Pat Cummins vs Waqar Younis - Who is the better ODI bowler?

[mominsaigol]

Pat Cummins. He won his team all 3 world tournaments with his bowling contributions. Temperamentally way stronger and bowls in the T20 era on flatter pitches, bigger bats and shorter boundaries. Still has excellent stats. Waqar Younis was a great but overall Pat Cummins any day. Also add batting + fielding + captaincy skills. No brainer.

Not putting Waqar down. He is a legend but overall Cummins will have a bigger legacy.

Captain vs bowler are 2 separate metrics.

Waqar is a better bowler. Cummins a better leader, captain, allrounder etc etc.

 

[AMSS]

Waqar Younis was a serial bottler. Anytime the pressure was on you could trust this mental midget to soil himself.

Anyone who has grown watching cricket in 90s and early 2000s knows how anticipated those 3-4 team ODI tournaments were. So I looked up how Waqar the white ball bowler featured in those tournaments - especially the finals.

So get this, Waqar played in 27 such finals. In these matches, Waqar averages 31.

To compare and contrast, Ventakesh Prasad played 20 such white ball finals and he averages 27 in those.

So Ajay Jadeja manhandling Waqar was NOT some exception to his career. This is what Waqar Younis was - a nothingburger.

 

[Bhaijaan]

You can create a gazillion threads just for the sake of it then. What an absolute baseless comparison.

Disrespectful to Waqar Younis who is an ODI legend and an icon of the 1990s.

 

[Hellion]

Waqar Younis was a serial bottler. Anytime the pressure was on you could trust this mental midget to soil himself.

Anyone who has grown watching cricket in 90s and early 2000s knows how anticipated those 3-4 team ODI tournaments were. So I looked up how Waqar the white ball bowler featured in those tournaments - especially the finals.

So get this, Waqar played in 27 such finals. In these matches, Waqar averages 31.

To compare and contrast, Ventakesh Prasad played 20 such white ball finals and he averages 27 in those.

So Ajay Jadeja manhandling Waqar was NOT some exception to his career. This is what Waqar Younis was - a nothingburger.

Apparently , ODI's were all equally valued and given equal importance before the coming of leagues.

But they won't acknowledge performances of modern bowlers in said leagues because it doesn't suit their agendas.

Hence the hype for an ICC tournament failure like Waqar who could do jack all despite his shenanigans with the ball.

 

[AMSS]

Apparently , ODI's were all equally valued and given equal importance before the coming of leagues.

But they won't acknowledge performances of modern bowlers in said leagues because it doesn't suit their agendas.

Hence the hype for an ICC tournament failure like Waqar who could do jack all despite his shenanigans with the ball.

Hoisted by their own petard

 

[Buffet]

Waqar Younis was a serial bottler.

To concluide that we need to take as large sample size as possible and see it against others in the same era.

Got me curious to look what other legends did in finals, semis and quarter finals taken togther. Because without looking at it we can't say that Waqar was poor. One random bowler can always do better or worse but let's see legends as a group and what they did. Then we can judge Waqar. Sample size is very large that way.


Sorted by Avg in Finals, Semis and Quarters:






Before some one says that Waqar was an aggresive bowler and he was told to go for wickets lets see how quickly he picked up wickets compared to other legends.

Sorted by ER in Finals, Semi and Quarters:


Among the legends ususal suspects like McGrath, Ambrose, Donald appear near the top in both. Pollock in middle.

Waqar was not that gun in any format but it's dissapointing to see him near bottom in both. Surprised to see Wasim not appear near the top in both despite having such a large sample size. He did very well with ER, so you got to give him that.

I think poor world cup record and not that great record in all finals/Semis/QF makes me rethink putting Wasim undoubeltly among the top 5 pacers in both formats combined. Given how far ahead McGrath, Donald and Ambrose were in the test format in the same era and more weight to test format for sure, it may be more appropriate to say top 5-7 spots combining both formats if undoubtebly word is used.

Looking at every thing, the gap between Waqar and Cummins does not appear that big in ODI. I had thought that gap was much bigger. I don't think we have large sample size for Cummins for semis/QF/F to compare him against his peer group.

I will still take Waqar over Cummins in ODI but this talk about Waqar being a great bowler in ODI has a weaker basis seeing his peer group performance. I know some will point out longevity, but longevity in test and ODI without high quality is not very meaningful.