Cricket for Americans: Batting
Or, “Wait, there are two of them? And they run with the bats?”
Note: This is the third in a series called Cricket for Americans. You also can read parts one and two.
First, let’s deal with the bat:
It’s certainly not a baseball bat, what with the flat “front” face, the curved back and the uniform width. Oh, you can use it like a baseball bat, but this is not only called by the less-than-graceful name of “slogging”, but Wikipedia tells us that slogging “carries a negative connotation in that it implies power hitting over grace and correct technique.”
Batting is much different in cricket than in baseball, not just because of the shape and purpose of the bat but also the manner of run-scoring and the layout of the pitch. There are no “foul balls” in cricket, in the sense that the entire field is in play, including the areas behind the batsman.
Indeed, a batsman doesn’t even have to make contact with the ball to score runs, and getting hit by a bowler’s delivery usually results in a bruise and possibly being out, but certainly not much good, as in baseball.
In baseball, a batter’s job is either to score runs himself or to allow his teammates to score. In cricket, a batsman’s job is to score runs, but also to not get out, and this balance can result in the same batsman playing very differently during the same innings. A stronger batsman might play much less aggressively if the rest of his team is collapsing around him, or a weaker batsman might go all out if he has little to lose.
Batting, then, is not a solitary exercise. It always depends upon and reacts to both the condition of the match at any point and the batsman at the other end of the wicket. And, of course, the bowler and fielders.
A team that is batting can score runs without a batsman even hitting the ball, but we’ll get to that in another piece. Here I’ll focus on the ways to score when a batsman does hit the ball. The first option is for the two batsmen to run back and forth between the wickets - each successful “trip” by the two results in one run, called a “single. The batsmen can try for as many runs as possible, but can be run out by the fielding team if they don’t cross the batting crease line before the bails are removed from the wickets.
Batsmen can also score runs by hitting the ball to the boundary that surrounds the pitch. If the ball hits the ground before it hits or clears the boundary, the batsman who hit the ball is awarded four runs. If the ball flies over the boundary before hitting the ground, six runs are awarded. These are called fours and sixes, respectively, as in, “Kieron Pollard hit a massive six that whacked a guy in the head!”
Fours and sixes are uncommon enough that statistics are kept on how many of each a batsman hits, although sixes in particular are a staple of T20 cricket. Hitting the ball in the air is risky because if the ball is caught before it hits the ground, the batsman is out, just like in baseball.
The metrics for batting in cricket are different from baseball, but the mark of an effective batsman is simple: one who scores lots of runs. Batsmen strive to score as many as possible without getting out, but performance is measured in several key ways. One is how many times a batsman has scored either 50 or (more importantly) 100 runs in a match. The scoring of 100 runs, called a century or a ton, is a milestone in any format of the game.
During a match, another key metric is the number of runs scored by a pair of batsmen, since a productive partnership usually means that both are well-set and scoring runs.
Like baseball, cricket batsman have averages, which is calculated by dividing the number of runs scored in a given format by the number of matches played in that format. For example, Don Bradman, considered by many the greatest batsman, averaged 99.94 runs in 52 Test matches. The next-highest Test average is 60.97 (think about that for a few seconds: in what other sport is the best career average so far ahead of the next-highest mark?).
Baseball swings aren’t identical, but there’s a pretty narrow set of swings that most hitters use. You will hear announcers describing baseball batters “slapping” the ball to the opposite field, or pulling it hard. Like cricket, baseball batting is a matter of timing, hand-eye coordination and footwork.
Except in cricket the ball usually bounces first and should be hit anyway. Or a batsman can leave the ball without trying to hit it, which usually has no penalty unless the ball then goes onto hit the stumps. This underscores the twin responsibilities of the batsman: score and protect your wicket (when you are out in cricket, you are said to have lost your wicket).
Another major difference between cricket and baseball batting is that in cricket, defensive batting not only occurs but sometimes is vital. Shivnarine Chanderpaul, a West Indian batsman, is renowed for his ability to defend his wicket, to the point where he is “the only batsman in the history of Test cricket to have faced 1,000 consecutive balls without getting out.” Yes, he also scores runs, lots of them. But there are times during a match when a player’s priority is to defend, not attack.
The best defense is to, as the English are fond of saying, “play with a straight bat”. This means showing the flat face of the bat in the direction of the bowler with the goal of deflecting the ball away from the stumps. If the delivery has enough pace on it, sometimes the ball caroms away for a distance, allowing the batsman to run. This is less a “swing” than the presentation of a wall.
The other defensive choice is to leave the ball, or not to play it as it goes by. This is often the best option for deliveries that are too wide of either side of the batsman.
