

 

[Flem274*]

it's a poor comparison imo. kallis is within 0.7 wpm of sobers, 0.4 of accepted bowler stokes and is 0.82 wpm ahead of hammond. he also apparently opened the bowling in 7 tests and 34 odis in a 6 year period.

kallis is an allrounder. you might as well argue flintoff was a batting allrounder and boje a batsman.

 

[StephenZA]

What's more ridiculous is that he's presented as the best all rounder after Sobers despite very rarely performing with bat and ball against sides not name

No, that is not the point you have been presenting. The point you have been arguing previously is that Kallis shored up a shaky batting lineup.

What you are presenting now entirely goes against your own case, and pretty much confirms what we have been saying.

No it does not, what you are ignoring is that those players had very poor output until Kallis came along. Until the order was stabilised. Why was Cullinan able to start producing good outputs. Because Kallis was at 3. We talk about pressure in tests SA was always 3/4 wickets down early without Kallis. And those batsmen for 5 years did not perform. This changed once Kallis started batting at 3. Before that why did they not perform?

There is a clear difference in team confidence between a batsmen able to produce at 40+ and 50+. Without Kallis those performances are unlikely to occur and that is observed because they did not do it prior. And SA continues on its path of batting mediocrity.

 

[subshakerz]

No it does not, what you are ignoring is that those players had very poor output until Kallis came along. Until the order was stabilised. Why was Cullinan able to start producing good outputs. Because Kallis was at 3. We talk about pressure in tests SA was always 3/4 wickets down early without Kallis. And those batsmen for 5 years did not perform. This changed once Kallis started batting at 3. Before that why did they not perform?

There is a clear difference in team confidence between a batsmen able to produce at 40+ and 50+. Without Kallis those performances are unlikely to occur and that is observed because they did not do it prior. And SA continues on its path of batting mediocrity.

So Kallis gets credit for all the runs scored by the openers Kirsten and Gibbs, the middle order of Cullinan, Cronje and Rhodes, and the lower order of Klusener, who were all scoring runs once he got in 98?

This is called shifting goalposts. Your first point that Kallis shored a shaky batting order was baloney. Now you are suggesting that actually he did bat in an otherwise very solid batting order, but without him it would have been a weak one. Doesn't make sense.

The more logical opinion is that the bats peaked around the same time.

 

[peterhrt]

it's a poor comparison imo. kallis is within 0.7 wpm of sobers, 0.4 of accepted bowler stokes and is 0.82 wpm ahead of hammond. he also apparently opened the bowling in 7 tests and 34 odis in a 6 year period.

kallis is an allrounder. you might as well argue flintoff was a batting allrounder and boje a batsman.

Kallis beats Hammond for bowling output, no question, and yes of course he was an all-rounder.

The similarity is that batting was clearly their stronger suit and they had the talent, if not the inclination, to bowl more. Tom Goddard said the fastest spell of bowling he ever saw during his thirty-year career was by a fired-up Hammond in a county match.

Hammond incidentally opened the bowling 13 times in his 85 Tests.

 

[Godard]

McGrath. I genuinely feel that dominating your disciple to the extent that McGrath, Marshall, Tendulkar(and ofc Bradman) did is even more difficult than being an allrounder who is decent in one disciple and one of the best in the world of his time. That is why I place Tendulkar and Marshall in the same tier with say Imran(who as a bowler is in the all time 7-8 for me and way ahead of Kallis the batsmen). The key example is Sobers ofcourse who mastered his disciple as much as the very very best(top 3 or 4, not merely top 10, and the difference between number 3 and 6 is more than difference between say 6 and 10/11).

 

[Slifer]

That's not a fair way of ranking players because then you end up with Jason Holder being a better cricketer than McGrath too. Kallis as an all rounder isn't Sobers or Imran level and as a batsman he's not Tendulkar or Hobbs either. McGrath is the GOAT pacer for me or at least very close to it.

Someone like Pollock or Imran maybe because both are at least great bowlers. But nobody would consider Jason Holder a great cricketer, let alone a better cricketer than Glenn. Jason is a good bowler and an ok batsman.

 

[subshakerz]

McGrath. I genuinely feel that dominating your disciple to the extent that McGrath, Marshall, Tendulkar(and ofc Bradman) did is even more difficult than being an allrounder who is decent in one disciple and one of the best in the world of his time. That is why I place Tendulkar and Marshall in the same tier with say Imran(who as a bowler is in the all time 7-8 for me and way ahead of Kallis the batsmen). The key example is Sobers ofcourse who mastered his disciple as much as the very very best(top 3 or 4, not merely top 10, and the difference between number 3 and 6 is more than difference between say 6 and 10/11).

