Draft: The Mashrafe Mortaza Simulation Draft

[Aislabie]

Just thankful I was somewhat fortunate with the lottery picks tbh otherwise I probably wouldn't have a middle order to speak of at all.

Yeah, Che Pujara and Michael Yardy could have gone far worse. Honestly, with a little bit of rearranging (and a non-Botham all-rounder) it's a really decent side.

1. Cheteshwar Pujara
2. Adam Gilchrist
3. Brian Lara
4. Viv Richards
5. Zubin Surkari
6. Clive Rice
7. Michael Yardy
8. Tony Suji
9. Paul Mooney
10. Muttiah Muralitharan
11. Glenn McGrath

I completely understand the quandry though - you ideally needed another quick bowler to fill in that gap in your side, but you also needed a hitter to beef up your middle order. So options include:

Shakib Al Hasan - It'll be an unbalanced bowling attack with yet another spinner, but almost worth the imbalance to get him in.
Ian Botham - I can't shake my opinion of him as a bits-and-pieces one day player, even if Test Botham was a completely different beast.
Richard Hadlee - A huge addition to your bowling attack, but less of a huge addition to your batting order.
Justin Kemp - A dynamic middle-order batsman, but his bowling wasn't really used as much as it could have been.
Albie Morkel - Like Kemp, but bigger.
Jacob Oram - Just a player who I remember really fondly from when I was growing up, even if he arguably wasn't that great.
Abdul Razzaq - Not the first player you think of, but he'd cover both bases pretty well.
Clive Rice - Only three ODIs, but he's going to have an impact. I chose him out of all of these options but there are others.
Ben Stokes - A superb batsman, but a bowling average in the 40s would leave you with a bit of a gap in your bowling attack alongside McGrath.

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

Will truly like and appreciate a full breakdown of my team as well

Like alternatives for Vettori etc etc

If and only if you have spare time @Aislabie

 

[El Loco]

I seriously considered Abdul Razzaq as he's actually one of the only genuine pace all-rounders you mentioned but I ended up opting for Botham just due to the star power aspect I guess...if that makes any semblance of sense.
Ben Stokes a great shout as well but decided against him for the very reason you mentioned.

Post automatically merged: Jun 5, 2021

I definitely missed a trick with Clive Rice, cheers for your analysis I very much enjoyed reading not only mine but everyone elses!

 

[Aislabie]

Will truly like and appreciate a full breakdown of my team as well

Like alternatives for Vettori etc etc

If and only if you have spare time @Aislabie

1. Sachin Tendulkar
2. Ian Philip
3. Jacques Kallis
4. Mohammad Ashraful
5. AB de Villiers
6. Alok Kapali
7. Kapil Dev
8. Daniel Vettori
9. Berend Westdijk
10. Lasith Malinga
11. Lionel Baker

Okay so this is a really interesting team; I cannot fault the top five whatsoever - Tendulkar and Kallis might not be explosive players by modern standards, but with AB de Villiers (as previously mentioned, him as a middle-order batsman is a greater point of difference than any other player in the history of the white-ball game. No issues there. Similarly, Kapil Dev coming in at seven is a pretty perfect selection given how much faster he scored than pretty much anyone else of his era. Your batting is fine. Your bowling is trickier though:

Lasith Malinga - death bowler
you had yet to pick Kapil Dev - attacking bowler (seam) when you made your Vettori pick
Lionel Baker - stock bowler (seam, lottery)
Jacques Kallis - stock bowler (seam)
Sachin Tendulker - part-time bowler (spin)
Alok Kapali - nah

So it was in this position that you picked up Daniel Vettori (stock bowler, spin) - an understandable pick, but not one that necessarily fills either of the holes in your bowling attack: namely, attacking bowlers (especially spin) and express pace bowlers. Therefore, you'd be looking for either a proper pace bowler or an attacking spinner, ideally one who provides you some batting prowess because you never know what's coming out of the lottery.

