Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.
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Its a good question, does he make a best mens 11 as a wicket keeper? Probably not. Does he make best mens 11 as a batsman? maybe. Does he make best combined mens and womens 11? less chance.
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Personally, even though I made an argument that he doesn't necessarily have the odds to get in, I do have splinters. As I think he does make it. For me he changed the way we played (arguably the last time we also fielded well) and during that time we won more than we lost. The 300 goes a long way to cementing that place as well. Agree though Ajaz should in time make it with a 10for
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@bayimports said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
Its a good question, does he make a best mens 11 as a wicket keeper? Probably not. Does he make best mens 11 as a batsman? maybe. Does he make best combined mens and womens 11? less chance.
If he doesn’t make it as a keeper he has even less chance as a batsman.
But then there are a few intangibles that make him a chance I guess
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I guess it depends on how much you weight the back third or so of his career. He spent a lot of time figuring out his game, but in that last third his average was up into the mid 40s, he scored multiple doubles, the triple, the fastest test ton and became the first kiwi to score 1000 runs in a calendar year (Kane the only other batter to do it). It's beyond just a hot streak, he really turned himself around. On the other side, he spent almost twice as long as a guy who probably benefitted from a weaker depth pool. Late career McCullum walks into the current test team. Early career McCullum probably doesn't even make the squad.
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He basically spent 6 years being McCullum the keeper, then 3 years being Conway the opener (but a bit better), then 3 years being Darryl Mitchell the number 5 (but a bit better).
Those are pretty accurate statistical comparisons for number of games and averages
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FWIW I would have Jack Cowie in the initial intake. I reckon he was probably the best fast bowler in the world.
But McCullum's record as an 'everyman' of NZ cricket is comparable to JR Reid, who isn't being quibbled about. Albeit Reid had to carry a team while McCullum got to (eventually) excel.
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@Rapido said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
He basically spent 6 years being McCullum the keeper, then 3 years being Conway the opener (but a bit better), then 3 years being Darryl Mitchell the number 5 (but a bit better).
Those are pretty accurate statistical comparisons for number of games and averages
Him and Vettori bailed us out of the shit at 7 and 8 respectively. I’m sure his record there is good.
Of course they might have looked better due to the top order we had at the time.
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@MN5 said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
@Rapido said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
He basically spent 6 years being McCullum the keeper, then 3 years being Conway the opener (but a bit better), then 3 years being Darryl Mitchell the number 5 (but a bit better).
Those are pretty accurate statistical comparisons for number of games and averages
Him and Vettori bailed us out of the shit at 7 and 8 respectively. I’m sure his record there is good.
Of course they might have looked better due to the top order we had at the time.
The batting part of his game when he was keeper-batsman is the weakest part of his overall record.
Averaged 30 in an era of Dhoni, Prior, late Gilchrist etc. And post-Flower.
Especially as he was probably usually the second or 3rd batsman in the team 'on talent', and we needed those lower order runs at that time because of the weak top order. Definitely under-performed in the late 2000s IMO.
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I think McCullum in an all time NZ Text XI is questionable as WK-batsman, but all time white ball XI isn't. Given this is an all format list, even ignoring T20Is (fair enough), McCullum is the best ever all format WK-batsman we've produced in that I think he's a lot better in ODIs than Watling, than Watling was better than McCullum in tests. If we had to send an all time XI to play tests and ODIs, say (so same XI for both), I think I'd pick McCullum over Watling as the all time keeper.
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Lots of griefing about McCullum, but not so much about Vettori. He was awesome for us - but as a core spinner he was ... kind of 'meh'. Would struggle to be in a World XI for tests (or 2nds); maybe for ODI. But that's not a massive claim to fame.
Like McCullum though he did more - the captaining, coaching, mentoring - he did damn near everything for NZC. Don't get me wrong - I loved him - but his place in a top XI must be questionable by their criteria.
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@nzzp said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
Lots of griefing about McCullum, but not so much about Vettori. He was awesome for us - but as a core spinner he was ... kind of 'meh'. Would struggle to be in a World XI for tests (or 2nds); maybe for ODI. But that's not a massive claim to fame.
Like McCullum though he did more - the captaining, coaching, mentoring - he did damn near everything for NZC. Don't get me wrong - I loved him - but his place in a top XI must be questionable by their criteria.
Yep Vettori would never get past Warne, Kumble or Murali at test level.
ODI is another story. He was very good there but someone’s test record tells more of a story than their limited overs one.
But everyone loved Dan. The way he carried the team ( let's not forget the massive improvement he made with his batting ) was pretty inspirational. I always thought it was a shame his career didn’t start and end ten years later so he got to play alongside the Test championship winning team.
…..he is far and away the best NZ spinner ever but as you say that’s a pretty shallow pool.
But yeah, universally loveable which is why got in and Chris Cairns didn’t despite being a better player
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@MN5 said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
But everyone loved Dan.
The CWC15 SF against SA, he came in at a clutch time, and just sauntered out like it was a sunday afternoon village game. TV coverage was in ads - but at the ground he cruised out, settled down the hairy javelin and then squeezed some crucial runs.
Dead. Set. Legend. But more like Ashleigh Giles than Shane Warne as a bowler.
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Interesting (but long) data analysis article on cricinfo. Author ranking the 32 test match 300s from best to worst.
Ends up ranking McCullum's 300 as the best ever.
I would guess, if the author does the same exercise with 10-fers then Ajaz's may rank ... actually, I don't know. Would rank last for match impact but best for lack of support .. depends hiw things are weighted.
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Not sure if it’s been posted elsewhere and if many non-Australian Ferners would’ve seen
8.2M views · 116K reactions | 📺 Wasim Akram on the best batsman he's...
Brian Lara, Sachin Tendulkar and Allan Border Wasim Akram has bowled to some of the greats, he has one bastman who stands out from the rest. 👀
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@ACT-Crusader Can't remember if I've seen that particular interview but I've seen similar interviews where Akram says Crowe worked out how to play reverse swing quicker than anyone else, and how impressed he was with that.
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@ACT-Crusader after all this time he's still the owner of the best cover drive I've ever seen.
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@antipodean said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
@ACT-Crusader after all this time he's still the owner of the best cover drive I've ever seen.
Definitely in my top 5 cover drives along with Damian Martyn (an almost flawless technique), Kallis, Sangakarra, Lara
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god Martyn was a beautiful player to watch.
Lara is my go to, that extravagant back lift gave it that little extra panache.
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@mariner4life said in Black Caps First Eleven for hall of fame.:
god Martyn was a beautiful player to watch.
Lara is my go to, that extravagant back lift gave it that little extra panache.
2nd best batsman ever. Best to watch in action