Batsmen usually stand in front of the stumps when batting, although depending on the bowler, they might step to one side to give themselves some room, but at the risk of leaving the stumps unprotected. If the delivery knocks the bails off the stumps behind the batsman — no matter how that occurs — the batsman is out. However, remaining in front of the stumps is no guarantee of safety, either: if the batsman fails to hit the ball and the umpire judges that it would be gone on to hit the stumps, the batsman can be given out, too (don’t worry, we’ll review this outcome, called Leg Before Wicket, in the next piece).
There are a handful of types of swings in baseball, but not nearly as many ways to play the ball as exist in cricket, since the ball can be hit in any direction. The most familiar to baseball fans might be the pull shot, in which a batsman pulls the bat across his body, usually when the ball is above his waist. In baseball, such a shot usually would result in a foul ball, but that’s not a concern in cricket.
But there are a number of shots that would seem strange to a baseball batter, including the sweep shot, in which the batsman goes down on one leg and whips the bat across his body, usually to a ball that keeps low. Or the scoop (or ramp) shot, which you’ll just have to see to believe. One common theme in aggressive shot selection is to place the ball in gaps between the fielders, or over the heads of fielders that are closer to the batsman.
In test matches, time usually permits the batsman to be pickier about when to play shots compared to ODI and T20 matches, although there are times when the bowler’s delivery forces the batsman to try and at least protect his wicket, regardless of the format.
This isn’t always easy, thanks to the bowler, who can vary the pace, height and length of the delivery, and to the captain, who often sets the fielders to induce a batsman into playing a particular shot, hoping for a mistimed one that ends up being caught in the air.
Since hitting the ball in the air carries a lot of risks for the batsman, the safest play is to hit the ball back into the ground, and hopefully with enough on the shot to allow for runs. There are many ways to do this, and many of the “orthodox,” or traditional shots are named for the direction that the ball travels:
The cover drive, which goes to the equivalent of right field for a right-handed baseball batter, involves less of a “swing” than an attempt to gracefully guide the ball through the fielders. Cuts, by contrast, involve the batsman waiting until the ball is nearly level with him before executing more of a sharp swing to hit the ball away. It can be riskier in that if the ball moves before being hit the batsman can mis-time the attempt.
In general, the batsman wants the ball to hit the middle of his bat - anywhere near the edges is usually results in a chance for fielders to catch it in the air. What makes this difficult is that the ball is caroming off the pitch at variable speeds, sometimes spinning, and the batsman usually faces a number of bowlers who have different styles. Imagine a baseball batter being forced to bat against 2-4 of the opponent’s pitchers in a single at-bat.
Just as not all bowlers are alike, batsman have different styles and roles. Cricket teams typically put their best batsmen near the top of the batting order, on the theory that they then have the opportunity to bat the longest during a match. But opening batsmen - the first two to bat - also have to face the opponent’s best bowlers, so teams sometimes will pair a more attacking opener with a more conservative one.
What makes for an attacking batsman? One who is not content (or perhaps unable) to play defensively for long. This isn’t quite a “swing for the fences” type of situation in baseball, but it’s not too far off. The trouble comes when bowlers are able to contain attacking batsmen who then cannot resist trying to score runs by playing riskier shots.
The risk of being conservative is that you don’t score enough runs or put enough pressure on bowlers. Great batsmen usually find a way to put pressure on their opponents rather than succumb to their own weaknesses. This is why great batsmen can bat for hours.
Although there is an announced batting lineup, players within the 11 listed can be moved up or down the order as circumstances dictate. For example, a batsman who is injured before batting could be moved down the order until he either feels better or is needed to bat.
The middle order of the lineup features solid batsmen but also those with some obvious flaws that prevent them from batting higher. They can score runs, and often are called upon to do so quickly once they get in, but they also might not be able to avoid playing riskier shots or have trouble with a particular kind of bowling. The middle order is also where you might find batsmen who are also called upon to bowl when the other side bats.
The last 4-5 batsmen are considered “the tail”, the weakest of the side, and whatever runs they manage to score usually are an unexpected gift. On rare occasions a tailender has an extraordinary performance,but more common are scores in the single digits and lower double digits. Bowlers look forward to bowling to the tail, in hopes of securing easier wickets.
Once a batsman is out, he doesn’t get to bat in that innings again, and the next batsman takes his place at the crease, which increases the pressure on the top order to score runs and not get out. When 10 of the 11 batsmen are out - leaving just the last batsman without a partner - the team’s innings is over. How batsman get out — from the baseball-like having a hit ball caught in the air to the subjectivity of LBW — are the subject of the next essay.
