Basic questions

[weldone]

This one was quite good. At least those Americans were genuine in their effort to understand and appreciate cricket.
» So, Cricket? Maybe?

 

[marc71178]

I suppose that will suffice but I have two concerns.
1. Stalling the game to force a draw when you are way behind does not come across as sporting and honorable. Presumably you play to win the game and you accept draws and losses if you have to while trying to win, but it seems an awful lot like soccer to just go out there, stall, and accept a draw ("Kissing your sister") when you have been outplayed and outscored.

Pretty sure that's not a draw...

 

[Victor Ian]

OK. You want what makes cricket different. In cricket the day ends, you talk about all the stuff that happened and then what might still happen. You check updated stats and play around with how much a player needs to reach a new milestone. Then you go to sleep. If you wake up you read news articles or you might leave that for your morning coffee. Then you wake up and it's day two.
During a game you might have a BBQ, you might go to the beach. You'll most likely do shopping. You'll meet your mates at the bar. You might even go to the game live. You'll watch it on TV, at times, the radio at other times or follow it on the internet when out and about. You'll even play the game yourself in the backyard or the beach. And still the game goes on.

Cricket is slowly digested. Baseball doesn't have a thing on test cricket.

 

[Daemon]

Harsh on baseball. Both very different yet great sports.

 

[weldone]

This one was quite good. At least those Americans were genuine in their effort to understand and appreciate cricket.
» So, Cricket? Maybe?

The that article "The batters, it occurs to Mike, are basically all Ichiro — because they stand in the center of a circular playing field, bat control is of the essence. It can be just as valuable to barely flick the ball as it rushes toward you, sending it almost directly backwards, as it would be to swing as hard as you can and try to power it to your pull side or back up the middle. The batsmen have the same few tenths of a second to decide what to do as baseball players, but the range of things they have to be able to do is much greater. It’s kind of inspiring to watch it done well."

 

[Victor Ian]

Harsh on baseball. Both very different yet great sports.

Harsh? I was just highlighting that baseball, like practically every other sport is, is unlike test cricket which is an event that allows you to live normal life while it goes on. Baseball is a great sport in it's own way. The similarity ends at hold stick - hit ball. Trying to compare is like saying AFL is like soccer because they both kick a ball.

 

[Victor Ian]

I am really enjoying that article. This line cracked me up

Another of the Pakistani fielders, Mohammad Hafeez, has zinc oxide all over his entire face, like he’s in whiteface. We are offended.

 

[weldone]

Yes that article is really funny and well-written.

 

[rodk]

The that article "The batters, it occurs to Mike, are basically all Ichiro ... The batsmen have the same few tenths of a second to decide what to do as baseball players, but the range of things they have to be able to do is much greater. It’s kind of inspiring to watch it done well."

I would disagree in part. Yes, cricket hitters can do more but that is because the sport is different and it invites them to do more.

The bat is much bigger with a relatively huge flat sweet spot; the bowlers are much more limited than pitchers in their ability to deceive because they can't conceal the ball while delivering it, they are much further away when they release it offering batsman more time at the same velocity; they must tell batsmen what speed is coming at them, and they have tighter restrictions on where they are allowed to deliver it (not above the waist or wide as that creates penalties). Also, batsmen get to stand where they choose, forcing the bowlers' hands with respect to accessing the stumps. And batsmen get to defend without necessarily producing (or wanting to produce) any offense.

Baseball hitters have restrictions as to where they can be, and because baseball is played on a heavily defended quadrant (rather than a relatively sparsely defended oval with lots of fielders under restrictions as to where they can begin a play under rules implemented to boost scores) hitters always have to change the momentum of the delivery and hope it finds a spot between fielders who have set themselves after thorough research of the hitter's tendencies. In most situations, they are required to produce offensively by hitting the ball into an open spot rather than simply stand in and exhaust the other side. The physics of doing all that are very limiting on the necessary skill set.

I will concede that there are certain options bowlers have that pitchers do not, namely the opportunity to consistently weaponize a ball thrown at 50 mph or less by getting it to break sharply off the pitch. The physics of full toss are not as kind; slow pitches typically do not break. Slow is typically a weapon when it is used specifically as a decoy to fast, not on its own merit. (There are exceptions.)

The upshot is that given the advantages pitchers have as opposed to bowlers when facing hitters, baseball offers very, very little opportunity for shotmaking, the centerpiece of cricket, and that's why you don't see it.

For those who don't know, Ichiro is a retired MLB player from Japan who was very successful incorporating a limited number of shotmaking skills into his game. But his ability to do that was enhanced because he was very, very fast afoot in his heyday -- a skill that doesn't seem to have a lot of significance in cricket -- and he could get hits from the types of batted balls that most others could not. What worked for him would not work for other players with other talents or limitations.

