Bradman, the greatest sportsperson ever?

[Ruckus]

@bigbambino

I think there's some confusion over language here...

Nascent: "Just coming into existence and beginning to display signs of future potential; not yet fully developed."

That is really the aspect of the meaning I was referring too (I don't mean literally when cricket was devised as a sport). You might disagree that the game wasn't fully developed in Bradman's era, but I firmly believe it wasn't. And also when I was referring to 'professional', I meant in relative terms to the modern era. In Bradman's era, I would agree it wasn't an amateur sport by any means, but at the same time I definitely don't think it approached the level of professionalism of today's game (and why would it? Every single ball sport has undergone major evolution and improvement since the time it was created. It's a natural progression.)

 

[dhillon28]

Yeah, agreed. The he-never-had-to-face-his-own bowlers argument is often raised to mark down Ponting, but very rarely gets applied to Richards. Like you, Viv's one of my all time favourite players and I think his greatness is nailed on, but I am sometimes surprised at the free ride he tends to get in that respect when compared to how often it gets brought up against someone like Punter.

Viv definitely gets a free ride in this respect (probably because most are blown away by his destructive playing style). I made this exact point to Kamran Abbassi (writer for Wisden and Cricinfo) at a conference last November and he completely gunned me down for even thinking it.

 

[Furball]

Well lets just agree to disagree on what the both of us has seen as subjective. Cricket was pro btwn the wars and even earlier. That disagreement can be refereed by the facts.

I don't see how Grace advances your point. If you argue that his pre eminence was due to the game's nascency then you have to remember that he debuted 62 yrs before Bradman or about the same distance of time when DGB retired to now. So if you consider Bradman a contemporary of Clarke you'd have a point...

But cricket was played for a long time before Grace. So its nascency even pre dated him.

Grace was revolutionary as a cricketer. So it could be argued his influence is similar to the one you argued. However his pre eminence did not coincide with the game's nascency and neither was he statistically as dominant as Bradman.

Grace was as dominant as Bradman. I can't remember the numbers off the top of my head but he scored a ridiculous %ge of First Class centuries scored in his day.

fertang will no doubt set me right.

 

[karan316]

The fact that seperates Viv from others is that you will hardly find any batsman in the history of the game whom you would actually back to do well in any given era.
Bradman would probably be a disaster against the modern bowling greats. And its tough to accept that the modern batters would have done well against the like of Lillee, Thommo, Marshall, etc. without the protective gears. And I m picking Viv over the other guys of that era because no one actually dominated the bowlers at that time like he did, Gavaskar did well, but he didn't really dominate and murder the bowling lineups like he did, and it doesn't matter if he didn't face his own bowlers, the way he dominated the hostile Aussie bowlers proves what he was capable of.

 

[the big bambino]

@bigbambino

I think there's some confusion over language here...

Nascent: "Just coming into existence and beginning to display signs of future potential; not yet fully developed."

That is really the aspect of the meaning I was referring too (I don't mean literally when cricket was devised as a sport). You might disagree that the game wasn't fully developed in Bradman's era, but I firmly believe it wasn't. And also when I was referring to 'professional', I meant in relative terms to the modern era. In Bradman's era, I would agree it wasn't an amateur sport by any means, but at the same time I definitely don't think it approached the level of professionalism of today's game (and why would it? Every single ball sport has undergone major evolution and improvement since the time it was created. It's a natural progression.)

Well I think its confusing nascent with simple evolution. Even now cricket will continue to develop like every other sport. But it can't be described as nascent. Point is an athlete dominating a sport will occur at anytime of its development as the many examples of this thread show.

 

[the big bambino]

Grace was as dominant as Bradman. I can't remember the numbers off the top of my head but he scored a ridiculous %ge of First Class centuries scored in his day.

fertang will no doubt set me right.

I had a quick look at 2 players of his era. Shrewsbury and CT Studd. Their batting averages are similar. Even Studd's bowling was competitive. Others like Ferris and Lohmann and a number of others were better bowlers. Fwiw I rate Grace as the game's best player due to his influence on the game's techniques and tactics on top of him being the best of his era.

 

[the big bambino]

The fact that seperates Viv from others is that you will hardly find any batsman in the history of the game whom you would actually back to do well in any given era.
Bradman would probably be a disaster against the modern bowling greats. And its tough to accept that the modern batters would have done well against the like of Lillee, Thommo, Marshall, etc. without the protective gears. And I m picking Viv over the other guys of that era because no one actually dominated the bowlers at that time like he did, Gavaskar did well, but he didn't really dominate and murder the bowling lineups like he did, and it doesn't matter if he didn't face his own bowlers, the way he dominated the hostile Aussie bowlers proves what he was capable of.

I see I see. The game has moved on since Bradman's time but has regressed since Richards time. Is that it? My my but you like to have your cake and eat it don't you?

 

[Ruckus]

Well I think its confusing nascent with simple evolution. Even now cricket will continue to develop like every other sport. But it can't be described as nascent. Point is an athlete dominating a sport will occur at anytime of its development as the many examples of this thread show.

Simple evolution is fine me with, as long as it's implicit that entails improvement and not just change.

 

[the big bambino]

Simple evolution is fine me with, as long as it's implicit that entails improvement and not just change.

True but its unimportant in rating players. The devotion cricket fans have in selecting ATG XIs shows that they implicitly mediate the differences in eras without being conscious of doing so. Otherwise selecting the best XIs would be a simple choice of seeing which XI most recently represented your country. It would be absurd to think cricket hasn't evolved since the decade dominated by the WI. Every other sport has improved too so why not cricket? So if you select Viv in an ATG WI XI you are acknowledging that a player from another era is better than those from the present day, all things being equal. Therefore it is not unreasonable to rate DGB above Richards using the same criteria.

