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[The 22nd Yard]

Boycott's comparison between possibly 3 of the greatest batsmen ever (not including himself...)

http://wp.me/p380Xy-9u

[Manormanic]

There were plenty of contempories who thought Sutcliffe better than Hobbs.  Equally, you could make arguments that Ponting, Lara and Kallis were as good as Tendulkar...

Find me a  good pub and a decent pint and we'll discuss at some length...

[jamielsn15]

There were plenty of contempories who thought Sutcliffe better than Hobbs.  Equally, you could make arguments that Ponting, Lara and Kallis were as good as Tendulkar...

Agree - we can never really say as we've never seen them play (in the case of Hobbs and Bradman); we can only judge those who have and who's opinion we respect...

I can't get away from the fact though that Bradman's average is so far ahead of anyone else that he had to have been significantly better, though I do acknowledge that averages aren't everything.  However, if he averaged 60-70, I can understand the debate, but 99.94, 90+ in first class cricket?  No-one has come close to touching that...

I would also argue that those mentioned are as good as Tendulkar, but that's been debated at length.

[Old boy]

I was fortunate enough to have known Sam Loxton (unfortunately passed away last year) who was one of the 1948 team under Bradman. The passion in his voice when describing how good Bradman really was & what Sam described as fruitless comparisons told me that his average said everything about how good he must have been.

[PedalsMcgrew]

I'd have more respect for Bradman if he had had a little more respect for his peers. The way he treated Larwood was a disgrace and all because Larwood made him look average....

[Old boy]

I'd have more respect for Bradman if he had had a little more respect for his peers. The way he treated Larwood was a disgrace and all because Larwood made him look average....

Bradman the cricket was liked far greater than Bradman the person.

[FattusCattus]

From what I've read, I'd like to have seen Hammond play.

By all accounts, nearly up here with Bradman, Hobbs, Tendular et al - however, also a canny medium pacer with many wickets and a dynamite fielder. Exiting with the bat too.

I would definately have wanted to see Larwood bowl - I missed seeing Trueman, Statham, Tyson and Bedser - however, again from what I've read, most people though Larwood genuinely frightening, with very few faults.

[Tail Ender]

A statistician by the name of Charles Davis did an analytic study of the stats from a group of prominent global sportsmen a while back, and concluded that  "no other athlete dominates an international sport to the extent that Bradman does cricket". To show how dominant Bradman was, Davis said that in order to be considered on an equal footing with Bradman's achievements, the greatest baseballer would need a .392 career hitting average, a basketballer would need to average 43.0 points per game and a golfer would need to win 25 majors (the records, by the way, are Ty Cobb with .366, Michael Jordan with 30.12 ppg and Jack Nicklaus with 18). Read as much, or as little, into that as you like. Either way, what he did was phenomenal (and FWIW, I would have loved to have seen Jack Hobbs play - he's a hero of mine).