Cricket: Why bowlers have already hit their speed limit

We may have a greater number of quicker bowlers today but the fastest are probably not appreciably quicker than the fastest bowlers of previous generations.

Australian fast bowler Mitchell Starc trains in in Sydney in August. Picture: Phil Hillyard

The cadaver lab in the American Sports Medicine Institute at the University of Alabama must have been a strange place to work. All those shoulders and elbows from dead bodies being stretched to their limit, tendons and ligaments eventually snapping under the strain, and providing beyond-the-grave research implications for injury prevention to baseball pitchers.

As the director of research at ASMI, Glenn Fleisig has had a constant fascination with the understanding, prevention and treatment of elbow injuries for pitchers who are pushing the boundaries of the possible. His work has helped to broaden understanding of the damage to the ulnar collateral ligament in the elbow joint, where strain is greatest and where injuries commonly occur, after repetitive throwing of fast balls.

A pitcher called Tommy John was the first to be operated on in this area in 1974 — his name is now given to the surgical procedure that repairs the damage — and although the treatment of elbow (and shoulder) injuries has improved since then, their frequency has continued to rise as the average speed of pitchers, and the frequency of fast balls, has increased over the years. Average speed, that is, not top speed.

Aroldis Chapman pitches for the New York Yankees against the Tampa Bay Rays in San Diego, California, this month. Picture: Getty Images

Since Aroldis Chapman pitched at record-breaking speed for the Cincinnati Reds 10 years ago, only one other man, Jordan Hicks, has reached the 105m/h (168.98km/h) mark. Mind you, plenty more are pitching at three figures: that number almost doubled in the decade since the PITCHf/x system was introduced in Major League Baseball to standardise the measurement of speed. More players are pitching at near top speed, even though that top speed is not increasing.

Fleisig’s research suggests why: unlike muscles, tendons and ligaments cannot be strengthened indefinitely. At some point, the wear and tear and the strain becomes too great, and they snap. It means, in all likelihood, that the upper reaches of velocity for baseball pitchers has been reached. “With better mechanics, more pitchers will be towards that top, but the top has topped out,” Fleisig was quoted as saying some years ago. Nothing that has happened since has disproved his theory.

Michael Holding bowling in 1988. Picture: Getty Images

Jeff Thomson in 1985. Picture: Getty Images

Trends in sport are for continual improvement, but not every record is broken. Jonathan Edwards’s triple-jump record has stood for a quarter of a century, Mike Powell’s longest long jump longer still. The great Triple Crown-winning horse, Secretariat, set times in 1973 that have not been bettered since. Modern does not always equate to faster, stronger, higher.

Instinct and research suggests a similar plateau for fast bowling in cricket. There may be a greater number of quicker bowlers operating at present — indeed the evidence of modern cricket suggests a far greater homogeneity of bowling speeds because of covered pitches and a homogenisation of conditions — but the fastest are probably not appreciably quicker than the fastest bowlers of previous generations.

Frank Tyson bowls for England at Adelaide Oval in 1958.

Training, nutrition and technique may allow bowlers to maintain top speed for longer, and the average speed in Test cricket has been on an upward trajectory, but in all probability, the quickest of the past — Frank Tyson, Jeff Thomson, Michael Holding et al — stand comparison still. “Typhoon”, “Thommo” and “Whispering Death” would still shake batsmen up.

Last week, Anrich Nortje, the South Africa speedster, recorded the fastest ball (156km/h) at the Indian Premier League since its inception over a decade ago, beating the previous fastest in the competition set by Dale Steyn at 154km/h. While hoopla around anything in the IPL is guaranteed, my own reaction was more muted: four-over spells only — tailor-made, therefore, for short, sharp spells — and a bowler in a T20 tournament still cannot surpass the quickest ball in cricket, recorded 17 years earlier?

It was at Cape Town in the World Cup of 2003 that Shoaib Akhtar of Pakistan became the first bowler to be clocked at over 100m/h. The ball itself was a little underwhelming — nonchalantly clipped by Nick Knight off his hip — but Shoaib is still one of only three bowlers to have topped that mark on the speed gun, Brett Lee and Shaun Tait, the Australia pair, being the others. All three are among the four quickest bowlers I have seen (or not seen), Allan Donald being the other.

Anything around 150km/h is really quick, the kind of speed where a batsman has four tenths of a second to make up his mind and play his shot. (Top-class batsmen become trained to pick up cues to give themselves more of a chance, and learn to play the ball without seeing it all the way on to the bat). What feels quick to a batsman may not equate to the speed gun anyway, some bowlers being harder to pick up by nature of their actions.

As well as those mentioned, present bowlers such as Jofra Archer, Mark Wood, and Mitchell Starc are all there or thereabouts, as was Mitchell Johnson in the 2013-14 Ashes. But then, so were a handful of those of yesteryear. Grainy footage suggests Harold Larwood was really quick. Those who saw Tyson at the time thought it not possible to bowl more quickly, a similar reaction to those who witnessed Thomson, who was clocked at a fraction under 100m/h at the Waca, in Perth.

South African bowler Anrich Nortje. Picture: Gallo Images

While the benefits of professionalism suggest improvement in speeds would be logical, there are also elements of the modern game that would run counter to that — not least the amount of cricket played and the desire for quick bowlers (like everyone else) to maximise earnings by playing as long as possible.

The greater financial rewards now on offer in the professional game discourage bowlers from flinging themselves into the fray at speeds that will damage their bodies. Wood’s fragility is a case in point, something he spoke about at length this week. He can bowl as rapidly as anyone today, but his body struggles to cope for any sustained length of time. Financial rewards encourage stars to glow at lower intensity rather than burning themselves out, as Tyson did.

It is not altogether certain that modern training methods have resulted in fitter bowlers in any case, as Larwood’s biography suggests. He enjoyed a level of natural fitness absent in today’s more sedentary age. From a young age, Larwood walked everywhere: 10km to the pit and back when he started work there and then 8km to the railway station every day when Nottinghamshire came calling. Does gym work beat that naturally instilled strength and fitness? I don’t know.

After his rapid ball at the IPL last week — which, incidentally, Jos Buttler scooped over short fine leg for four runs — Nortje was asked about breaking Shoaib’s record in due course. “Hopefully it’s something I’ve got in me — it’s definitely something I’ve wanted to do.

“Maybe a good wicket, some adrenaline, the right combination and I can do it,” he said. Don’t hold your breath.

The Times