 

[fredfertang]

Grace was as dominant as Bradman. I can't remember the numbers off the top of my head but he scored a ridiculous %ge of First Class centuries scored in his day.

fertang will no doubt set me right.

the stat I always trot out, 'cos it sticks in my mind, is that when he scored his 50th First Class ton the man in second place had 10, and the rest of mankind 109 between them - I think there's also a season when he got several centuries, and no one else got one at all, or something like that, but just having raised my head from penning a piece on Brian Statham, I cba looking it up

 

[Furball]

I'll say this again: in terms of batting average Viv Richards is closer to Chris Martin than he is to Don Bradman.

 

[Furball]

the stat I always trot out, 'cos it sticks in my mind, is that when he scored his 50th First Class ton the man in second place had 10, and the rest of mankind 109 between them - I think there's also a season when he got several centuries, and no one else got one at all, or something like that, but just having raised my head from penning a piece on Brian Statham, I cba looking it up

That's the one.

The second one from memory is that he once scored about 800 runs in a week in May when no-one else scored 1000 for the season. Can't remember exact numbers.

 

[Ruckus]

True but its unimportant in rating players. The devotion cricket fans have in selecting ATG XIs shows that they implicitly mediate the differences in eras without being conscious of doing so. Otherwise selecting the best XIs would be a simple choice of seeing which XI most recently represented your country. It would be absurd to think cricket hasn't evolved since the decade dominated by the WI. Every other sport has improved too so why not cricket? So if you select Viv in an ATG WI XI you are acknowledging that a player from another era is better than those from the present day, all things being equal. Therefore it is not unreasonable to rate DGB above Richards using the same criteria.

Hmm yeah well I don't think there's any legitimacy to ATG XI's at all. Too many things simply aren't equal between eras, so trying to make any meaningful comparisons is pretty futile for me. And back to the thread, the exact same applies to comparing athletes across sports - accept it's even more fraught with difficulty.

 

[Ruckus]

WG's beard was also statistically a lot more impressive than anyone else's at the time

 

[The Sean]

Looking at it, Grace was statistically a bit like Ruth or Gretzky in a sense in that by the end of their careers their numbers - while still ahead of anyone else - had come back to the field a little, thus masking somewhat an almost superhuman dominance over contemporaries during their peak years.

 

[Coronis]

I had a quick look at 2 players of his era. Shrewsbury and CT Studd. Their batting averages are similar. Even Studd's bowling was competitive. Others like Ferris and Lohmann and a number of others were better bowlers. Fwiw I rate Grace as the game's best player due to his influence on the game's techniques and tactics on top of him being the best of his era.

Man was just looking over Grace's stats, he played first class cricket from the ages of 17-60. Amazing.

 

[the big bambino]

Hmm yeah well I don't think there's any legitimacy to ATG XI's at all. Too many things simply aren't equal between eras, so trying to make any meaningful comparisons is pretty futile for me. And back to the thread, the exact same applies to comparing athletes across sports - accept it's even more fraught with difficulty.

Fair enough. I'm not so keen on them either. Others are and they do pick men across all eras meaning that they account for the difference in standards. Which I think is legitimate. The analogy that excuses it in my mind is one where a modern army beats Hannibal without losing a casualty. Yet its Hannibal who'll be remembered as one of history's finest generals. But what would happen if you transported a modern soldier, stripped of his training and weapons, and placed him in the field at Cannae and opposite Hannibal? They'd be mince meat just like rest of them.

When people select ATGs they are equalising all eras. They do so by judging a man's stats in the confines of his own era and then comparing it to another man accruing his stats in a different era and seeing which one is the better player. That is the fairest and only comparison and it clearly establishes Bradman's primacy.

 

[karan316]

The day someone proves that playing against 1 good team(which is a lot inferior to your own team) and 3 minnows in a semi professional era is tougher than playing 8 good teams and 2 minnows in a professional and competitive era, that day I will agree that Bradman was the greatest and better than the current lot of players.

 

[kyear2]

The most hostile bowlers of his era were on his side. So he didn't face them. The decadal ave of his era is not remarkably different to any other era and in some cases higher.

There was still Snow, Willis, Hadlee, Lillee, Thomson, Hogg, Imran, 2 W's, Botham, Procter, Dev, Indian Quartet and Underwood were the players he faced. Yes, for me the Ali of cricket.

btw Bradman also didn't face the best two bolwers of his era in O'Reilly and Grimmett and the only other great bowlers hed faced were Larwood, Verity and then Bedser after the war, and for all of the critism that Murali gets for plundering Murali, Bradman equally benefitted vs the minnows (weak teams) of his day India and South Africa.

To the original question, Bradman is overrated. The best batsman ever, no doubt. But when people start stating that he was twice as good as (an example recently used) Lara, Tendulkar or Viv or would have absolutely destroyed even the quartet of the '80's and give him almost god like status (despite how they ridicule the India's for similar treatmeant for their hero) the yes he is over rated. But so is Warne, and yes even Sobers.

Late for work, will expand later.

 

[fredfertang]

The day someone proves that playing against 1 good team(which is a lot inferior to your own team) and 3 minnows in a semi professional era is tougher than playing 8 good teams and 2 minnows in a professional and competitive era, that day I will agree that Bradman was the greatest and better than the current lot of players.

Which is a perfectly reasonable point to make, but Hammond, Sutcliffe, Nourse, Merchant, and Headley et al didn't average 80+, your point doesn't deal with the fact that Bradman was so much more successful than his peers