Tendulkar/Hobbs vs Marshall/McGrath

[Johan]

So which trunders did he keep flopping against to end up so perilously close to averaging sub-50?!

Viv fumbles a lot of serieses that should be pretty easy, the 1982-83 India series and 1977-78 Pakistan series played in dead wickets with not so adequate attacks are some examples.

 

[subshakerz]

"Context" my behind. Context = "excuses" for players you favor but nobody else.

I will remember this argument next time you mention Ambrose being injured in his series in South Africa. Don't be a hypocrite.

 

[kyear2]

That just sounds like a way to hide blatant intellectual inconsistency and hypocrisy. Dismissed.

I'm sorry, I generally don't get into the weeds with these types of discussions, not least of which because it really is very subjective and some do take it too far in both directions.

But if you believe that the level of the sport and just as critically, the level of competition is the same today as it was in 1912, then you're deliberately deluding yourself.

The notion that some have that Grace, a batsman who none of us have seen, and as such not have the opportunity to critique, be it his technique or the relative capabilities of his opponents, is just as capable as say a Neil Harvey, is ridiculous.

There has to be a cut off at some point, you just happen to disagree as to where that is.

And to be frank, in such a subjective matter, no one individual's opinion can be seen to be better than the next.

What I will say though, is that if we were to transport Grace to present day, and Everton Weekes as well, I'll bet anything that one would find conditions not only much more familiar, but would be able to go out and compete. None of us can say that with any confidence about Grace.

You and I also disagree with regards to Barnes as quite frankly none of the representative footage shared in anyway looks like anything that would bother less threaten anyone today. And no, I don't for a second buy that any of said footage was from when he was in his 69's far less 80's. Not at that quality.

And so we disagree, it shouldn't for a second though make any of our arguments more valid than the next. We just disagree.

 

[Sliferxxxx]

I will remember this argument next time you mention Ambrose being injured in his series in South Africa. Don't be a hypocrite.

Lol lol dude, you're a real peace of work. You're the one who tried to bury Ambrose talking about he was bowling in his "prime" in the 98 south africa series and came in behind pollock, Walsh and Donald. Had you done even a sliver of research instead of your usual anti Ambrose bs, you'd know the man was not fit. You're the damn hypocrite.

Fwiw the injuries Sachin had were legit but so too were everyone else's. Remember that when you're doing your usual mission to tear any West Indian not named Viv down plus Kallis, Ashwin etc.

 

[capt_Luffy]

I'm sorry, I generally don't get into the weeds with these types of discussions, not least of which because it really is very subjective and some do take it too far in both directions.

But if you believe that the level of the sport and just as critically, the level of competition is the same today as it was in 1912, then you're deliberately deluding yourself.

The notion that some have that Grace, a batsman who none of us have seen, and as such not have the opportunity to critique, be it his technique or the relative capabilities of his opponents, is just as capable as say a Neil Harvey, is ridiculous.

There has to be a cut off at some point, you just happen to disagree as to where that is.

And to be frank, in such a subjective matter, no one individual's opinion can be seen to be better than the next.

What I will say though, is that if we were to transport Grace to present day, and Everton Weekes as well, I'll bet anything that one would find conditions not only much more familiar, but would be able to go out and compete. None of us can say that with any confidence about Grace.

You and I also disagree with regards to Barnes as quite frankly none of the representative footage shared in anyway looks like anything that would bother less threaten anyone today. And no, I don't for a second buy that any of said footage was from when he was in his 69's far less 80's. Not at that quality.

And so we disagree, it sdoemdt for a second though make any of our arguments more valid than the next. We just disagree.

WOW!!! This whole post is bullshiting. Gotta love how the game wasn't same between 1912 and 62, but is between 62 and now

 

[Sliferxxxx]

Viv fumbles a lot of serieses that should be pretty easy, the 1982-83 India series and 1977-78 Pakistan series played in dead wickets with not so adequate attacks are some examples.

True that. Just shows he's human like eveyone else. For me, it's like Lara vs India in general. India had no bowler who should've bothered Lara yet, they're the team that gave him the most headaches. And he played them mostly at home. On top of that, Shiv who is much more limited, excelled vs them. Real head scratcher.....

 

[Sliferxxxx]

How do you exactly judge the pure skill level of a bowler against a batsman??

Lol lol very subjectively I suppose but I begin with the numbers like anything else. For me an atg bowling average for pace is 25 and under, for batsman atg = 50. Then you look at performances across conditions and vs teams, home and away and records vs the best of the best. 5 fors vs 100s is erroneous because bowlers typically only have a shot at 20 wkts therefore the make up of the rest of the attack plays a major role there. Batsmen don't have that limitation generally. There's more but that's a start for me.

 

[kyear2]

This also changed more between Sobers era and Root era than between Hobbs era and Sobers era.

I think that's not only impossible for you to prove, but kinda deliberately, ummm.