Partially agree. The difference between Kallis as a bat and McGrath as a bowler is much more than between Imran and McGrath as bowlers, and the utility of Kallis the bowler is less than Imran the bat.

Sobers, Imran and Hadlee should be genuinely ahead of the pack as overall cricketers.

 

[subshakerz]

Someone like Pollock or Imran maybe because both are at least great bowlers. But nobody would consider Jason Holder a great cricketer, let alone a better cricketer than Glenn. Jason is a good bowler and an ok batsman.

I made this point in a thread about Chris Cairns, that being decent/good in two disciplines doesn't translate to the value of world class specialist, at least in tests, though on this board some are convinced by that.

 

[trundler]

I was going to make an effort post about my contentions but I see some good work has been done in this thread already. I'll say this though, the woe is Kallis narrative is simply a different iteration of Tendulkar being under a lot of #pressure, Ponting never playing in India in his prime and Smith being too tired from scoring runs to score tons in the second innings. Kallis's retirement did leave a gaping prolapse in SA's middle order and he's easily in the top dozen odd batsmen for me despite being relatively slow.

You don't just have a difference of style or selection philosophy or interpretation, you are willfully misrepresenting what actually occurred

Get the **** out of here with this though. Questioning motives when someone has a fundamentally different way of looking at things than you is the coward's copium. This is especially annoying coming from you because you've coupled this with a healthy dose of sanctimony of late to unlock a new level of tiresome. You know damn well that the way I rate all rounders has everything to do with this because I rate blokes like Miller and even Cairns very highly relative to the rest of the forum. Do better.

 

[Godard]

Partially agree. The difference between Kallis as a bat and McGrath as a bowler is much more than between Imran and McGrath as bowlers, and the utility of Kallis the bowler is less than Imran the bat.

Sobers, Imran and Hadlee should be genuinely ahead of the pack as overall cricketers.

Sobers is ahead yes. In Hadlee’s case, sure one of the top 10/11 test cricketers sure, but because while Hadlee is a top three bowler his batting is overrated, and Sachin’s benchmark as a batsmen was Bradman(the only test batsmen ahead of Sachin for me)while the guys(Marshall, McGrath) ahead of Hadlee weren’t as dominating in their disciples to be as unreachable as Bradman. Plus Sachin was a handy part time bowler. Imran and Sachin are touch and go, and tied as the 3rd greatest test cricketers(Bradman and Sobers 1 and 2 respectively).

 

[Godard]

Sobers is ahead yes. In Hadlee’s case, sure one of the top 10/11 test cricketers sure, but because while Hadlee is a top three bowler his batting is overrated, and Sachin’s benchmark as a batsmen was Bradman(the only test batsmen ahead of Sachin for me)while the guys(Marshall, McGrath) ahead of Hadlee weren’t as dominating in their disciples to be as unreachable as Bradman. Plus Sachin was a handy part time bowler. Imran and Sachin are touch and go, and tied as the 3rd greatest test cricketers(Bradman and Sobers 1 and 2 respectively).

Should have specified Imran ahead of Marshall and McGrath overall.

 

[ankitj]

Allrounders are a big up front investment, and players who need to divide their attention between practicing two roles are rarely at the level of specialists. Kallis is one of the greatest batsmen ever and just casually bowls test standard medium quick bowling.

Steve Smith is on record saying that he stopped bowling because it's just too much demand to put in hours of bowling training after hours of batting training. Either Kallis didn't put hours and still casually bowled test standard medium pace for 150+ tests or he did put hours into bowling that someone as hardcore as Smith refused to do. Both cases it speaks volumes for Kallis' ability/grit.

 

[Sunil1z]

If Kallis was a Pakistani, he would have more Test wickets than any Pakistani bowler since his debut .

 

[trundler]

If Kallis was a Pakistani he'd have played 60 fewer tests and averaged 45 with the ball.

 

[Sunil1z]

If Kallis was a Pakistani he'd have played 60 fewer tests and averaged 45 with the ball.

Considering he averaged 83 in Pakistan as a Test bat , he would have been rated 2nd best Test batsman ever even if he had played 60 fewer Test ?

 

[Coronis]

If Kallis was a Pakistani he'd have played 60 fewer tests and averaged 45 with the ball.

If Kallis was a Pakistani they’d have had a winning record against non minnows.