Are modern greats simply better?

[ataraxia]

Always adjust for the fact that if the pool of competitive cricketers in the period from 1920-25 was 100, then in 1950-55 it could be 1,000, and in 1980-85 2,500. Obviously, it's more impressive to be in the top 10 or 20 in the latter eras than top 3 in the former.

#Maths

I mean this is actually a salient point worth discussing – and in general I think we do take it into account though perhaps not as much as we should (and I would be one guilty of that too); tally up inter-war greats and 70s/80s greats and compare – but those are dumbly exagerrated numbers.

 

[Slifer]

This is regarding greats in the modern period, basically mid-70s onwards, and how they compare with the pre-modern post War era. Was there an added competitive spirit and professionalism brought by the Aussies and the Packer revolution that took the quality of cricket in this era beyond the skill level of what was before? How should we compare their records and achievements then?

Good question....

 

[Blenkinsop]

When comparing present to past greats, should we adjust for the difference in coaching and fitness regimes? Standards of outfielding are higher today, but you'd think that players of Bradman's generation would have been just as able to reach those standards had they had today's coaching and training. Likewise there's a much bigger emphasis on fitness and physical conditioning today, which presumably has a positive effect on performance.

 

[peterhrt]

The total talent pool of another big cricket playing nation in England right now compared to Hobbs-Bradman era would be total insult. There would be at least 8-10x more cricket players in England in Hobbs-Bradman era to now.

Yeah,Talent pool!

Around 350,000 adult men are thought to play cricket in England currently. That's about 1.5% of the available population. Football is up to ten times higher.

During the early years of the twentieth century participation in cricket and football was comparable. With virtually no overlap of seasons many folk played both. Every village had a team but standards at that level were low. With little money for ground preparation a team total of 50 would be enough to win most matches and there was often time for two innings a side. This continued until the 1950s.

The bigger clubs of the south were managed by the strictly amateur Club Cricket Conference which forbade them from joining leagues or engaging professional coaches. It was different in the north where there was professionalism but fewer matches.

Participation has fallen while average standards have risen. Between fifty and sixty batsmen are known to have scored 100 centuries in English club cricket. Half of them are still alive.

 

[Coronis]

Athletically etc. there is no doubt the overall level has increased.

I’m of the opinion you can’t just dump a player into another era and expect them to perform - and of the opinion that great players will be able to adapt. It works both ways with putting modern players in a past era and past players in the modern era. Would Tendulkar automatically be successful if he was transported back in time to when sticky wickets were commonplace and bats were tiny?

 

[_00_deathscar]

Would Tendulkar automatically be successful if he was transported back in time to when sticky wickets were commonplace and bats were tiny?

I mean he’d probably be the one you pick to give you the best chance of a modern player doing that really - that’s part of what makes him so good.

I do think the average has risen up considerably - the ATGs will still be ATGs but a lot of the really early ATGs may have had inflated averages (on both sides), because they played relatively fewer tests and because the averagr was so low — it would be like putting peak Sachin Tendulkar into top level school cricket. You may have the odd guy there that looks somewhat his standard, but he would stand out so much.

 

[Prince EWS]

I think the answer to the title in any sort of objective sense is: almost certainly.

The idea that after a century of refinement, innovation, trial and error, spread to new countries, greater professionalism etc that the standard wouldn't be higher is basically nuts IMO. Even more basic sports that would intuitively have less room to improve through those factors like athletics and swimming keep having world records broken every generation.

My real answer is that I just don't really care, though. Hobbs absolutely shouldn't have been trying to develop his game in such a way as to do better against theoretical future bowlers he'd never face in conditions he'd never see at the expense of helping his real-life team - not even Chanderpaul or Pietersen disappeared that far up their own arseholes when they played.

If we're going to do cross-era comparisons I do think we have to do so under the (probably false) assumptions that all eras are equal and that we're comparing players against the mean standard of their era and not in some sort of objective time travel sense... firstly because there's just too much guessing otherwise, secondly because that'd be way too far removed from the reality of what these players were trying to do, and thirdly because that'd just be really boring and lame.

 

[ParwazHaiJunoon]

How are bats with their T20 techniques better in test cricket now than in the 70s?

How are 70s bats with their tuk-tuk techniques better in test cricket than modern batters? In a match b/w a decent 70s team & current Eng team, 70s team would tuk-tuk its way to 400 while Eng would hack its way to 400.

We have seen how badly Cummins (70s era accurate line & length pacer) was treated in Ashes. Scoops, ramps & reverse-scoops etc messed up his 4th stump line bowling style. Starc (a modern day pacer) outperformed him.

Instead of saying modern cricketers are better than 70s cricketers, it would be better if we say skillset required is changed. Hitting is being preferred over defence & having bowling variations with accuracy is being preferred over channel bowling.
70s cricketers would struggle in current era & vice versa.

