Ask Your Cricket Questions Here

Posted on July 25, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook
Inspector Clouseau

Are you feeling Clouseau-less about cricket?

If you’re a regular reader, you’ll notice that on the whole we don’t spend a lot of time explaining the rules and nuances of cricket on this site. That’s because (a) we think that you can easily get bogged down by minutiae and miss the larger pleasures of both games—the premise of our eponymous book (shortly to be available as an audiobook); and (b) because you can always just Google the answer to your question or visit Wikipedia. However, it would be churlish not to offer our baseball brethren a chance to ask about strategy, nuance, and subtlety, and we’ll do our best to elucidate. You never know, we might learn something, too! So, ask away.

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The Suzuki Steal

Posted on July 24, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook
Ichiro Suzuki

Ichiro Suzuki: Reaching for the ring

Wait . . . hold on . . . what the hell just happened? How on earth did Mr. Seattle say sayonara to the Mariners and arrive at the New York Yankees on Monday and play a game (and win) last night without anyone knowing? The Mariners must have been desperate for cash to let their star player Ichiro Suzuki be seduced by the big money of the Yanks. When I (Martin) was in Seattle recently, I went to Safeco stadium and popped in to the store. Everywhere I looked there was Suzuki swag and—at the risk of profiling all East Asians—everywhere I looked there were Japanese people buying it. I cannot imagine just how much revenue the Mariners will have given up from memorabilia in order to pressgang a whole new team and weigh anchor out of last place in the AL West.

That said, the Yanks too often seems to be the place where superannuated superstars like dying supernovas go to shed their final, fading energies, so the last laugh might be on Seattle. Suzuki is 38 and joins an aging, although still impressive line-up (Jeter is 38, A-Rod is 36, etc.), whose glory days may not be ahead of them. Of course, it’s possible that Suzuki—who’s never been in a World Series before—might suddenly gain a new lease on life now that he has the ring almost in his grasp. Big bucks and big-time ball can do that to a player. Just ask his 38-year-old countryman Hideki Matsui, who batted .615 in the Yanks World Series win of 2009.

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England vs. South Africa, First Test, Day 5

Posted on July 23, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook

Final result. England 385 & 240. South Africa 637-2 declared. South Africa win by an innings and 12 runs. As expected, England succumbed to defeat in the first Test match today. Only Ian Bell and Matt Prior put up any real resistance to the South African onslaught. This is a stupendous defeat. In fact, it’s the most comprehensive victory ever in a Test match. Here’s what that means: each South African wicket cost 318.50 runs; each English wicket cost 31.25. That’s a difference of 287.25 runs—the largest differential ever. That’s not so much a loss as a crushing, soul-sucking evisceration. It’s so big that I’m unable to think of any baseball equivalent: perhaps a score of 30 to zip might just about get there. At some point you just want to call the umpires over and tell them to take the pummeled side off the field: it’s just too painful. But, no—the game had to go on to the bitter end.

One of the reasons for the South African triumph was Hashim Amla, who became the first South African player in the history of the game to score more than 300 runs in a Test innings—a triumph in and of itself. Another was the astonishing pace and brilliance of Dale Steyn, who destroyed the English middle order today. He is a bowler apart. Yet another reason was that this South African side has so much depth in its batting and bowling that England had no answer. England now go 1-0 down in the three-match series. They’ve come back to win series before from a deficit, and they may do so again, but the team they’re facing is a record-breaking unit. In my book (and perhaps shortly in the official books as well) they’re the best side in the world.

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England vs. South Africa, First Test, Day 4

Posted on July 22, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook
Jacques Kallis

Jacques Kallis: We are not worthy

End of day score. England 385 and 102-4. South Africa 637-2 declared. As I (Martin) suspected yesterday, South Africa put their large, hobnailed boot on England’s neck and only lifted it in order to kick the supine body in the shins, punch it in the stomach, and then box it around the ears (and you thought cricket was a gentle game!). South Africa continued where they left off at the end of the third day and simply batted  . . . and batted . . . and batted . . . until they decided they had enough runs to roll England out and declared. The England bowlers had no answer as Hashim Amla ambled, flicked, glided, and stroked his way to a nonchalantly elegant 311 not out, and Jacques Kallis magnificently, imperiously marched to 182 not out, on the way getting his forty-fricking-third Test century.

I’m sorry: I love Sachin Tendulkar like a brother, and think he’s an unalloyed boon to the world of cricket. But can we just all admit right now that Jacques Kallis is the greatest player in the world today? Anyone who can bat like him and take almost 300 Test wickets for his country is quite simply giving South Africa an extra player and a half each time he steams over the horizon like an aircraft carrier in a skirmish between frigates and destroyers. Sure, he may not be the most elegant, sinewy player to pick up a bat (the unflappable Amla is a much more attractive craftsman) but Kallis goes about picking apart an attack like hyenas around a dead gazelle until there’s nothing left but the bones and the distant memory that once there was a living, breathing being. (That’s enough with the violent metaphors, Ed.) What’s even more amazing is that A. B. de Villiers, one of the most exciting and destructive batsmen in the world at the moment, didn’t even get a chance to bat. Can you imagine what might have happened if A. B. had come to the crease at 600-3 and decided to practice his Twenty20 skills on the English bowlers?

England, 252 runs behind, replied in their second innings as though they’d run into a brick wall, fallen back and been mugged by eleven angry Boers, before being thrown off a turret onto a herd of disgruntled rhinos below. (I said that’s enough, Ed.) England have been known to mount rearguard actions before. In fact they’ve made rather a specialty of it against South Africa. The final day’s play, however, will require the mother of all Dunkirk spirits. I see a South African win by ten wickets. Unless . . .