Shahid Afridi - Not the most consistent player, but an attacking leggie and undeniably hard-hitting batsman.
Shakib Al Hasan - The quintessential underrated ODI cricketer, truly excellent.
Upul Chandana - What baseball converts might call a "three-tool" player, he'd be a good firefighter and fielder as well as a fine one-day leggie.
Jamie Dalrymple - Not really!
Brad Hogg - Really underrated chinaman bowler, and would do a decent job batting at seven or eight.
Richard Hadlee - One of the best fast bowlers available, and more than capable of swinging the bat at seven or eight.
Rashid Khan - Wouldn't bat higher than eight, but already one of the format's great attacking spinners.
Abdul Razzaq - See previous post.
Clive Rice - See previous post.

Because of where you were in the draft, you could make a case for most of those options:

1	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar
2	Ian Philip	Ian Philip	Ian Philip	Ian Philip	Ian Philip
3	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis
4	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful
5	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers
6	Shakib Al Hasan	Shahid Afridi	-	-	-
7	-	-	Richard Hadlee	Brad Hogg	Alok Kapal
8	Alok Kapali	Alok Kapali	Alok Kapali	Alok Kapali	Rashid Khan
9	-	-	-	-	-
10	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga
11	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker

I do think that whichever of those you go with, you get a better balanced team than with Vettori though.

Of course, the real fun times are when I try and do this for my own team!

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

1. Sachin Tendulkar
2. Ian Philip
3. Jacques Kallis
4. Mohammad Ashraful
5. AB de Villiers
6. Alok Kapali
7. Kapil Dev
8. Daniel Vettori
9. Berend Westdijk
10. Lasith Malinga
11. Lionel Baker

Okay so this is a really interesting team; I cannot fault the top five whatsoever - Tendulkar and Kallis might not be explosive players by modern standards, but with AB de Villiers (as previously mentioned, him as a middle-order batsman is a greater point of difference than any other player in the history of the white-ball game. No issues there. Similarly, Kapil Dev coming in at seven is a pretty perfect selection given how much faster he scored than pretty much anyone else of his era. Your batting is fine. Your bowling is trickier though:

Lasith Malinga - death bowler
you had yet to pick Kapil Dev - attacking bowler (seam) when you made your Vettori pick
Lionel Baker - stock bowler (seam, lottery)
Jacques Kallis - stock bowler (seam)
Sachin Tendulker - part-time bowler (spin)
Alok Kapali - nah

So it was in this position that you picked up Daniel Vettori (stock bowler, spin) - an understandable pick, but not one that necessarily fills either of the holes in your bowling attack: namely, attacking bowlers (especially spin) and express pace bowlers. Therefore, you'd be looking for either a proper pace bowler or an attacking spinner, ideally one who provides you some batting prowess because you never know what's coming out of the lottery.

Shahid Afridi - Not the most consistent player, but an attacking leggie and undeniably hard-hitting batsman.
Shakib Al Hasan - The quintessential underrated ODI cricketer, truly excellent.
Upul Chandana - What baseball converts might call a "three-tool" player, he'd be a good firefighter and fielder as well as a fine one-day leggie.
Jamie Dalrymple - Not really!
Brad Hogg - Really underrated chinaman bowler, and would do a decent job batting at seven or eight.
Richard Hadlee - One of the best fast bowlers available, and more than capable of swinging the bat at seven or eight.
Rashid Khan - Wouldn't bat higher than eight, but already one of the format's great attacking spinners.
Abdul Razzaq - See previous post.
Clive Rice - See previous post.