FWIW, women's softball also incorporates shotmaking techniques that might look common in cricket. Softball pitching is very consistently 60-65 mph. Pitchers can't snap their elbows in underhand deliveries that offer very little deception, and the ball is very large and luminescent green. All that allows many hitters (batswomen?) to step forward in or move across the hitting zone as the pitch comes in, and time their swings so as to slap the ball this way or that as their female cricket counterparts might. Part of the explanation lies in the fact the bases are much closer to each other than in baseball, and because women defenders can not throw the ball very quickly or very far, complicating the task of getting certain kinds of outs on batted balls.

 

[srbhkshk]

The bat is much bigger with a relatively huge flat sweet spot; the bowlers are much more limited than pitchers in their ability to deceive because they can't conceal the ball while delivering it, they are much further away when they release it offering batsman more time at the same velocity; they must tell batsmen what speed is coming at them, and they have tighter restrictions on where they are allowed to deliver it (not above the waist or wide as that creates penalties). Also, batsmen get to stand where they choose, forcing the bowlers' hands with respect to accessing the stumps. Baseball hitters have restrictions as to where they can be, and because baseball is played on a heavily defended quadrant (rather than a relatively sparsely defended oval with lots of fielders under restrictions as to where they can begin a play under rules implemented to boost scores) hitters always have to change the momentum of the delivery and hope it finds a spot between fielders who have set themselves after thorough research of the hitter's tendencies. The physics of doing all that are very limiting on the necessary skill set.

lol

 

[weldone]

Isn't repeatedly hurling personal insults to the point some OP's might feel harassed pretty much the definition of being a troll? Not that I mind, but generally speaking "that isn't cricket" on most forums.

I'm being very pedantic, but no.

Coming to a cricket forum to discuss baseball only is trolling. Shall I come to your favorite baseball forum and discuss Bollywood?

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Ichiros

 

[marc71178]

TIL 58 is much larger than 60.5.

 

[rodk]

Coming to a cricket forum to discuss baseball only is trolling. Shall I come to your favorite baseball forum and discuss Bollywood?

Baseball-fever.com. There are actually 100 posts there mentioning cricket. Some from me.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

The replays clearly show that the ball hit the outer edge of the chalk. There is nothing you can do. Then he strikes out (on a terrible call from Angel Hernandez — again, nothing you can do) and the Mets go to the World Series instead.

This was funny because I know who Angel Hernandez and his notoriety.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

More gems:

12:56
Whiteface guy is now bowling. A Pakistani fielder boots a batted ball and turns what would’ve been two runs into four. Afridi throws up his arms in disgust. Seriously, Afridi, don’t ever play American sports. Your teammates would reward this behavior by filling a tube sock with oranges and beating you senseless.

So many Tendulkar line drives dropped by various fielders...

Afridi just tore out his own tongue and slapped the fielder across the face with it. He quite literally cannot believe how many times they have let Tendulkar off the hook. Neither can Tendulkar, by the way — he looks like a politician who got caught in a *** scandal at the exact moment SEAL Team 6 was dropping into bin Laden’s compound.

On the floor,

A nice shot of four Indian dudes in bright orange wigs, wearing matching orange T-shirts. Good to know that idiot fandom also transcends international borders.

 

[andmark]

Baseball-fever.com. There are actually 100 posts there mentioning cricket. Some from me.

In fairness to this site, there's a baseball thread with just over 1000 posts (and I've been interested in that sport- as well as the NFL and other American sports- without posting about it) and so I expect there's a large community on here who wouldn't begrudge your interest in America's pastime.

 

[weldone]

^As long as he discusses that outside the 'cricket-chat' subforum

 

[trundler]

Let's invade a baseball forum

 

[rodk]

I saw these puzzlers in a women's big bash t20 yesterday. Could someone have made a mistake, or are there different rules, or do I just not get it?

On about the third ball of an over during the first innings, the batter was out on a catch. After the new batter came in, the game resumed with the partner batting. The new batter didn't get her turn to swing until after a single on the second bowl after she came onto the field. Was that handled right? Later on in the same game, after another catch, the replacement batter immediately had her turn to swing. Nobody had any objections to either event. Is it possible that the rules are different at different points in a women's big bash game?

At a later point in that same game, a batter had a dot ball that was the end an over, and after the bowling changeover, she was still the batter. I didn't understand that either.

Last, who is the batter after a run out? The striker was run out at the batting end trying to stretch a single into a double during the 20th over. I would have thought that the game would resume with the replacement batter now being the striker in as much as the non-striker was not out on her side of the pitch, but instead the non-striker became the batter. What is the rule on that? Does the rule open up the possibility that one of the batsmen can deliberately sacrifice him or herself on by a run out to orchestrate who is batting?

TY.

It turns out that cricket announcers are useless to noobs. Not only do they not discuss basics and chat in (accented) jargon, but the jargon is inconsistent from country to country. If the Pakistan announcer says it is 9 for 2, he means there are nine runs and two wickets down. But if the Australian announcer says it is 9 for 2, he means there are 9 wickets down and two runs.