Everyone gets out cheaply early. Bradman reckoned this was unavoidable and bats needed to cash in more when set. Bradman is out for less than 20 in 22/80 innings. His average is so high because he scored 118 runs per innings in the remainder. He almost never gets opportunities to go big, and his early failures represent a much higher proportion of his time at the crease. If he doesn't strike farm, and gets his usual rate of sub 20 scores, he may never get an opportunity to hit his career average, even if he is never dismissed in another game (which is obviously ridiculous).
Strike farming drops this impact a bit, but doesn't eliminate it. And adds in issues of turning down runs, taking risks to make runs and difficultly scoring runs into different fields
Strike farming drops this impact a bit, but doesn't eliminate it. And adds in issues of turning down runs, taking risks to make runs and difficultly scoring runs into different fields