If Bradman played in today's era?

[pasag]

Originally Posted by Goughy

Bradman was supposedly weakest in 2 areas. a) Intimidating bowling and b) Playing on bad wickets and stickys

Now with modern protective equipment and covered wickets his 2 main areas for criticisms no longer exist and are now irrelevant.

Add in new bat technology and his style of playing most balls and he would be near unstopable.

Nice points, never thought of it like that before.

[Smudge]

Bradman would have been amazing if he was playing test cricket today. That is, until he got worked over by Iain O'Brien.

[bagapath]

had he made his debut post 2001, with a helmet and field restrictions on leg side, and shorter boundaries and lighter bats, and on covered wickets, bradman would still be batting in his first innings

[silentstriker]

Originally Posted by Goughy

Bradman was supposedly weakest in 2 areas. a) Intimidating bowling and b) Playing on bad wickets and stickys

Now with modern protective equipment and covered wickets his 2 main areas for criticisms no longer exist and are now irrelevant.

Add in new bat technology and his style of playing most balls and he would be near unstopable.

AWTA

[weldone]

Originally Posted by bagapath

had he made his debut post 2001, with a helmet and field restrictions on leg side, and shorter boundaries and lighter bats, and on covered wickets, bradman would still be batting in his first innings

Would have been unable to hold the average record then....until he gets out at least once ...

[vic_orthdox]

As I've brought up a couple of times, its his mental skills that must've been so far ahead of anyone else. I could play against U/16s for the rest of my cricketing career, and I wouldn't average 100, and consistently make those scores, because I'd allow myself to get overconfident, or make a stupid mistake. Bradman didn't let himself do that against the best players in the world at that time. Hence he made such enormous scores.

[Ikki]

Originally Posted by vic_orthdox

As I've brought up a couple of times, its his mental skills that must've been so far ahead of anyone else. I could play against U/16s for the rest of my cricketing career, and I wouldn't average 100, and consistently make those scores, because I'd allow myself to get overconfident, or make a stupid mistake. Bradman didn't let himself do that against the best players in the world at that time. Hence he made such enormous scores.

Yeah, great post.

[weldone]

Originally Posted by vic_orthdox

As I've brought up a couple of times, its his mental skills that must've been so far ahead of anyone else. I could play against U/16s for the rest of my cricketing career, and I wouldn't average 100, and consistently make those scores, because I'd allow myself to get overconfident, or make a stupid mistake. Bradman didn't let himself do that against the best players in the world at that time. Hence he made such enormous scores.

Have to agree...That was probably his biggest strength...As once he commented that he has seen many awesome batsmen in his lifetime throwing away their wickets in such a manner which he never would've done...

[andruid]

Originally Posted by Goughy

Bradman was supposedly weakest in 2 areas. a) Intimidating bowling and b) Playing on bad wickets and stickys

Now with modern protective equipment and covered wickets his 2 main areas for criticisms no longer exist and are now irrelevant.

Add in new bat technology and his style of playing most balls and he would be near unstopable.

However given his legendary preference for scoring majority of his runs of ground strokes and the subsequent gulf in the quality in ground fielding between then and now I suspect his scoring rate would drop significantly

[silentstriker]

Originally Posted by andruid

However given his legendary preference for scoring majority of his runs of ground strokes and the subsequent gulf in the quality in ground fielding between then and now I suspect his scoring rate would drop significantly

But with better bats and other equipment, the effect of improved ground fielding is neutralized, and in fact, gone a lot the other way considering the averages these days.

[Goughy]

Originally Posted by andruid

However given his legendary preference for scoring majority of his runs of ground strokes and the subsequent gulf in the quality in ground fielding between then and now I suspect his scoring rate would drop significantly

Ground fielding makes no difference when finding the gaps. A few runs come from misfields etc but its only a tiny proportion

[Richard]

Originally Posted by vic_orthdox

As I've brought up a couple of times, its his mental skills that must've been so far ahead of anyone else. I could play against U/16s for the rest of my cricketing career, and I wouldn't average 100, and consistently make those scores, because I'd allow myself to get overconfident, or make a stupid mistake. Bradman didn't let himself do that against the best players in the world at that time. Hence he made such enormous scores.

Basically, exactly as I said...

Originally Posted by Richard

What made Bradman special was not an "attitude ahead of his time" as some seem to think, but a skill that no batsman - with the possible exception of WG Grace, but IMO we can't totally compare those two - has ever possessed before or since. David Boon once said (probably not an exact estimate, but you get the drift) that he reckoned bowlers got him out 1 out of 10 dismissals, and himself the other 9. Now of course, there are times when both come into play simualtaneously (ie: getting yourself out would be hitting a nothing ball to mid-wicket; the bowler and yourself getting you out would be chasing a full away-swinger outside off and edging to slip; and the bowler getting you out would be a straight ball which had to be played, was attempted to be defended, that swung away onto the edge and was taken by the wicketkeeper). But what made Bradman special was that this happened with an enormously lesser ratio than anyone else. Where most batsmen played a bad shot, say, every 30 balls on average, Bradman played one maybe every 130. But a realistically unplayable legcutter to him was no different to one to any other batsman.

[DaRick]

It is, as has been pointed out, ridiculous to assess a player whose career ended nearly 60 years ago. There are a whole lot of variables within the game of cricket which have been altered since those seemingly idyllic, almost romantic days. If Donald Bradman played today, this is what I think will be in his favour:

- No sticky wickets
- Flatter pitches
- Better bats
- Smaller boundaries
- Better protective gear (and no Bodyline, to boot)

...plus the fact that he was still dominating net bowlers as a 68-year old.

This is what I think will go against him:

- Timeless Tests (I'm almost certain that they featured in his era; I'm not sure whether he ever had the opportunity to play one)
- Better ground fielding
- Greater professionalism of bowlers (leading to a greater amount of desperation, as a lucrative career is on the line)
- More media pressure (I don't know how he'd react if the media - and by extension, people who read various media - wrote him off after a few relative failures because of his exceedingly high standards)
- More substantial video analysis (allows bowlers to probe for technical flaws, although his supreme discipline would reduce the effect of this - see Justin Langer)

He would probably cope just as well as he did back in the 1930's, but it is impossible to say for sure, so I'm wimping out on this one.

[Richard]

Exactly half of Bradman's 52 Tests were timeless games, apparently. UIMM, all pre-WWII international games in Australia were timeless (Sean to confirm). However, by the sounds of things, his scoring-rates tended to be sufficiently quick that time limits would not be an impediment.

As regards video-evidence - this can help batsmen as much as bowlers. Sachin Tendulkar, for example, has always found ways to spot weaknesses in his own game, usually before anyone else has. I'm more than confident Bradman could use video-evidence to his advantage, if anyone were to be able to use it to theirs against him.

[DaRick]

Originally Posted by Richard

Exactly half of Bradman's 52 Tests were timeless games, apparently. UIMM, all pre-WWII international games in Australia were timeless (Sean to confirm). However, by the sounds of things, his scoring-rates tended to be sufficiently quick that time limits would not be an impediment.

As regards video-evidence - this can help batsmen as much as bowlers. Sachin Tendulkar, for example, has always found ways to spot weaknesses in his own game, usually before anyone else has. I'm more than confident Bradman could use video-evidence to his advantage, if anyone were to be able to use it to theirs against him.

Fair points. However, Timeless Tests would also wear bowlers and fielders down (more psychologically than anything else), which would probably make Bradman's task of scoring runs a touch easier, for mine.