I've seen Sobers take on a rampaging Dennis Lillee in the twilight of his career.

No this takes away from the fact that Jack Hobbs is an all-time great and probably the second greatest batsman of all time.

That statement makes no sense.

 

[shortpitched713]

WOW!!! This whole post is bullshiting. Gotta love how the game wasn't same between 1912 and 62, but is between 62 and now

It's not that crazy of a concept.

In chess, players get a lot out of the games of Fischer to this day, not so much for the games of Morphy.

Fischer was something of a dividing line in the approach of modern chess, same way some might posit the 70s for modern cricket, although there's valid considerations for other dividing lines, like post computer era for instance.

But it's obvious that some objectively bad moves from some of Morphy's games, for instance aren't really relevant in a modern context. That doesn't mean Morphy couldn't possibly adapt with modern tools, but it does mean that the game was at a meaningfully lower level and highlighted different kinds of skills. And it's reasonable to think that the insane preparation based approach of a psychotic genius like Fischer is as good of a point to use to recognize the shift as any. Doesn't mean that Tal for instance couldn't compete, but the further back you go from Fischer I think the less advanced the opening preparation tended to be.

 

[Johan]

I'm sorry, I generally don't get into the weeds with these types of discussions, not least of which because it really is very subjective and some do take it too far in both directions.

But if you believe that the level of the sport and just as critically, the level of competition is the same today as it was in 1912, then you're deliberately deluding yourself.

The notion that some have that Grace, a batsman who none of us have seen, and as such not have the opportunity to critique, be it his technique or the relative capabilities of his opponents, is just as capable as say a Neil Harvey, is ridiculous.

There has to be a cut off at some point, you just happen to disagree as to where that is.

And to be frank, in such a subjective matter, no one individual's opinion can be seen to be better than the next.

What I will say though, is that if we were to transport Grace to present day, and Everton Weekes as well, I'll bet anything that one would find conditions not only much more familiar, but would be able to go out and compete. None of us can say that with any confidence about Grace.

You and I also disagree with regards to Barnes as quite frankly none of the representative footage shared in anyway looks like anything that would bother less threaten anyone today. And no, I don't for a second buy that any of said footage was from when he was in his 69's far less 80's. Not at that quality.

And so we disagree, it sdoemdt for a second though make any of our arguments more valid than the next. We just disagree.

Not really the point was it?

I'm gonna be extremely frank with you as I've seen so far in this thread, there are two methods one can apply and both methods require the person to be intellectually consistent.

1. Linear Progression Method – under this methodology Cricket is going to always improve and all the players from the next generation would be superior to those who came before, we see this kind of progression in other sorts, and this applies to not only Grace, or Hobbs, or Hutton, this applies to everyone. As always moving, professionalisting, intensity increasing and developing sport, the logical consistency would demand that Boycott is better than Hutton, Cook is better than Boycott and Yashasvi is going to be better than all of them simply because the game's level is at a constant linear increase. This makes Hobbs trash to Sobers, but jt also makes Sobers trash to modern players, same thing happens with Viv or Imran or anyone really, hell, under this system Joe Root and Steven Smith would objectively be the two greatest Batsmen of all time and Jasprit Bumrah and Pat Cummins the two best bowlers, as the level of competition faced would just increase linearly, same way you treat 1912-1962.
2. Golden Era – rather than thinking about hypothetical developements, One accepts that Cricket developed into a mature sport in 1890s and henceforth, there's nothing to advance only for it to change slightly here and there, and no era of Cricket is inherently "better" than any other.

Personally, I've no issue with either approach, where it gets messy is when one doesn't rate Hobbs in comparison to Sobers but rates Sobers in comparison to modern day bats, or one doesn't rate Hobbs but rates Hutton when the gap between their eras is literal peanuts compared to the gap between the latter's eras and the modern era.

If one believes level of competition and skill level is increasing, fine, that does make older players garbage in comparison to modern day players physically and skillfully, but this increase and developement doesn't stop in 1970 just because colour Telivision came into play, the developement would keep happening and due to no world war interruptions and due to modern developments, the gap between a great from 1962 and 1912 is gonna be far smaller than the gap between a 2022 great and a 1962 great under the guise of linear Progression, pretending otherwise is foolish and ignores the boom period human technology, healthcare and medicalcare has gone since the second world war.

simply put, if there's a gap between 1912 and 1962 cricket in quality, the gap between 1962 Cricket and 2022 Cricket would be exponentially higher, Of Course, I personally interpret it as just differences, but if one wants to argue superiority of one era...go for it, it'll just doom every Cricket who played Cricket before the year 2000.

I don't even care about anyone's views on Barnes, his record speaks for himself, everyone who saw speaks for him, if you don't rate him that's fine, but there's probably nothing that's gonna make me change my view on him.