Because of where you were in the draft, you could make a case for most of those options:

1	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar	Sachin Tendulkar
2	Ian Philip	Ian Philip	Ian Philip	Ian Philip	Ian Philip
3	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis	Jacques Kallis
4	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful	Mohammad Ashraful
5	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers	AB de Villiers
6	Shakib Al Hasan	Shahid Afridi	-	-	-
7	-	-	Richard Hadlee	Brad Hogg	Alok Kapal
8	Alok Kapali	Alok Kapali	Alok Kapali	Alok Kapali	Rashid Khan
9	-	-	-	-	-
10	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga	Lasith Malinga
11	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker	Lionel Baker

I do think that whichever of those you go with, you get a better balanced team than with Vettori though.

Of course, the real fun times are when I try and do this for my own team!

I missed Afridi Rashid and Shakib went for Vettori

Excellent analysis @Aislabie . Yes I also could have gone for a pace all rounder but then my spin dept. would be majorly hollow hence I had to select a spin bowler. Didn't pick a genuine spinner because if I got a spl bowler in lottery (which I actually did) that would have been a long tail.

 

[ddrap14]

8. Tony Suji
9. Paul Mooney

it's a really decent side.

Will never see that again

Update: Only if you have spare time for it, but I would like an analysis too please.

 

[Aislabie]

Will never see that again

Update: Only if you have spare time for it, but I would like an analysis too please.

With your side, you got some fairly okay lottery picks (Akmal, Gavaskar), but I feel as though you could generally have made better use of your draft picks to create a more balanced team. Obviously, your lottery pulls are also a little restrictive:

1	Sanath Jayasuriya	Round 4 pick
2	Shane Watson	Round 6 pick
3	Virat Kohli	Round 1 pick
4	Chaminda Vaas	Round 3 pick
5	Courtney Kruger (L1)	Must bat at five
6	Michael Bevan	Round 2 pick
7	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)	Must bat at six or seven
8	Adnan Akmal (L3)	Must bat at seven or eight
9	Naimur Rahman (L5)	Can bat anywhere in the top nine
10	Saqlain Mushtaq	Round 5 pick
11	Josephat Ababu (L2)	Best kept out of the way

So let's look at these picks one by one

Round 1: Virat Kohli
You had a blank slate and went with one of the best ODI batsmen of all time. Very hard to argue with, my only gripe being that AB de Villiers and Viv Richards (both available at the time) were better than their contemporaries by an even greater distance than Kohli was. And I picked none of them, for I am an idiot.

Round 2: Michael Bevan
In response to being lumbered with Courtney Kruger, you have chosen to immediately strengthen your middle order with Michael Bevan. Again, it's a sensible choice - his batting was streets ahead of his contemporaries in this role. However, given the type of draft we're running here, it would also make sense to have picked at least one all-rounder by now. Pollock, Klusener, Shakib, Flintoff, Hadlee, Kapil, Rice and Symonds were all available at this point.

Round 3: Chaminda Vaas
Of course, it was not your plan for Vaas to become such a floater in the batting order, but this is definitely your most confusing pick. Every one of the all-rounders mentioned as possible Bevan alternatives would still be available at this point, and would certainly have lent themselves better to the awkward fit ultimately demanded by your team.

Round 4: Sanath Jayasuriya
A good, solid dual-role player - exactly the type of cricketer we needed to prioritise in this draft. Jayasuriya was one of those Sri Lankan players who is weird because you remember him being a beast but his ODI batting average was barely over 30 (in this case 32.28), but for him this is partly due to his early years spent as a non-opener. His strike rate was still exceptional for the era, and his record as a stock spinner is still pretty hard to fault. Not a player I had on my list, but a well-thought-out pick.

Round 5: Saqlain Mushtaq
Mushtaq in round five is a bit of a steal - the approach of sneaking a specialist spinner while we're all scrabbling for all-rounders is a very strong one, but might have been better for your team if you had picked up a couple of better all-rounders earlier. This is sort of Schroedinger's pick - simultaneously excellent and lacking something, depending upon when it is observed.

Round 6: Shane Watson
Absolute cracker of a last-round pick. Can't fault this one at all.

So, what would I would have done differently with the benefit of hindsight?