 

[subshakerz]

Guys, there are some excellent, thoughtful responses here. Thanks.

 

[Starfighter]

Betteridge's Law comes to mind.

 

[OverratedSanity]

secondly because that'd be way too far removed from the reality of what these players were trying to do

I think this is the most important point when it comes to any sort of cross era comparisons in any sport. Players should be judged on how they honed their game to succeed in their own era, not an imaginary one that might happen in 50 years. Makes a lot of the conversations around "What would X player have done in another era" pretty frustrating.

 

[Shady Slim]

Athletically etc. there is no doubt the overall level has increased.

I’m of the opinion you can’t just dump a player into another era and expect them to perform - and of the opinion that great players will be able to adapt. It works both ways with putting modern players in a past era and past players in the modern era. Would Tendulkar automatically be successful if he was transported back in time to when sticky wickets were commonplace and bats were tiny?

this is the objectively correct take for reasons that should be obvious to anyone who's developed beyond the age of object permanence being a new concept, largely for the reasons pews touches on in his first paragraph.

it's unfair to apples to apples compare guys who smoked and drunk the house down to guys with the advantages of modern sports science and recovery etc unless you're doing comparison relative to era or extending to older era guys an assumption that they'd have all the same advantages (which really is just doing the first thing, but with the current era as a baseline)

 

[Flem274*]

I think this is the most important point when it comes to any sort of cross era comparisons in any sport. Players should be judged on how they honed their game to succeed in their own era, not an imaginary one that might happen in 50 years. Makes a lot of the conversations around "What would X player have done in another era" pretty frustrating.

Yeah this. Players even adjust their game to fill specific niches in their team that might not be there in other contemporary sides. Cosplaying as a cricketer from the future is irrelevant to them and their team.

 

[NotMcKenzie]

How are 70s bats with their tuk-tuk techniques better in test cricket than modern batters? In a match b/w a decent 70s team & current Eng team, 70s team would tuk-tuk its way to 400 while Eng would hack its way to 400.

We have seen how badly Cummins (70s era accurate line & length pacer) was treated in Ashes. Scoops, ramps & reverse-scoops etc messed up his 4th stump line bowling style. Starc (a modern day pacer) outperformed him.

Having watched plenty of 70s cricket, your comparison with Cummins is inaccurate at least as far as Australian bowlers go: Cummins is a bang-it-in short-of-a-length type bowler with relatively little variation and usually no swing, while bowlers back then were more likely to vary their length and bowl for swing and cut. Not that there wasn't considerable variation: you had your Hendricks who did bowl short-of-a-length, and your Greigs and Massies who bowled swing at a slower pace. Despite being tall, Roberts or Holding did not bowl like McGrath.
Regarding the Ashes, in the 3rd and 4th tests especially, it was apparent that the England bowlers were actually much more controlled and able to keep the ball outside off, whereas we kept directing deliveries at the pads. Our bowling was more all-over-the-place from the start.

 

[Daemon]

We have seen how badly Cummins (70s era accurate line & length pacer) was treated in Ashes. Scoops, ramps & reverse-scoops etc messed up his 4th stump line bowling style. Starc (a modern day pacer) outperformed him.

If you’re backing Cummins to be worse than Starc against bazball all the time you’re deluded

 

[subshakerz]

I suppose the question I can ask, would it be easier or more difficult for an ATG to dominate in the pre-modern era as opposed to the modern one?

Or are we assuming it is as hard to become and stay a great in every era for the sake of easier comparison?

 

[sledger]

Comparing players from one era to another is a fruitless and pointless exercise for mine. A much better test for measuring a player's quality and lasting impact is not some meaningless speculative analysis re: whether they are/were better than a player from another era, but to consider how much better they were than their peers at the time they were playing.

 

[Coronis]

Comparing players from one era to another is a fruitless and pointless exercise for mine. A much better test for measuring a player's quality and lasting impact is not some meaningless speculative analysis re: whether they are/were better than a player from another era, but to consider how much better they were than their peers at the time they were playing.

Yeah this is always the case for me when it comes to comparing greats from any sport, not just cricket. There’s just a ridiculous number of changes to the sports and assumptions you’re making which have little to no basis in facts that its pointless.

Each player only played when they played against who they could play and within the rules of that time.

 

[subshakerz]

Comparing players from one era to another is a fruitless and pointless exercise for mine. A much better test for measuring a player's quality and lasting impact is not some meaningless speculative analysis re: whether they are/were better than a player from another era, but to consider how much better they were than their peers at the time they were playing.

Yeah but what if it was much easier to be ahead of your peers in one era compared to the other.

 

[sledger]

Yeah but what if it was much easier to be ahead of your peers in one era compared to the other.

Then clearly these players must be chastised for only beating the opposition put in front of them at the time, instead of beating other players from decades in the future who were yet to be born.