Is Maxwell better than Kohli? Analysing strike rate vs average in ODIs

[mr_mister]

Title meant to be tongue in cheek so put down your pitchforks.


This thought was inspired by the Waugh/Sachin 'moderate upgrade' argument from the other thread. As openers in the 90s they had near identical averages of around 45 in ODIs but their strikerates were 77 and 90 in favour of Sachin. Someone mentioned thatd be about the equivalent of a guy averaging about 52-53 if they struck at the same rate of 77. Or if they both struck at 90 Juniors average would be worth around 37-38, to put things in a better perspective. This got me thinking.


Basically I want a CW consensus on the trade off between average and strike rate, and to create a list of the greatest ODI bats based on a simple formula. Obviously the different era issue is something to consider but I guess some kind of weighting could be added.


So Maxi has the highest ODI strike rate of all time at around 120, though he only averages 32 or so. If that strike rate was pushed down to 100, his average could jump up to 40 or thereabouts. Jos Butlers numbers are 117 and 39, so that could jump to 100 and 50, hot on Kohlis heels. If we used 100 S/R as a base, Kohlis average might fall to 55-56 from 59 so his S/R could climb from 92 to 100.

These are all massive estimates but you get the picture. Perhaps 90 would be a better base strike rate as only a handful of players hit at 100 over a career, but 100 is neater.


It gets tricky when we start to account for era.

Shahid Afridi struck at 117 but played a lot of games in an era where this figure was insanely high. Could his meagre average of 23 be brought up to nearly Maxis 40 when we account for how far ahead of his peers his strike rate was?

All food for thought. Maybe we could come up with some fair numbers and formulas and then get an interesting list of the best ODI bats including strike rate and avg together to create this new modified number

 

[a massive zebra]

No.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Soumya Sarkar's SR is over a 100 and he averages 35 last time I checked.

 

[Spark]

Without commenting on the specific utility of your example, if your new statistical measure is giving you extremely unorthodox/controversial/clearly-wrong-seeming results, then it's almost certainly the new statistical measure which is flawed relative to conventional wisdom.

Mind you, ODI stats are useless anyway, so have at it

 

[mr_mister]

@Spark

Basically nobody considers blokes like Maxi and Afridi to be anything close to ATG ODI bats. Which is fair enough, sure. But not enough credit is given to players who have these ridiculous strike rates imo.

Amlas wasteman 120 ball unbeaten 108 the other week was a match losing knock. A maxi 27(15) could be just as useful if not more in the right circumstances. Amla built a platform but wasted balls. Maxi only slightly moved the needle but did it in no time and might have shifted momentum. Yet Amlas average shoots up and another ton is added to the column, so the gut reaction would be to call it a much better innings, in terms of helping his side win. Which it arguably wouldn't be.

Maybe this list would give some funky results but it'd just be looking at ODI batting through a different lens

 

[weldone]

http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/cricket-chat/77265-weldone-s-odi-rankings.html

 

[mr_mister]

http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/cricket-chat/77265-weldone-s-odi-rankings.html

Interesting. Maxwell and Amla both ranked very high using your method haha

 

[weldone]

Interesting. Maxwell and Amla both ranked very high using your method haha

As of 23-Nov-2017, in career ranking Maxwell was at #103 between Younis Khan and Jeremy Coney. That's not very high, although he will be a few places higher if I re-calculate now.

 

[trundler]

Idon't think we can establish universal equivalence. Strike Rate only comes into play once the Average is past a certain threshold. Doesn't matter if your 20 runs are coming at 200. Wouldn't say 20@200 would be worth half as much as 40@80.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Maybe something to this, obviously depends on the rest of the team and match situations that a given player finds themselves in.

However, in no universe and under no circumstances is Maxwell better than Kohli

 

[mr_mister]

The thread title was a joke that need not be addressed lol. Just using the highest average and highest strike rate as my clickbaity examples

And trundler, I honestly think 20(10) could be better than 40(50) in a lot of situations. Soaking up balls for dots loses games.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

However, in no universe and under no circumstances is Maxwell better than Kohli

2014 IPL in UAE and India

 

[TheJediBrah]

The thread title was a joke that need not be addressed lol. Just using the highest average and highest strike rate as my clickbaity examples

And trundler, I honestly think 20(10) could be better than 40(50) in a lot of situations. Soaking up balls for dots loses games.

This is clearly true. But you can't look at players' career stats as a whole and come to conclusions based on specific situations.

To use an example of my own, if Kohli needed to make 20 (10) he could probably do it better than Maxwell, but he rarely has to do that. Just because Maxwell has a higher career strike rate doesn't mean he would be better at scoring quickly and winning a game should the situation arise.

 

[Dan]

The assumption of a Phillips Curve trade-off between average and strike rate is hardly settled either, tbf

 

[stephen]

http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/cricket-chat/77265-weldone-s-odi-rankings.html

Interesting that according to these metrics, which favour strike rate (Tendulkar's strength), Tendulkar doesn't even come out that far ahead of Waugh.

 

[marc71178]

Give it up stephen, Waugh is a country mile behind Tendulkar.

 

[stephen]

I think if there's a problem with weldone's rankings it's that it uses 10% off the innings for calls faced as the cut off. However, I'd suggest that a batsman reigning themself in slightly and going at 8 runs per over in the last 5 overs is better than them pushing for 10 runs per over, getting out with 4 overs to bat and then having a tall ender come in and hit at 5 rpo.

Which is largely the problem with any statistical analysis. In an ODI anything that doesn't take into account match situation and the team makeup doesn't properly summarise the situation.

Maxwell coming in at 7 and hitting a 35 ball 50 in the last 8 overs is worth more than it would be if he came in with 20 overs to go and played the same innings.

ODIs are a trade off between runs, wickets and time. Lose to many wickets and you need to scrape for as many runs as you can get. If you don't lose wickets you need to go as hard as the situation lets you to get as many runs as you can. From a team point of view it doesn't matter if you end up all out on the last ball or finish with one wicket down, so long as you're maximising your runs. Get all out before the last ball and going slower may have helped more.

But then, it may not have helped either. It may make more sense to go hard at the bowling when Razaq is bowling in the middle overs and risk losing wickets than wait until Waqar comes back on and bowls massive inswinging Yorkers.

Historically it's been easier to chase in ODIs and I think part of that is it lets you time your aggression better because you know exactly what you need. Which is why Bevan had a strike rate in the 60s in the second innings and in the 80s in the first.

 

[Burgey]

Neither has done anything noteworthy in a WC final, so neither can be called great players tbh.

 

[mr_mister]

If Maxwell got a chance to bat in the WC final he could have stole the show. Played like an ATG all tournament. I have big doubts he can do it again but I guess we'll see. Stupid NZ not putting up a competitive total

 

[TheJediBrah]

If Maxwell got a chance to bat in the WC final he could have stole the show. Played like an ATG all tournament. I have big doubts he can do it again but I guess we'll see. Stupid NZ not putting up a competitive total

Got the wicket of Guptill though, who made a double ton earlier in the tournament