	Option 1	Option 2	Option 3
1	Sanath Jayasuriya	Sanath Jayasuriya	Sanath Jayasuriya
2	Shane Watson	Shane Watson	Shane Watson
3	Virat Kohli	Virat Kohli	Virat Kohli
4	Michael Bevan	Andrew Flintoff (for Bevan)	Shakib Al Hasan (for Bevan)
5	Courtney Kruger (L1)	Courtney Kruger (L1)	Courtney Kruger (L1)
6	Shakib Al Hasan (for Vaas)	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)	Andrew Flintoff (for Vaas)
7	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)	Richard Hadlee (for Vaas)	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)
8	Adnan Akmal (L3)	Adnan Akmal (L3)	Adnan Akmal (L3)
9	Naimur Rahman (L5)	Naimur Rahman (L5)	Richard Hadlee (for Saqlain)
10	Saqlain Mushtaq	Saqlain Mushtaq	Naimur Rahman (L5)*
11	Josephat Ababu (L2)	Josephat Ababu (L2)	Josephat Ababu (L2)

*Can be shunted all the way to 10 if there is nobody else to bat that low.

I would probably have gone for something more like Option 3, just to definitely avoid Naimur Rahman really having to do important stuff like bat or bowl or anything

 

[CerealKiller]

With your side, you got some fairly okay lottery picks (Akmal, Gavaskar), but I feel as though you could generally have made better use of your draft picks to create a more balanced team. Obviously, your lottery pulls are also a little restrictive:

1	Sanath Jayasuriya	Round 4 pick
2	Shane Watson	Round 6 pick
3	Virat Kohli	Round 1 pick
4	Chaminda Vaas	Round 3 pick
5	Courtney Kruger (L1)	Must bat at five
6	Michael Bevan	Round 2 pick
7	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)	Must bat at six or seven
8	Adnan Akmal (L3)	Must bat at seven or eight
9	Naimur Rahman (L5)	Can bat anywhere in the top nine
10	Saqlain Mushtaq	Round 5 pick
11	Josephat Ababu (L2)	Best kept out of the way

So let's look at these picks one by one

Round 1: Virat Kohli
You had a blank slate and went with one of the best ODI batsmen of all time. Very hard to argue with, my only gripe being that AB de Villiers and Viv Richards (both available at the time) were better than their contemporaries by an even greater distance than Kohli was. And I picked none of them, for I am an idiot.

Round 2: Michael Bevan
In response to being lumbered with Courtney Kruger, you have chosen to immediately strengthen your middle order with Michael Bevan. Again, it's a sensible choice - his batting was streets ahead of his contemporaries in this role. However, given the type of draft we're running here, it would also make sense to have picked at least one all-rounder by now. Pollock, Klusener, Shakib, Flintoff, Hadlee, Kapil, Rice and Symonds were all available at this point.

Round 3: Chaminda Vaas
Of course, it was not your plan for Vaas to become such a floater in the batting order, but this is definitely your most confusing pick. Every one of the all-rounders mentioned as possible Bevan alternatives would still be available at this point, and would certainly have lent themselves better to the awkward fit ultimately demanded by your team.

Round 4: Sanath Jayasuriya
A good, solid dual-role player - exactly the type of cricketer we needed to prioritise in this draft. Jayasuriya was one of those Sri Lankan players who is weird because you remember him being a beast but his ODI batting average was barely over 30 (in this case 32.28), but for him this is partly due to his early years spent as a non-opener. His strike rate was still exceptional for the era, and his record as a stock spinner is still pretty hard to fault. Not a player I had on my list, but a well-thought-out pick.

Round 5: Saqlain Mushtaq
Mushtaq in round five is a bit of a steal - the approach of sneaking a specialist spinner while we're all scrabbling for all-rounders is a very strong one, but might have been better for your team if you had picked up a couple of better all-rounders earlier. This is sort of Schroedinger's pick - simultaneously excellent and lacking something, depending upon when it is observed.

