BOWLING PLAN-MAKER

Encapsulating all of 2024 into a stats page

It’s fitting to start this year with a recap of all the new methods, metrics, graphs, and plots that we explored in 2024. I attempted to quantify intent and introduced intent plots to understand a batter’s inning progression over a 20-over span. Next came the line-length predictor for death overs, which discussed how using simple means doesn’t provide the full picture and how we could incorporate confidence levels for specific deliveries against any batter. Lastly, I introduced intelligent wagon wheels and a 360-degree metric to gain a better understanding of a batter’s regions of strength and his 360-degree ability. All of these, along with a small new metric called reliability, have been combined to create a simple yet comprehensive bowling plan stats page. The idea is to start with the information we currently have and continually update and expand this page as new metrics and methods emerge.

Features

1. 360 degree ability, pace intent and spin intent scores.

2. Intelligent wagon wheel.

3. An intent (the batter’s SR compared to his partner) progression plot for 20 overs against both pace and spin.

4. The top five best deliveries against the batter along with a weakness rating to compare between the deliveries.

5. Pace reliability, spin reliability and vulnerability (explained below).

(Currently consists of 76 batters)

Understanding Reliability and Vulnerability

This metric wasn’t a part of the page initially. However, I realized that intent alone doesn’t differentiate between a batter scoring 10 (5) and one scoring 100 (50). That’s where reliability and vulnerability (inverse metrics) come in.

In simple terms, vulnerability is a batter’s false shot percentage compared to their partner. On a vulnerability plot, being below parity indicates good control for the batter. This means they’re generally more controlled than others batting alongside them. Net vulnerability against pace and spin is calculated as the weighted mean of all 20 vulnerability values across each over.

Reliability, on the other hand, is the reciprocal of vulnerability. As the name suggests, it measures a batter’s consistency in avoiding false shots.

An Example – Shimron Hetmyer

The first thing we notice is the significant difference between Hetmyer’s pace and spin-playing abilities. The intent progression confirms this across all phases of the game. For many players, there’s often a trade-off between reliability and intent. However, in Hetmyer’s case, neither his spin intent nor his spin reliability is particularly strong. Although the sample size for spin in the death overs might be small, bowling spin to Hetmyer during this phase is a tempting option that many teams fail to exploit. Additionally, Hetmyer isn’t a true 360-degree player, as he is overly dependent on the cow corner for scoring. Tossing it wide outside off to force him to target the cow corner could be an effective strategy. The target deliveries further confirm his weakness against spin; he has struggled against the good length. Targeting the stumps with spinners is another viable wicket-taking approach against him.

The elite class

Klaasen, Russell, and Surya led the pack in spin intent, pace intent, and 360-degree ability, respectively. Shubman Gill took the top spot in reliability, against both pace and spin.

Combining all the metrics, graphs, and plots, some players stood out. The elite list of T20 batters includes - Suryakumar Yadav, Nicholas Pooran, Andre Russell, Jos Buttler, Heinrich Klaasen, AB de Villiers and Glenn Maxwell (in no particular order).

A young and promising name to watch is Rahmanullah Gurbaz. He is challenging for a spot on this elite list (do check out his numbers) and deserves a mention. However, I’m holding off on adding him for now, as he hasn’t played extensively against top-tier teams. With Afghanistan’s rise in white-ball cricket, perhaps I can point to this blog in a few years when Gurbaz becomes a marquee name.

Some interesting cases to explore

As I explored the page, I came across some intriguing stories worth reflecting on -

· Hardik Pandya against pace in middle overs is really poor. He barely crosses or touches parity (intent=1) and starts picking up only from the 17^th over.

· Steven Smith is actually a lot better around the ground than an average T20 batter. The wagon wheel is legside dominated but it’s still a nice spread on the offside. He ranks 15^th in this aspect.

· Moeen Ali has had a long association with the bits and pieces tag. Teams somehow have neither trusted him fully as a 4 over bowler nor a top 5 or 6 batter. His spin intent score can maybe help us in deciding a good role for him. He strikes at 1.35 times than his partners against spin and ranks 4^th amongst all batters. CSK gave him a somewhat similar role – a spin basher in the middle who could bowl handy offbreaks.

· Babar Azam, Jason Roy and Colin Munro are openers who spend most of their death overs around or below parity. The idea of ‘getting well set’ for top order batters has been to use their time on the crease in maximising the score later on which has not happened with them. The best strategy for these players could be to not wait long and start taking their chances from the 11^th/12^th over.

I’d be excited to see some good insights you all might uncover from this page—after all, that’s exactly what it’s for.

And in the end, here’s the link to the page (laptops/tablets screens preferred)
Do check it out, feedback is welcome. Thanks.