 

[shortpitched713]

Globalization was a bitch. It changed everything, and we're not going back. But the idea that race, class, and geography segregated sports were every bit as good as the ones post those dramatic changes. Or that the kinds of changes we've seen in recent decades can match the world toppling effects associated with roughly the middle of the 20th century, is for lack of a better word... wild.

 

[Johan]

It's not that crazy of a concept.

In chess, players get a lot out of the games of Fischer to this day, not so much for the games of Morphy.

Fischer was something of a dividing line in the approach of modern chess, same way some might posit the 70s for modern cricket, although there's valid considerations for other dividing lines, like post computer era for instance.

But it's obvious that some objectively bad moves from some of Morphy's games, for instance aren't really relevant in a modern context. That doesn't mean Morphy couldn't possibly adapt with modern tools, but it does mean that the game was at a meaningfully lower level and highlighted different kinds of skills. And it's reasonable to think that the insane preparation based approach of a psychotic genius like Fischer is as good of a point to use to recognize the shift as any. Doesn't mean that Tal for instance couldn't compete, but the further back you go from Fischer I think the less advanced the opening preparation tended to be.

and Yet, yet Fischer would lose to just about any modern day Super GM due to gap in preparation knowledge, skill level and so forth....are we ready to accept that Bradman would be inferior to just about any excellent batsmen today?

 

[capt_Luffy]

It's not that crazy of a concept.

In chess, players get a lot out of the games of Fischer to this day, not so much for the games of Morphy.

Fischer was something of a dividing line in the approach of modern chess, same way some might posit the 70s for modern cricket, although there's valid considerations for other dividing lines, like post computer era for instance.

But it's obvious that some objectively bad moves from some of Morphy's games, for instance aren't really relevant in a modern context. That doesn't mean Morphy couldn't possibly adapt with modern tools, but it does mean that the game was at a meaningfully lower level and highlighted different kinds of skills. And it's reasonable to think that the insane preparation based approach of a psychotic genius like Fischer is as good of a point to use to recognize the shift as any. Doesn't mean that Tal for instance couldn't compete, but the further back you go from Fischer I think the less advanced the opening preparation tended to be.

Fischer would loose to anyone in Top 20 today convincingly. And Morphy was around 200 years old. If you want to make a jump in Chess, compare Capablanca (Hobbs) to Botvinnik (Sobers). Both's games are studied, Capablanca more so. As I said, this whole argument that cricket changed on one fine morning in the 1960s is pure, unadulterated bullshit. And if you argue for gradual shift, the thinking it changed more between 1910 and 60 (with 2 WWs in between) than 1960 and now is laughable, at best.

 

[Johan]

Globalization was a bitch. It changed everything, and we're not going back. But the idea that race, class, and geography segregated sports were every bit as good as the ones post those dramatic changes. Or that the kinds of changes we've seen in recent decades can match the world toppling effects associated with roughly the middle of the 20th century, is for lack of a better word... wild.

Literally just say Viv and Gavaskar were garbage players compared to modern guys and I'll respect your stance, all I'm asking for is intellectual honesty.

 

[capt_Luffy]

Lol lol very subjectively I suppose but I begin with the numbers like anything else. For me an atg bowling average for pace is 25 and under, for batsman atg = 50. Then you look at performances across conditions and vs teams, home and away and records vs the best of the best. 5 fors vs 100s is erroneous because bowlers typically only have a shot at 20 wkts therefore the make up of the rest of the attack plays a major role there. Batsmen don't have that limitation generally. There's more but that's a start for me.

I get what you are saying, but not sure it really separates Marshall from SRT or especially Hobbs

 

[capt_Luffy]

Just remember, between Hobbs' retirement and Sobers' debut, there were 24 years. That's the length of Sachin's career. It's 3 years less than what's between Malcolm Marshall and Jasprit Bumrah.

 

[Johan]

can Sachin even make the current Indian team? idk man, the standards raised a lot since he retired.

 

[Johan]

I think that's not only impossible for you to prove, but kinda deliberately, ummm.


I've seen Sobers take on a rampaging Dennis Lillee in the twilight of his career.

No this takes away from the fact that Jack Hobbs is an all-time great and probably the second greatest batsman of all time.

That statement makes no sense.

I suggest you actually read the thread rather than posting your own views on him.

 

[Sliferxxxx]

I get what you are saying, but not sure it really separates Marshall from SRT or especially Hobbs

Oh no Marshall, is not in some exalted catergory above either one. For me, he's a coat of varnish better. Hadlee and Imran though no question are better than all three.

 

[capt_Luffy]

Oh no Marshall, is not in some exalted catergory above either one. For me, he's a coat of varnish better. Hadlee and Imran though no question are better than all three.

Well, I generally will go with the batsmen as they have career 23-24 years long. Ofcourse not attainable by a pacer like Maco, but that's just a perk and they are exceptions in this regard even among other ATG batsmen.