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England vs. South Africa, First Test, Day 3

Posted on July 22, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook
Hashim Amla

Hashim Amla: Long of beard and patience.

End of day score. England 385. South Africa 403/2. Every now and again in Test cricket a team experiences not merely a bad day but total demoralization. Because the Test match may go on for five days, a side can not only grind the opposition down but can stamp on the ashes and scatter them to the four winds. Today was such a day for England, who toiled for six hours and only took one South African wicket. South Africa are now 17 runs ahead with the chance to gather the scattered ashes of England, reconstitute the body, and then destroy it all over again—sending a signal not only that they are going to win the series but attain the number-one spot in world cricket. South Africa’s batsmen were dominant: the crab-like captain Graeme Smith poked and prodded his way to 131, while the elegantly understated Hashim Amla (183 not out) and the indomitable warship Jacques Kallis (82 not out) piled on the agony. This match is heading in only one direction, and that is a crushing defeat for England. Unless . . .

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England vs. South Africa, First Test, Day 2

Posted on July 22, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook

End of day score. England: 385 all out. South Africa 86-1. The great glory of Test cricket is that a side can be dominant at the end of one day’s play and by the end of the next day’s play can be under the cosh. That happened to England today, as they collapsed from 275-3 to 385 all out before South Africa accumulated runs, with some painfully slow progress, to leave themselves in a good situation to pile on the agony tomorrow.

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England vs. South Africa, First Test, Day 1

Posted on July 20, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook
Alastair Cook

Alastair Cook: Good day at the office

End of day score: England 275-3. The hero for England was Alastair Cook, who scored his twentieth century at the age of only twenty-seven. Cook is not an exciting batsman; I (Martin) think even he would admit that. But he’s incredibly solid. Jonathan Trott (also low in the wowza quotient) made a patient 71, while Kevin Pietersen provided one of his cameos of 42. England should expect to push on to something over 400 for their first innings total. Question of the day: Who are (or have been) the Alastair Cooks of baseball: great stats, no great excitement; sterling performers with minimal charisma; the sort of guy you want on your team but the crowd just can’t get that thrilled about?

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Finally, the Big One

Posted on July 18, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook

Tomorrow (Thursday), it begins: the Test series that all cricket fans have been waiting for—England vs. South Africa in three mouthwatering matches to determine which is the best side in the world. Although the series should have been five games, and is being squeezed by the Olympics and the British Open, it nonetheless has all the ingredients of being a mighty contest: great bowlers, very talented batsmen, and “history” between some of the characters. I (Martin) will try to fill you in on some of the dramas, large and small, as the cast takes the stage and the plays begin.

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Once round the Sun for Right Off the Bat

Posted on July 12, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook

Once around for “Right Off the Bat”

Our blue sphere has made one revolution round the sun, and in the words of James Joyce, “by a commodious vicus of recirculation back to” today, July 12, 2012, Martin and I have thus officially completed one year in print—between covers (and in electronic form, even on our Paper Anniversary). However, there was little celebrating in the baseball universe yesterday, as the Major League All-Star Game quickly devolved into a snooze thanks in large measure to the uncharacteristically (?) poor pitching of Justin Verlander. Not only did the American League lose their third straight All-Star Game (handing over five earned runs in the first inning), but former A.L. outfielder (Yankees and Royals) Melky Cabrera was awarded Most Valuable Player honors on the National League side. (While circling the bases, like an indifferent planet orbiting the pitcher’s mound, Melky hesitated a moment and even seemed perplexed when former teammate and best-buddy, second-baseman Robinson Cano, would not shake hands in passing. Good grief.) Incidentally, A.L. manager Ron Washington would not yank Verlander: as it is said in the UK, such would be bad form. With the unfortunate All-Star Game rule dictating home-field advantage in the World Series, Washington may find himself holding the fuzzy end of the lollipop (cf. Marilyn Monroe, Some Like It Hot) come postseason—as he did in 2010 and 2011—when the Giants and then the Cardinals had home-field advantage versus Washington’s Texas Rangers. (Adding “meaning” to the All-Star Game, an exhibition largely drawn from fan vote, is, once again: Bad Form.)

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Ding Dong Ding Dong Ding

Posted on July 12, 2012 by rightoffthebatbook
Ian Bell

Sound as a bell

Frank Loesser said it best. “Ask me how do I feel,” chimes the ostentatiously virtuous Sarah Brown (rhetorically) to the covertly virtuous Sky Masterson in Loesser’s musical-without-equal Guys and Dolls, “Well sir, all I can say, is if I were a bell I’d be ringing!” Sarah’s campanological joie de vivre is currently being shared by all fans of English cricket after the national side beat the Australians 4-0 in the recent, deeply acontextual one-day international (ODI) series.

There were several stars of the show for England—Steven Finn, the young fast-bowling tyro; Ravi Bopara, finally establishing himself in the England line-up as a more-than-useful all-rounder; and, in our humble opinion, beyond them all, Ian Bell. Bell, who’d taken his place at the top of the order following Kevin Pietersen’s “retirement” from international one-day cricket for England, scored more runs than anyone else, and did so with an understated and effortless brilliance that redefined flamboyance. Bell may lack Pietersen’s “ring-a-ding-ding,” but his technique is sound, and the timing and sinuousness of his shots are positively tintinnabular. What’s more, Bell has been so good that the England team haven’t missed Pietersen’s spectacular dominance at all. Here is Ian Bell showing everyone how to play his specialty—that purest and silkiest of cricket shots, the off drive:

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