Michael Vaughan concludes Steve Smith is a better test batsmen than Sachin !!!

[velu]

 

 

 

 

[Pandya_Power]

Hard to make a case for Sachin against Smith in Tests, tbh. 

[sergio04]

He is. 

 

 

[sandeep]

19 minutes ago, Pandya_Power said:

Hard to make a case for Sachin against Smith in Tests, tbh. 

Did you ever watch Tendy bat in the 2nd half of the 90s?  Comparing Sachin past his prime, to the absolute peaks of guys like Ponting, Kohli, Smith, Dravid etc etc - its a familiar bit.

[Pandya_Power]

7 minutes ago, sandeep said:

Did you ever watch Tendy bat in the 2nd half of the 90s?  Comparing Sachin past his prime, to the absolute peaks of guys like Ponting, Kohli, Smith, Dravid etc etc - its a familiar bit.

Yes I did. You can't just bracket Smith with the others you've mentioned. He averages >60 across his career, ~ 10 points more than the next bets of his generation. 

 

So yes, I was talking about Sachin's career in entirety. We need to overcome this home bias and open ourselves to facts - the fact that Smith is the best modern Test bat doesn't in anyway take away from Sachin's or Kohli's accomplishments. Both had / have a far better all round game (hence their terrific ODI records) than Smith.

Edited August 4, 2019 by Pandya_Power

[Ankit_sharma03]

Just dont get this obsession of comparison specially players from diff era

[Nikola]

Wait that also means he is better test cricketer than thala? no way! 

[velu]

4 minutes ago, Nikola said:

Wait that also means he is better test cricketer than thala? no way! 

 

thala hates test cricket

[Nikola]

2 minutes ago, velu said:

 

thala hates test cricket

he plays test cricket over 3 formats unlike steve smith so thala gets my vote for sure. 

[bahubali]

24 minutes ago, Pandya_Power said:

Yes I did. You can't just bracket Smith with the others you've mentioned. He averages >60 across his career, ~ 10 points more than the next bets of his generation. 

 

So yes, I was talking about Sachin's career in entirety. We need to overcome this home bias and open ourselves to facts - the fact that Smith is the best modern Test bat doesn't in anyway take away from Sachin's or Kohli's accomplishments. Both had / have a far better all round game (hence their terrific ODI records) than Smith.

What obsession, talk when smith maintain this 60 avg for more than 150 matches.Just because someone better  in this generation that too in 60 matches doesn't mean better than others.In today's world only sa and india f*from past 2 years ) has some consistent bowling attack. And eng has better bowling attack till 2016 when ansu and broad was in peak.

[velu]

3 minutes ago, bahubali said:

What obsession, talk when smith maintain this 60 avg for more than 150 matches.Just because someone better  in this generation that too in 60 matches doesn't mean better than others.In today's world only sa and india f*from past 2 years ) has some consistent bowling attack. And eng has better bowling attack till 2016 when ansu and broad was in peak.

 

if average matters then sanga > sachin ..

whenever aussiea are in trouble , smith saves them .. rarely sachin did even in his peak

[sandeep]

24 minutes ago, Pandya_Power said:

So yes, I was talking about Sachin's career in entirety. We need to overcome this home bias and open ourselves to facts - the fact that Smith is the best modern Test bat doesn't in anyway take away from Sachin's or Kohli's accomplishments. Both had / have a far better all round game (hence their terrific ODI records) than Smith.

You can't talk about Sachin's career in its "entirety" and compare it to Smith who's in the middle of his prime.  If you want an apples to apples comparison, you should take Tendy's prime and compare it to Smith's.  Or wait till Smith retires.  We all saw how Ponting's numbers cratered in his last year or so.  Tendulkar also averaged in the 60s when he was in his prime in the 90s.  And did it in an significantly weaker team on either side of the ball. 

 

I have no qualms with saying xyz is better than Sachin.  But if you make unequivocal statements about xyz is better, without taking into account all relevant factors, you should be prepared to see perspectives that challenge it. 

 

Sure, you can prefer to make like an ostrich, put your head in the sand, and assume I'm just a blind "worshipper" etc etc. 

[Pandya_Power]

2 minutes ago, bahubali said:

What obsession, talk when smith maintain this 60 avg for more than 150 matches.Just because someone better  in this generation that too in 60 matches doesn't mean better than others.In today's world only sa and india f*from past 2 years ) has some consistent bowling attack. And eng has better bowling attack till 2016 when ansu and broad was in peak.

