"Marshall didnt have to bowl to the best in his time, that's the point. It is inherently an unfair criteria.
Marshall wasn't a lone warrior and had a substantially shorter career. Let's compare Hadlee post WSC until retirement to Marshall's numbers. He averages 20.11 in that period. That's as long as Marshall's entire career. Hadlee generally outranked Marshall in the ICC rankings when their careers overlapped too.
I don't actually consider Hadlee a better bowler than Marshall. But I do find it strange that people find even raising the question to be borderline sacreligious. Hadlee > Marshall is a very justifiable opinion, for reasons you have raised, plus some others, like the amount of time bowling dry.
Why are we doing this chopping up career stuff again? Why not ignore Marshall's pre wsc stats as well? No. Marshall had better numbers vs the same opponents and Marshall played 81 tests to Ricchards 86.
This
Because it is unfair to judge players by averages when one guy's career is substantially longer than the other's. It's not Hadlee's fault that NZ was a joke cricketing nation when he debuted and thus picked him before he was ready. It fair to chop up careers as long as a chopped up chunk is as long as someone's entire career.
Not when they played together and that's despite Hadlee being disadvantaged in pretty much every meaningful way compared to someone who had the luxury of scoreboard pressure, ATG bowlers to bowl with as well as less pressure to grind through injuries because the team doesn't win unless he bowls them to victory. Hadlee missed far fewer tests in his career through injury than Marshall. All of these things have a big impact on one's average and only someone with a vested interest in saying otherwise would say so.
Eknath Solkar once outbowled, outcaught and outbatted Gary Sobers in a test.
Who do you consider to be a better bowler?
Well ****ing played.
Hadlee tbh. More and more I've come to believe that CW's top 2 pacers aren't really better than the 3-6 but they just had a lot more intangibles going their way. McGrath had to bowl in a much tougher era so I might still have him as #1 but the apparent difference between Hadlee and Marshall is so minute despite Hadlee being disadvantaged on just about every measure except the spiciness of home wickets.
Btw how is Hadlee’s career substantially longer? Marshall played 81 tests to Hadlee’s 86. Oh ok I assume you mean number of years in which case it's 17 vs 13 not a huge difference but ok.
We were comparing Marshall and Murali, and I was pointing out that its a bit unfair to hold Murali's record vs the best team of his era against him because Marshall didnt have to face the best lineup of his time (WI) . Since Hadlee and Imran actually did face the best team of their era and did well, it is fair to use that as a reason to say they were better than Murali. I was not doing a Marshall vs Hadlee comparison.
Marshall's career is effectively 11 years because he was dropped in between. There are almost no ATG pacers with careers as long as 17 years and plenty with ~12 years.
Don't they? He's always rated as the #1 WI bowler. He's never outside the top 3.
You only get a like. You would have got a love if you had said Marshall, cos I thought you preferred him, and we really need people defending players who they don't believe are as good.
What if I told you that I convinced myself mid way through a devil's advocate defence?
What if I told you that a half like/half love button does not exist does not exist on this site?
If Hadlee is your favorite, why is Marshall your best?
There is something called "objectivity" and consistency.
We are allowed to prefer players who are not as good. I love Hadlee for soloing a team from complete dogshit to arguably the 2nd best of the 80s. And everything (other than his personality, which I luckily missed) engenders him to me postively. Love the style of player.
Yeah. Marshall is my goat but can make good cases for Hadlee and McGrath. Hadlee is probably the best cricketer of the three.
For the record I was asking for the objective reasons. For someone who is a fan of Hadlee, there must be tangible reasons as to why you rate Marshall even marginally higher.