Adam Parore

[Days of Grace]

Adam Parore interview on Runner’s Only! Podcast

There’s a very candid recent interview with Adam Parore available on YouTube. He talks about his cricket career in the first 45 minutes, then he shares his experiences climbing Everest in the second half. The last part is him discussing the Tall Poppy Syndrome in New Zealand culture, along with Matthew and Sally Ridge.

One of the best stories is near the beginning of the Podcast when after a fielding for close on 2 days against the West Indies at Wellington (it must have been 1994/95) he went for a run around the bays, listening to the cricket on his headphones. The top order collapsed and he was next in but 3km from the basin!

What was particularly interesting was that he admitted that he was outmatched by the great players of his era so he developed this aggressive, arrogant persona to compete.

If anyone else has watched the interview I’d like to know your thoughts on it.

Secondly, how would you rate Parore as a cricketer and a wicketkeeper?

 

[Flem274*]

Interesting, thanks for sharing.

I read his book in high school. He was pretty self absorbed at the time of writing imo.

World class gloveman and underachieved a bit with the bat. Spent a lot of his book complaining about how boring batting is.

His persona wasn't exactly alone in that side. Either Taylor or McCullum mentioned the Fleming era players used to behave like dicks because that's what other successful teams did. Bit of a cop out explanation imo, those 90s and 00s guys were never shrinking violets even as young men. Parore, Cairns, Nash is a lot of ego to put in one room. Nash has mellowed heaps tbh.

 

[slippy888]

Guy was underrated i think.

 

[TheJediBrah]

What was particularly interesting was that he admitted that he was outmatched by the great players of his era so he developed this aggressive, arrogant persona to compete.

This perfectly describes me posting on cricket chat

 

[James]

Thanks for sharing - will give it a listen

 

[Zinzan]

Secondly, how would you rate Parore as a cricketer and a wicketkeeper.

Technically a superb keeper. He and Smithy are still our best glovemen imo. Bmac could be more spectacular with the odd catch, and Watling trained hard to develop that skill, but Parore and Smith were the best technicians and can hardly recall either shelling a chance.

Has to go down as an underachiever with the bat though, averaging just 27 in tests remembering there was a time in the mid 90s, he batted no.3 in ODIs and looked one of our best, and you only have to watch his 100 in Perth in partnership with Astle against McGrath, Lee, Gillespie & Warne to see how good a bat he could be on his day.

 

[Zinzan]

And while we're there, who can forget the 12th Man's rendition of Dean Martin's classic, 'That's Amore'....

" When some big Kiwi prick, gets a 4 from a snick, that's Parore "

 

[mr_mister]

Surprised he found batting boring. Considered the most fun part of cricket by nearly everyone who plays it. What was his reasoning?

 

[Days of Grace]

Surprised he found batting boring. Considered the most fun part of cricket by nearly everyone who plays it. What was his reasoning?

I think he was just so into the technical side of keeping. He said that one of his ultimate goals was to get a "clean sheet", which means no blemishes at all with the gloves during a whole day in the field, which he achieved only 2 or 3 times.

 

[slippy888]

Was he ever interested in baseball

 

[SteveNZ]

Tall poppy syndrome can often be an excuse sportspeople/big names come up with to justify why people think they're a prick. In Parore's case, that would fit well.

Big ego, not a positive influence in the environments, couldn't be arsed playing domestic cricket, more interested in being in Woman's Weekly or being a celebrity. Wasted the talent that could've made him the best wicketkeeper-batsman in the word. In an era where egos in our team were rife and divisive, his was the worst. I think it was in his book that he said he felt he had to live up to the nickname 'Maverick' that Martin Crowe and others gave him as a youngster. A lot to do with the fact he once borrowed Sir Richard Hadlee's sign-written car in England, crashed it into a ditch, then left it there and didn't tell anyone.

Had the pleasure of playing against him in club cricket once, ahead of the 2002 England Test series when Auckland refused to pick him and the selectors made him get match practice. He turned up after the start of play in his red Porsche with Sally Ridge in tow, kept for some of the day but left his brother to do a lot of it while he shot off with Sally for a while, was dead plumb first ball but the umpire didn't have the stones, then was out lbw for 30 and let everyone around him know this was beneath him and he'd never do it again. Hell of a role model for the young guys playing.