60 matches is not a small sample size! Infact he might have finished >50% of his career. Its gone on long enough for us to safely conclude its not a purple patch (like Hussey at the start of his career). He has been playing for a decade almost.

 

If he can display this kind of form after returning from a ban of 1 year, I don't think anything will disrupt his run.

[Pandya_Power]

3 minutes ago, sandeep said:

You can't talk about Sachin's career in its "entirety" and compare it to Smith who's in the middle of his prime.  If you want an apples to apples comparison, you should take Tendy's prime and compare it to Smith's.  Or wait till Smith retires.  We all saw how Ponting's numbers cratered in his last year or so.  Tendulkar also averaged in the 60s when he was in his prime in the 90s.  And did it in an significantly weaker team on either side of the ball. 

 

I have no qualms with saying xyz is better than Sachin.  But if you make unequivocal statements about xyz is better, without taking into account all relevant factors, you should be prepared to see perspectives that challenge it. 

 

Sure, you can prefer to make like an ostrich, put your head in the sand, and assume I'm just a blind "worshipper" etc etc. 

Good to hear that you're open to other perspectives, as am I. Its just that I am not convinced Sachin was better as things stand. Certainly if Smith suffers a prolonged dip in form, it could make things interesting (in my book).

[sandeep]

2 minutes ago, Pandya_Power said:

60 matches is not a small sample size! Infact he might have finished >50% of his career. Its gone on long enough for us to safely conclude its not a purple patch (like Hussey at the start of his career). He has been playing for a decade almost.

 

If he can display this kind of form after returning from a ban of 1 year, I don't think anything will disrupt his run.

Ever heard that old legal disclaimer on mutual funds?  The one about past performance not guaranteeing future results? 

 

All batsmen go through a basic cycle - they start off their career, experience a bit of a plateau, find their game, hit their prime, and then in the 2nd half of their career, slowly fade and decline.  Different players willl put up different number of games under those phases, but they all go through this cycle.  Smith, Kohli, Williamson -are all in their prime, and yet to hit the past-prime phase. 

 

Tendy was a bit of an outlier, because in his post-prime phase, he managed to play at the highest level for a decade.  Majority of batsmen - even great ones like Dravid, Ponting, Gavaskar etc - only manage a year or 2 in the post-prime phase.  What this does, is skews Sachin's career numbers down.  But it doesn't matter.  If you pick a 4 to 5 year period for a batsman in the middle of his career, when he is putting up his best numbers - you can take that and compare it to others.  This still doesn't take into account other variables, such as the number of test matches played (opportunities), playing conditions, quality of opposition, Quality of new-ball protection enjoyed by middle order batsmen etc.  This is what makes comparisons inherently difficult and ambiguous.  And why blanket statements like X is better than Y, should be made after due consideration. 

 

 

[sandeep]

5 minutes ago, Pandya_Power said:

Good to hear that you're open to other perspectives, as am I. Its just that I am not convinced Sachin was better as things stand. Certainly if Smith suffers a prolonged dip in form, it could make things interesting (in my book).

Since you appear to believe that Smith is somehow magically going to continue performing at his current levels - here's a prediction for you - for the last 18 years of Smith's test career, he will average less than 25.  Whenever that is. 

[Epic]

Did Tendulkar ever hit an average of 60?  I think came close but didn't touch it.  Unless, you're going to break up his career into multiple sections, I don't think he touched 60?

[sandeep]

41 minutes ago, Ankit_sharma03 said:

Just dont get this obsession of comparison specially players from diff era

Vaughn likes to troll - he says a lot of things intentionally, tongue in cheek.  Simpletons sometimes bite, others take the bait to demonstrate how "un-biased" they are, never mind the actual facts...

[Ajju]

Is he better than Dhoni

[mancalledsting]

52 minutes ago, Pandya_Power said:

Yes I did. You can't just bracket Smith with the others you've mentioned. He averages >60 across his career, ~ 10 points more than the next bets of his generation. 

 

So yes, I was talking about Sachin's career in entirety. We need to overcome this home bias and open ourselves to facts - the fact that Smith is the best modern Test bat doesn't in anyway take away from Sachin's or Kohli's accomplishments. Both had / have a far better all round game (hence their terrific ODI records) than Smith.

the underlying assumption in your argument is that similar averages across different eras are directly comparable. Yes statistically Tendulkar may behind (in terms of average) but that not the same as saying he's a lesser batsmen.