Best Batsman Besides Bradman (inactive players only)

[shortpitched713]

Surely no one argues he isn’t a great - just that he’s not in contention for best after Bradman.

We shifted into top 10 of modern era, which subz doesn't think he is. I have to disagree on that point.

 

[subshakerz]

A reputation as a rock, and the lynchpin of a SA batting side? The key batting piece in a side that had as their main achilles (besides for quality spinner), middle order batting depth?

I dunno, I think the opposite is the case, and people far overstate the shortcomings of a career in which he was scoring a **** load of runs, in the most reliable possible manner, as his team asked him to do. During his career he was always talked about and considered as a great. Must have been due to his bowling, eh?

Being a batting lynchpin aint so special when compared to the other ATGs.

Kallis' allrounder greatness for some reason gets people to overrate him as a bat. But during his peak time, he was respected but not really feared by opposition. He wasn't going to build a truly huge score like Dravid or demoralize your team like Ponting. He just sort of was there, scoring runs without really threatening anyone while you can focus on getting the rest of the team out.

As I have said before, his batting position in a fairly solid lineup with decent support lent itself to someone who could take it up a notch. Instead, he needlessly batted in a shell and rightfully wasnt rated as highly because of that.

But yeah, I've said this before, nothing new.

 

[Bolo.]

Border and Waugh were champs at times when bowling standards were super high. Notably better than Kallis.

Kallis and Dravid is a toss up. Kallis is better than Miandad.

Posters here are fond of giving Kallis a reputation he never had when he played.

Search results for query: kallisball

 

[Coronis]

He just sort of was there, scoring runs without really threatening anyone while you can focus on getting the rest of the team out.

Instead, he needlessly batted in a shell and rightfully wasnt rated as highly because of that.

Clearly you watched a lot of his matches.

 

[subshakerz]

Clearly you watched a lot of his matches.

I wouldn't say watch, I suffered through a lot of his matches.

Though to be fair, around 2008 onwards when he actually started batting at a decent pace, I found him good to watch. I remember a lovely cameo of his against Johnson in 2011, then his twin knocks against India the same year I think.

 

[shortpitched713]

No one said winning cricket was always exciting.

 

[subshakerz]

No one said winning cricket was always exciting.

His brand of SA cricket was safety first cricket, not winning cricket.

 

[shortpitched713]

In your opinion.

 

[Godard]

Keeping all the stats and other objective arguments for who’s greatest aside, I have to say for me, if batsmenship was ever invented for someone, it was for Viv Richards and Sachin Tendulkar. Viv is the most exhilarating cricketer I have ever seen. Walking in without a helmet, with the fractionally delayed entrance of his, to face the fastest and fiercest of bowlers. No matter, how much they tried to bounce him, he never batted an eye, and started them down whilst continuously hooking and pulling. Viv has the most superhuman reflexes of any batter I have seen. He would literally expose his stumps to the fastest of bowlers and whack them over their heads, while they stood in utter disbelief and fear. Viv is probably the most physically devastating batter I have seen, but there was a natural quality to his murdering of various attacks. There was no element of blind slogging and haphazard swinging, it was like he invented a form of batsmanship by himself based on his fearlessness and his godly reflexes. Has there ever been a cricketer more sure of himself? On the other hand, Sachin is the most wholesome batter I have seen. He possesses of an extraordinarily breadth and range of strokes, while being as technically astute as the best of the defensive batsmen. As Subs pointed out, while watching him in the 90s, one felt they were watching the perfect batsmen. As Gideon Haigh said once, while watching Sachin, one was seeing the whole history of batsmenship represented in an individual.

While there are countless other great batsmen who were very unique, Sobers was swashbuckling, Lara had majestic flair, Sanga was as elegant as one could get, but for me, Sachin and Viv are the supreme masters of their trade, they have made batsmenship their own.