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The 'real' Steven Smith question...

Based on this hypothetical, Should Smith be considered the 2nd Greatest Test bat?

  • Total voters
    20
  • Poll closed .
Spark

Spark

Global Moderator
honestbharani said:
Which shows the break he got due to tampering may have ended up helping his record ultimately. That is such a strange way of things working out, lol.
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Yeah as weird as it sounds, it probably was a good thing for his career long term, even if it was egregiously long.
 
Chrish

Chrish

International Debutant
It‘a impossible to determine the greatest sportsman simply because talent pool available to compete at the top varies significantly across the sports. Take current cricket for example; you only have like 4 teams at any given time that play cricket at extremely high level. Compare that to soccer and this number approaches close to dozen. That’s why you won’t see one team keep winning world cups each time because it’s much harder to dominate soccer as compared to cricket.

Conversely, talent pool available to compete at professional swimming and running would be even lower than cricket; you have few entire nations who are crazy about cricket sport; I doubt that’s the case with running/ swimming.

Phelps and Bolt have phenomenal records but it’s silly to assume they are necessarily better sportsman than any cricketer.
 
Shady Slim

Shady Slim

International Coach
the title of this thread really makes it sound like it's going to homophobically insinuate that he's gay or something of that ilk and i can't help but think that when ever i see the title on the side pane
 
Shady Slim

Shady Slim

International Coach
Gnske said:
Classic Spark not capable of critical cross-comparative thinking.
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Why Tom Brady needs 13 rings to be a top 3 athlete of all-time

Tom Brady is already by far, and not even close the greatest NFL player of all-time and is likely maybe or sort of better than Michael Jordan depending on who you ask. He is also the greatest US AMERICAN athlete ever, but he is not the greatest athlete ever or even the greatest North American Ath...
forums.footballsfuture.com forums.footballsfuture.com

Tom Brady is already by far, and not even close the greatest NFL player of all-time and is likely maybe or sort of better than Michael Jordan depending on who you ask. He is also the greatest US AMERICAN athlete ever, but he is not the greatest athlete ever or even the greatest North American Athlete ever. You see there is one more. But Brady needs at least 12 to 13 rings just to get anywhere near him, and imo he needs 15 rings to be unquestionably the greatest.



In my opinion when considering the legacy of hockey players I use a Stanley Cup to equal 3 Super Bowl and NBA rings when judging players all-time since it makes the most logical sense when doing my all-time athlete ratings. So 1 Cup is like 3 rings in the NFL/NBA. 3 is like 9, and 4 is like 12. And I like doing that. It makes the most sense to me.





But even if Brady equals Gretzky and gets his 12th ring, his stats won't be as above other NFL QBs as far as Gretzky is above other players. So if he wants to ACTUALLY equal Gretzky he needs about 15 Super Bowl rings before I even consider him in the same tier, and that is a big if depending on how Brady wins.



8 is he way worse than Gretzky by a country mile.

12 rings he equals Gretzky in terms of winning, but is far behind him in numbers so much that Gretzky is still far beyond Brady



15 rings he might just about equal him, but Gretzky still likely has his number.



So maybe 16 rings is the perfect number for an NFL player to surpass Gretzky, as Canadians have the best athletes on the planet anyways.
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Spark

Spark

Global Moderator
centurymaker

centurymaker

Cricketer Of The Year
Chrish said:
It‘a impossible to determine the greatest sportsman simply because talent pool available to compete at the top varies significantly across the sports. Take current cricket for example; you only have like 4 teams at any given time that play cricket at extremely high level. Compare that to soccer and this number approaches close to dozen. That’s why you won’t see one team keep winning world cups each time because it’s much harder to dominate soccer as compared to cricket.

Conversely, talent pool available to compete at professional swimming and running would be even lower than cricket; you have few entire nations who are crazy about cricket sport; I doubt that’s the case with running/ swimming.

