MLB players vs World class cricketers

Junk Master wrote:

There's no comparison-- baseball players are better athletes.

Just like NBA players are better athletes than baseball players. Surely we could reach a consensus about that. Wait, what about Michael Jordan you say? Compared to John Kruk playing in the NBA he was a pretty good baseball player.

That's a ridiculous comparison. John Kruk was a very good baseball player, but was nowhere near the talent level of Michael Jordan in each of their respective sports. I understand where you're coming from, but you need to pick a more comparable player in baseball. When you do that, I believe the gap seems to narrow quite a bit. Jordan hit .202 in AA. It's not unreasonable to think Mike Trout (who is a great player, but is too young to be compared to Jordan as far as legacy) has the athleticism to play comparably in the D-League.

Let's get over the whole "chubby" or "overweight" ball player thing. I covered professional baseball for 15 years and I can guarantee that whatever size or shape, an MLB player is a phenomenal athlete, and that unless you watch pro baseball up close day after day you have no concept how athletic a person has to be in order to play it.

Look at the bios of MLB players, and plenty of them were all-state in other sports than baseball. Most pitchers were shortstops in high school on days they didn't pitch. If you look at those sports science shows, the only people better than baseball players when it comes to reaction time and hand-eye coordination are race car drivers.

John Kruk plays the fat jokester well, but in reality he hit .300 in the big leagues with a .400 on-base percentage (97th best all-time). According to Baseball Reference, just 202 players in the history of the game hit .300 or better for their career, meaning to hit like Kruk did you have to have some pretty amazing physical gifts. Which means other than running, John Kruk would be a high level athlete in any sport he chose.

Flat-out, ballplayers are stud athletes.

Maybe Cricket players should dope like MLB players to get an accurate assessment of ability.

hmmmm...... wrote:

Cricket takes more skill by far. In baseball you just swing the bat, in cricket there is a whole batting technique to it that takes a lot more technique and skill.

So cricket is some sort of speedwalking equivalent to baseball?

India is by far the worst nation in the world at sports, but they are the fifth ranked cricket nation in the world. Having a country with ~no athletes being world-ranked at a team sport indicates only one thing: real athletes are not playing that sport.

Phil Fondacaro wrote:

India is by far the worst nation in the world at sports, but they are the fifth ranked cricket nation in the world. Having a country with ~no athletes being world-ranked at a team sport indicates only one thing: real athletes are not playing that sport.

Not a real athlete.

You want to know who makes barehanded catches at baseball games? The fans do. So baseball fans are as good of athletes as cricket players.

Just because you don't play the game or participate in athletics does not mean you don't have the skills necessary.

Baseball is a lot simpler.

Most cricketers grow up playing a form of baseball at school (rounders or softball).

Swinging a bat horizontally is instinctive, using a bat vertically is much harder to learn.

Throwing the ball horizontally is more instinctive than bowling which uses all sorts of crazy body mechanics.

Baseball players aren't used to 90 mph an hour "pitches" hitting the ground and changing direction right in front of them.

Baseball batters can't deal with the ball being thrown their legs, body or head, which is legitimate in cricket (provided the ball bounces).

Cricket players don't wear gloves.

Can baseball players adapt to hitting the ball behind them.

There are about 50 fielding positions in cricket, not 9 or 10.

Cricketers have had some success in baseball, Graham Lloyd for instance.

Catching fly balls in baseball is boring. Of course they're going to catch it, they have a bloody great glove.

Physically they're about the same.

Top cricket players in the India Premier League make about $4 million in salary, a ton more in sponsorship, and can play elsewhere or in Test cricket the rest of the year.

8/10

Golf clap for you!

Cricket has a larger talent pool. By simple mathematics, Cricket players are better. If baseball's talent pool somehow increased by a factor of 10 overnight, then only a tenth of current MLB players would still have a job.

Baseball puts more of a premium on size and strength since Cricket doesn't have anything like a home run. But here's the thing - the more of a premium you put on size and strength, the less of a premium you put on hand-eye coordination. In baseball there are a lot of extraordinarily coordinated slap hitters that aren't big enough and strong enough to make the majors. Less coordinated players with more power are making it to the big leagues instead.

By contrast, Cricket basically is slap-hitting. That big strong guy doesn't have the same contact skills as our slap-hitter, and thus wouldn't be as good of a cricket player.

I have never seen 3 finer examples of circular reasoning in my life. I much prefer baseball, but your argument boils down to "I'm an American, and I'm ignorant."

dsfsssss wrote:

Cricketers are not as good of athletes as baseball players. This is not debatable.

Reluctantly I have to disagree. Here is a cricket player defeating one of the greatest milers the world has ever seen in a very simple test of fitness:

Runnah wrote:

dsfsssss wrote:

Cricketers are not as good of athletes as baseball players. This is not debatable.

Reluctantly I have to disagree. Here is a cricket player defeating one of the greatest milers the world has ever seen in a very simple test of fitness:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDVis0TGkcQ

It's actually a pretty complex test. As it should be.

Neither of the two men you refer to played cricket.

You can read the book or watch the movie Million Dollar Arm.

Indians have never produced really fast bowlers in cricket...or at least this has been the trend. That does not mean they have not produced excellent medium fast,seam and spin bowlers.

The flip side of your argument or point would be if Indian scouts came to North America looking to find native born Canadians or Americans to suddenly make it into top level cricket teams...not likely to happen.

The above reference to what turned into a Hollywood movie did help me understand however why there is sometimes 'animosity' between cricket and baseball supporters as each 'supports' their respective sport. The scout and main character delivers a huge put down to the game of cricket in his tirade about the game to his Indian friend. Why I wonder ?

A cricket field is more than double the size of a baseball field. Cricketers have a lot of ground to cover. Today's players are tremendous athletes.

Interesting notion...but so called 'slap hitting' would only be one aspect of batting. Many runs (points) in cricket are scored behind the batsman...ie,guided,nudged,glanced,scooped,pulled,hooked in what would be foul territory in baseball...so to say that cricket is basically slap hitting is just plain wrong. And what about hitting a six...a stroke which results in the ball clearing the boundary...like a home run. Cricket and baseball are very different games with different skill sets...but they are also very similar...but that is fairly obvious as American baseball 'grew out' of rounders and cricket,not the other way around.Cricket and rounders predate American baseball by some margin! ( Abner Doubleday didn't suddenly invent baseball in Cooperstown on day,despite what Bud Selig is reported to have said). Anyway what I find interesting about this forum is how much misinformation,misguidedness,etc there is around about the two sports.

Re: reaction time...are those sports science shows americancentric? Or are they considering all major world sports. Fielders in cricket sometimes stand just a few metres/ yards from the bat...and that ball is travelling! The closest baseball player to the batter is the pitcher and they usually duck! Also batsmen face a rising ball off the pitch that has changed direction very close to them and may now be travelling at their head...they have to decide if to play a shot,what stroke to play,or get the heck out the way...consider that reaction time.

How about ice hockey goalies...

Or boxers...

Obviously baseball batters have amazing hand eye coordination and reaction time but second on the list...maybe not! Batters face a falling ball ( submarine pitching excluded) and the pitcher is aiming for the strike zone...so knowing that ahead of time,that helps a bit.

"IF" American MLB players are more athletic it would probably be because of the incredibly mammoth league systems in the US.

This is a huge farm to train and draw stock from with a built in culling system.

There are about 2.5 million kids playing little league.

Mix that with the dreams of a high-paying professional slot and voila.