Round 6: Shane Watson
Absolute cracker of a last-round pick. Can't fault this one at all.

So, what would I would have done differently with the benefit of hindsight?

	Option 1	Option 2	Option 3
1	Sanath Jayasuriya	Sanath Jayasuriya	Sanath Jayasuriya
2	Shane Watson	Shane Watson	Shane Watson
3	Virat Kohli	Virat Kohli	Virat Kohli
4	Michael Bevan	Andrew Flintoff (for Bevan)	Shakib Al Hasan (for Bevan)
5	Courtney Kruger (L1)	Courtney Kruger (L1)	Courtney Kruger (L1)
6	Shakib Al Hasan (for Vaas)	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)	Andrew Flintoff (for Vaas)
7	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)	Richard Hadlee (for Vaas)	Rohan Gavaskar (L4)
8	Adnan Akmal (L3)	Adnan Akmal (L3)	Adnan Akmal (L3)
9	Naimur Rahman (L5)	Naimur Rahman (L5)	Richard Hadlee (for Saqlain)
10	Saqlain Mushtaq	Saqlain Mushtaq	Naimur Rahman (L5)*
11	Josephat Ababu (L2)	Josephat Ababu (L2)	Josephat Ababu (L2)

*Can be shunted all the way to 10 if there is nobody else to bat that low.

I would probably have gone for something more like Option 3, just to definitely avoid Naimur Rahman really having to do important stuff like bat or bowl or anything

Ok, now I can't resist asking for an analysis of my team too

 

[ddrap14]

[TD] Andrew Flintoff[/TD]

That's the only fault I can give for this analysis.

Kohli got the nod over AB because I think he's a slightly better captain and none of my other picks were remotely close to that.

For pick 2, I chose Bevan because he is pretty much the best rescue man the game has seen, and having lumbered myself with Courtney Kruger (and knowing I'd likely get another batsman through the lottery) I needed that kind of firefighter. Also he can bowl

Pick 3 looks bad on the surface. You see, I picked Vaas as a bowler who I wanted to bat at nine- my plan was to try and nullify the first three lotteries, then plug the gaps with allrounders. The issue being, I then got Ababu and Naimur with two of the next three lotteries. Which, combined with needing an actual spinner, pushed him higher than I ever wanted him to be. My issue with all of your suggestions (barring Hadlee who I missed and Rice who I forgot existed) is that they aren't as penetrative with the ball as I was wanting at this point. Just look at the 2003 World Cup, and that Bangladesh game.

Mushtaq at fifth pick was something of a panic pick, but again, Rashid Khan was taken and not many spinners are outright better.

Basically my plan, as I said, was to get a spine in the first six picks and then stem the bleeding with allrounders. It didn't go too badly (I got very lucky with getting a keeper in the lottery) but maybe if I had gone the other way (or picked Joel Garner first (it was a tossup between him and Kohli), allowing for another bat up top) my team would have been a bit stronger in the end. My habit of lumbering myself with my own lottery picks didn't help!

 

[CerealKiller]

That's the only fault I can give for this analysis.

 

[Aislabie]

Ok, now I can't resist asking for an analysis of my team too

1. Javed Omar Belim (Lottery 3)
2. Rohit Sharma (Round 5)
3. Brijal Patel (Lottery 1)
4. Jos Buttler (Round 6)
5. Imran Khan (Round 2)
6. Shaun Pollock (Round 3)
7. Gerrie Snyman (Lottery 5)
8. Wasim Akram (Round 1)
9. Waqar Younis (Round 4)
10. Deighton Butler (Lottery 2)
11. Pommie Mbangwa (Lottery 4)

Okay, so let's look at the picks on a round-by-round basis first of all.