 

[SteveNZ]

I think he was just so into the technical side of keeping. He said that one of his ultimate goals was to get a "clean sheet", which means no blemishes at all with the gloves during a whole day in the field, which he achieved only 2 or 3 times.

To be fair, in the latter part of his career from 1999-2002 under Rixon, he was the best gloveman in the world. Especially standing up. And he was a world class player of spin, probably one of the best non-Indian players of Shane Warne that I can think of.

 

[RossTaylorsBox]

Yeah if I recall he was one of the best sweepers of the ball.

 

[jcas0167]

Adam Parore interview on Runner’s Only! Podcast

There’s a very candid recent interview with Adam Parore available on YouTube. He talks about his cricket career in the first 45 minutes, then he shares his experiences climbing Everest in the second half. The last part is him discussing the Tall Poppy Syndrome in New Zealand culture, along with Matthew and Sally Ridge.

One of the best stories is near the beginning of the Podcast when after a fielding for close on 2 days against the West Indies at Wellington (it must have been 1994/95) he went for a run around the bays, listening to the cricket on his headphones. The top order collapsed and he was next in but 3km from the basin!

What was particularly interesting was that he admitted that he was outmatched by the great players of his era so he developed this aggressive, arrogant persona to compete.

If anyone else has watched the interview I’d like to know your thoughts on it.

Secondly, how would you rate Parore as a cricketer and a wicketkeeper?

Thanks, will check out the interview. Apparently when Steve Rixon took over he said "Parore is the best batsman in the team, the best wicket keeper in the team, does he bowl?"

I think under Rixon his keeping became as good as anyone in the world, although his batting tailed off. In his book Parore says how he remodeled his keeping technique so instead of taking the ball in front of his body he would pivot and take it inside or outside the line of the ball (I think this is basically the Australian approach). Another thing was moving backwards with the ball to deliveries from the spinners close to the stumps. The inside foot is left anchored but by moving back it gave him more time to catch the ball if it deviates. It took him 12-18 months to adjust but his keeping to spin improved massively.

I remember seeing him around Akl law school a bit. He was rumored to park in the staff carpark.

Yeah if I recall he was one of the best sweepers of the ball.

Yeah, he played for a NZ XI against India when he was 19 and Mohammed Azharuddin showed him how to play spin in the nets. I've got Martin Crowe's batting DVD and for the sweep he shows footage of Parore playing it.

 

[Zinzan]

Adam Parore interview on Runner’s Only! Podcast

Cheers mate, just listened to most of it over a long evening run. Decent listen, quite a grounded dude now & definitely some concessions about his arrogance when he was younger which he says was driven by his insecurities.
Just a shame the interviewer clearly didn't know much about cricket so didn't ask the in-depth questions some of us would've, but worth a listen nonetheless.

 

[SteveNZ]

Cheers mate, just listened to most of it over a long evening run. Decent listen, quite a grounded dude now & definitely some concessions about his arrogance when he was younger which he says was driven by his insecurities.
Just a shame the interviewer clearly didn't know much about cricket so didn't ask the in-depth questions some of us would've, but worth a listen nonetheless.

Runner's World is so frustrating. Dom Harvey seems like a really good guy, and he gets some insanely good interviews. But he talks over people, doesn't seem to listen and is moreso looking for his opportunity to talk, and doesn't seemingly do a lot of homework like the great podcast hosts do. I had to turn the Ryan Fox one off, which sucks as I love the guy.

 

[Flem274*]

Didn't Harvey quietly leave morning radio just before some nasty reveals?

 

[thierry henry]

Acquaintance of mine got into some sort of business deal with Parore a year or two ago. He brought it up with me half-jokingly for "advice" because he knew I was a cricket guy, and I basically told him that Parore was well known to be a dickhead but of course I didn't actually know him personally. Some time later he confirmed that Parore had totally shafted him on whatever the deal was and was an arrogant prick.

 

[The Hutt Rec]

Didn't Harvey quietly leave morning radio just before some nasty reveals?

He left quite hastily just before or after that big investigation about the toxic mediaworks environment/***ual harassment info all came out.

If you were checking Reddit at the time there were some pretty harrowing first person accounts of his behaviour.

 

[The Hutt Rec]

As for Parore, my only interaction with him was when I was a kid, him and the NZ team were out watching on the balcony at the Basin, and we yelled out to him could we chuck him up a mini bat to get the team sign. To his credit he seemed keen, but asked someone and they said he wasn’t allowed lol