Phelps and Bolt have phenomenal records but it’s silly to assume they are necessarily better sportsman than any cricketer.
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How many kids have participated in a sprint at school growing up? That would be a looooooooooooooot more than number of kids who would have picked up a cricket bat in 1930s 1940s when cricket was almost exclusively played in Aus and Eng. We are not looking at competitive era of cricket, since we are comparing Bradman’s era vs Bolt‘s / Phelps‘ era.


And here is the data for swimming alone, just in the US- 300,000 +


E0782DC7-D9C1-4E6D-A6B9-49BF751F0B57.jpeg
 
Chrish

Chrish

International Debutant
Footballers, tennis players and basketball players above can’t be called greatest players IMO. I mean how can you say Messi is the greatest player ever when he isn’t clearly that much better than Ronaldo? How can you say Federer is GOAT when you got Nadal and Joker? How can you say it’s Jordan when you have Kobe and LeBron?

in order for sportsman to be considered greatest ever across all sports, he has to be at least undisputedly best of his sport, no?
 
Chrish

Chrish

International Debutant
centurymaker said:
How many kids have participated in a sprint at school growing up? That would be a looooooooooooooot more than number of kids who would have picked up a cricket bat in 1930s 1940s when cricket was almost exclusively played in Aus and Eng. We are not looking at competitive era of cricket, since we are comparing Bradman’s era vs Bolt‘s / Phelps‘ era.


And here is the data for swimming alone, just in the US- 300,000 +


View attachment 30224
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Olympic games can’t compete with mainstream sports in terms of popularity. You also have outliers in Heather McKay and Jahangir Khan when it comes to Squash.

You can’t convince me it’s harder to dominate Squash than Cricket.
 
Chrish

Chrish

International Debutant
Rise of Marnus has coincided with Smith’s relative dip. Just a coincidence? May be. Or perhaps he isn’t sure about his changing role as an anchor rather than being the main guy for the team.

Usually though, stronger the number 3, easier it is for No. 4.
 
Spark

Spark

Global Moderator
subshakerz said:
Since his 2019 Ashes epic, Smith averages 38 in 12 tests. His form doesnt seem as bad as Kohli but it is clear he has lost his mojo and I imagine before long his average will enter the 50s range. He doesnt seem sure footed in his shot selection as previously.

stats.espncricinfo.com

All-round records | Test matches | Cricinfo Statsguru | ESPNcricinfo.com

stats.espncricinfo.com stats.espncricinfo.com
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He just doesn't seem as "nailed on" as he used to. I think he's always been liable to getting out early for low scores, but now he seems liable to throwing it away a bit when set; that's quite different. A 1-5 100-to-50 record as opposed to 27-32 overall would definitely indicate that.
 
S

subshakerz

Hall of Fame Member
Chrish said:
Rise of Marnus has coincided with Smith’s relative dip. Just a coincidence? May be. Or perhaps he isn’t sure about his changing role as an anchor rather than being the main guy for the team.

Usually though, stronger the number 3, easier it is for No. 4.
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Yeah technically he should be killing it, scoring easy unbeaten hundreds every second game as the team declares. Its not like the attacks he faced have been great either.
 
Spark

Spark

Global Moderator
subshakerz said:
Yeah technically he should be killing it, scoring easy unbeaten hundreds every second game as the team declares. Its not like the attacks he faced have been great either.
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? Last three attacks he's faced in Tests are arguably the three best pace attacks in the world outside of Aus, which obviously he can't face.
 
CodeOfWisden

CodeOfWisden

U19 Cricketer
Pap Finn Keighl said:
Bradman's average is overrated,

If you check 1920s, 30s and 40s.. Every decade produced 10 or more 50+ avg batsmen.. 5 from Australia and 5 from England.
Compare that to 70s or 80s or 90s
Just 4 or 5 batsmen from 3 or 4 different teams.
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Yeah it's quite surprising that England hasn't produced a 50 averaging batsman since matches started getting recorder.
Looks like all their legends were frauds who played against 115 kph WBBL level pacers.
 
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