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James Laver and The Monster bat
He calls it The Monster, this 3 pound, 15 ounce club.
And you don’t need extraordinary strength to wield this slab of willow.
Simply position it in front of the ball and the bat does the rest (although presumably hooks, pulls and cuts are out of the question).
But it’s not for sale: Master New Zealand bat-maker James Laver has made it as a statement about the growing arms race of bigger and heavier bats.
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The Monster, he says, is allowable under the laws as they stand. And Laver says it shouldn’t be.
As the ICC considers imposing restrictions on ever-burgeoning bat sizes, Laver has entered the debate wielding his super bat.
“We made it to provoke conversation to see what people actually thought,” Laver told The Weekend Australian this week.
“If you make a massive bat you’ll always sell loads.
“(But) I’m not going to sell bats like that. I’m not going to make it.
“This is the sort of thing that I don’t think should be sold.”
You might think making and selling big bats would make good business sense for a bat-maker.
But the founder and managing director of Waipawa bat-making firm Laver & Wood is of the same mind as so many others: big bats have swung the balance too far in the batsmen’s favour.
The Monster is all about fuelling the discussion about regulating bat sizes.
And Laver’s gone further than that.
He has suggested any size restriction is enforced using a sizing device similar to the ones used to test the ball’s shape.
He has produced a frame with a bat shaped hole in the middle. A bit like a giant cookie cutter.
If the bat can fit in the hole it is legal. Simple.
“I really believe that the basics of the bat need to be regulated,” Laver said.
“And it’s got to be simple. It’s got to be straightforward.
“Everyone seems to be on the same page. Everyone’s talking about how something needs to be done.”
So they are. The ICC announced this week it was considering amending rules that stipulate the face of a bat is no wider than 4.25 inches (10.8cm) and the length is no longer than 38 inches (97cm).
The rules are silent about the width — or depth — from the face to the back of the bat.
“The balance may have shifted a little bit too much because sometimes poor shots or mis-hits are going for six,” ICC chief executive David Richardson told ESPN Cricinfo this week.
“Some batsmen are mis-hitting balls and it is just carrying over the rope and going for a six instead of being caught at the boundary, that is what some cricket people believe has become unfair.”
“Let us try and rectify that. The bats are so good these days that the sweet spot is much larger than it would have been 10-15 years ago.
“The MCC, as lawmakers, and the ICC will be looking at giving perhaps some consideration to placing limitations on the depth of a bat in particular,” Richardson said.
That is welcome news to the mums, dads and junior coaches bemoaning how big bats are straining young wrists and elbows and ingraining bad batting habits from a young age.
Laver has welcomed the news and says there’s nothing revolutionary about his proposal to test bat sizes.
A sizing device is a much simpler way of regulating bats than testing by weight or by volume.
He suggests limiting bats to a thickness of about 60mm and their edges to about 35mm, with some small leeway for the curve of the blade and one or two layers of tape.
That would outlaw Dave Warner’s Kaboom bat, which is 85mm thick at its widest part.
Presumably Chris Gayle’s 3 pound club would be rendered obsolete as well.
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