I am, Shoot fire away...
Lets get this conversation happening
Both are players whose greatness is directly linked to their longevity.
An average of 53 is excellent but nothing out of this world and it has been bettered by several batsmen. Similarly, Anderson’s career average of 26 is nothing special either, better by several bowlers.
Their best achievement (most runs/centuries) and most wickets for a pacer are a consequence of playing the most matches and not a reflection of how good they actually were.
Batsmen and bowlers have had bigger impacts than them but have less runs and wickets because they played less.
Both Tendulkar and Anderson have amongst the worst MOM/matches played ratios in history.
This shows that they but rarely thundered. When India/England won Test matches, they were usually outperformed by their teammates. When India/England were losing, they could rarely turn the tide.
There have been around 30 instances of an Indian batsman scoring more than 500 runs in a Test series. Batsmen like Gavaskar, Dravid and Kohli managed the fear multiple times. However, interestingly enough, Tendulkar did it 0 times.
Tendulkar played Test cricket for 24 years. However, when you look at the list of most runs scores in a calendar year, you will find his name only twice out of the top 20 and not once in the top 5.
This again shows the drizzle and lack of thunder in his batting, as well as the lack of dominance relative to his peers.
There are only 3 instances of Anderson taking 10 wickets in a Test in spite of 188 matches.
There are 0 instances of Tendulkar scoring 300 in a Test.
In spite of playing the most Test matches in history, 7 batsmen have scored more 200s than Tendulkar and 6 batsmen have scored the same number as he has. This includes two active players in Williamson and Root who should overtake his tally.
Tendulkar had 0 contribution to three of India’s most famous Test wins of the 2000s - Kolkata 2001, Adelaide 2003 and Rawalpindi 2004.
All in all, it is fair to say that Tendulkar was a slightly juiced up batting version of Anderson, or Anderson was a slightly inferior bowling version of Tendulkar.
They are the same level as great Test batsmen and bowlers and the only aspect that sets them apart is their longevity, which is impressive in its own right but it is not exactly an advertisement of how great a player truly is.
Tendulkar is extremely comparable to almost every 50+ averaging batsman in history just like Anderson is extremely comparable to every 22-28 averaging bowler in history.