Round 1 - Wasim Akram
Just a huge pick straight off the bat. The absolute ultimate in terms of counting stats; his VARP doesn't factor quite so highly because he ends up being compared against a very strong "Replacement" player but still an absolutely enormous pick. Almost impossible to argue with, especially given the underrated second string that his hitting represented.

Round 2 - Imran Khan
In some ways, Imran is one of your less remarkable picks - he's got stats like Andrew Flintoff and performs a similar role, but this is where I have to diverge from my usual stat-based reasoning. It's IMRAN KHAN. And he's here as captain. Arguably not the pick I'd have made but definitely not a pick I'm complaining about. Next.

Round 3 - Shaun Pollock
Three picks now and three engine room all-rounders This is particularly valuable as you've picked up Brijal Patel and Deighton Butler as your first-round picks, neither of which is going to pull up any trees. Pollock by comparison could be considered the "forgotten" all-time great in one-day cricket and is a steal of a round-three pick.

Round 4 - Waqar Younis
A third Pakistani player, and a definite steal in Round 4. This more or less completes a top-quality bowling line-up, but at this point one must ask - is it worth it? So far, you have the bowling of these four quicks, but you've not used a single draft pick on a specialist batsman, a keeper or a spinner. All of your eggs are in one basket, but it is a very nice basket.

Round 5 - Rohit Sharma
Rohit certainly plugs one of those holes: you now have a top-quality top-order batsman. If you wanted to claim a top-order player who would add to the predominantly Pakistani chemistry of the side then Zaheer Abbas was also a definite option as well, but Rohit definitely works. He also breaks up the utterly dour Brijal-Belim partnership that had threatened to form.

Round 6 - Jos Buttler
After holding out for a lottery keeper that didn't come, you were forced in Round Six into picking a wicket-keeper, and you really needed him to bat in the top four. To this end, there were a few options - Jos was obviously one, although one who usually comes in a little lower in the order. Kumar Sangakkara was another. Kamran Akmal was available. The pick I expected you to make here was Jonny Bairstow, giving you a Bairstow-Rohit opening partnership with Brijal at three and Belim at four; given how Brijal usually gets out in mere moments, this would have guaranteed you at least one big hitter at the crease at any time until Wasim got out - especially after picking up Gerrie Snyman in an excellent draft steal.

However, there is one hole in this team that goes unplugged, and it is that of a good spin bowler. Although you do manage to cover all bases in terms of roles - you have a death bowler (Wasim), an express pace bowler (Waqar), an attacking bowler (Imran) and a stock bowler (Pollock) and your lottery bowlers to fill in the gaps, but you don't have a spinner.

I will cautiously say that I would have considered bringing in another spinner, possibly a spinning all-rounder in place of Waqar in Round Four, and I would definitely have picked Bairstow over Buttler in Round Six so as to complete an imposing opening pair. Therefore, my side would be something like:

1. Rohit Sharma
2. Jonny Bairstow
3. :ban Javed Omar Belim
4. Shakib Al Hasan
5. Imran Khan
6. Shaun Pollock
7. Gerrie Snyman
8. Wasim Akram
9. Brijal Patel
10. Deighton Butler
11. Pommie Mbangwa

One alternative pick to Shakib as a spinning all-rounder (which does admittedly go against my ethos of picking an attacking spinner in the side) is that of Darren Lehmann. An ODI batting average of 39 (which rises to 47 in all List A cricket) and a bowling average of 27 (which is consistent with his average across all List A cricket) points to one of the most underrated one-day international cricketers of all time. His Running Strike Rate - remarkably for someone with such a well-earned reputation for poor ground speed - is also higher than anyone else of his era, which really does highlight the extent to which he was the Joe Root of his day with the bat: adept at manoeuvring the field and scoring with a minimum of fuss or risk.

Indeed, Lehmann would be a strong candidate to get picked up in my next planned draft...

 

[ddrap14]

Indeed, Lehmann would be a strong candidate to get picked up in my next planned draft...

Treat this post as, I'm in