The concept of ‘Moneyball’ or sabermetrics has turned popular in the sport of baseball ever since Michael Lewis published a book by the same name in 2002.
For the unaware, the book followed the exploits of the Oakland Athletics in Major League Baseball (MLB), and their ability to constantly punch above their weight despite limited financial resources.
It explained how Billy Bean – the general managers of the Oakland Athletics – used sophisticated statistical models to identify players that were often overlooked by other franchises. These models looked at new parameters and differed greatly from the conventional baseball statistics of the time.
By shedding orthodox wisdom, Bean and his team devised newer methods to recognise what was really important to attain a victory. It was a concept aimed at maximising Oakland’s financial resources by doing ‘more from less’, and its success was certainly undeniable.
Sabermetrics or the empirical analysis of baseball with the use of statistics, became a widely adopted practice at nearly every MLB franchise following the release of Lewis’ book. Since then, the approach has been successfully implemented in several other sports and has lately been carving a place for itself in cricket.
With the sheer amount of numbers involved in the game, cricket is ripe for a heavy statistics driven approach. It has always been a statistics-heavy sport with its conventional statistics such as batting averages and strike-rates. In the last few years, numbers are being mined more extensively and with greater depth, with analysts developing newer and sophisticated models to look at the available data.
Cricket analytics is gradually becoming a lucrative industry and almost every team now employs a data analyst in order to gain every possible advantage over their opponents. While the use of analytics and metrics is now wide-ranging in the sport, it is arguably the T20 format which looks perfectly poised to reap its benefits.
It was only a matter of time before the Moneyball approach found its way to the T20 format with the various franchise leagues that have sprouted across the globe in the past decade. Northants have adopted the concept to great success in England’s domestic T20 competitions over the past few years, while Islamabad United are its torchbearers in the ongoing Pakistan Super League.
Having won two of the past-four editions, Islamabad are the most successful franchise in the competition’s history. Ahead of the first edition in PSL, the franchise hired two former cricket journalists – Hassan Cheema and Rehan-ul-Haq – to work as their recruitment analysts for the player draft. Impressed by their input, Islamabad recruited the duo on a permanent basis as managers of the franchise. Both of them are also a part of the franchise’s five-man selection panel.
This novel approach of hiring cricket journalists in a recruitment role is not just limited to Islamabad United. Caribbean Premier League (CPL) outfit St. Lucia Stars employed Jarrod Kimber as their head analyst for the 2019 season.
In an exclusive chat with Sport360, we asked Cheema about this phenomenon.
“I think it provides a neutral perspective to the game from someone who has not been brought up in the same bubble,” the Islamabad United manager and recruitment analyst explains.
The number of inspiring purchases made by Islamabad with the two recruitment analysts in tow is evidently high. Current skipper Shadab Khan was plucked out of relative obscurity ahead of the second edition, and his since gone on to establish himself as a mainstay for both Islamabad United and Pakistan.
When it comes to overseas recruits, New Zealand veteran wicketkeeper batsman Luke Ronchi has proved to be a big hit despite not being a sought-after name before his move to the franchise.
When queried about how the recruitment model works at Islamabad, Cheema says: “It depends on the sort of player that you are looking for.
“As far as the young Pakistani and local players are concerned, we do look at their numbers but we also look at their talent and mindset. Since for many of the young players, the sample size is too small and the numbers available might not indicate what they are really capable of.
“At that stage, they are still unformed players and they are in the middle of their evolution as a professional.
“When it comes to the experienced players, both local and foreign, especially the foreign players, then the approach is very much a data specific one.
“We look at a large set of numbers in this case and break them down in detail. We look at data which is venue specific and condition specific, positional numbers, their numbers against spin and pace.
“We then compile a shortlist of five to six players who fit the required profile and hand them over to the team management.”
Cheema continues: “We look at data mostly from CricViz and ESPNcricinfo.
“Then we narrow it down to certain parameters which fit the profile of players that we are looking for. We look at their performances in certain conditions.
“For batsmen, we see how they match up against left-armed spin or off-spin. There are so many T20 leagues happening around the world but the conditions and quality of bowling attacks are different in each one of them. We look at if they are flat-track bullies or excel in all conditions.”
While looking at every statistic with a microscope is a hazard of Cheema’s profession, the Islamabad United manager concedes there are occasions where other factors take greater precedence.
“I think you need to keep an open mind with regards to that. You can’t be ideologically tied to your numbers all the time,” he warned.
“When you have very experienced players such as Saeed Ajmal and Misbah-ul-Haq in your squad and they advise you to go a certain way based on the local playing conditions, then you need to listen to them.
“Over the years, we have had many instances where logic and numbers dictate something else but the wisdom of experienced players dictate something else. In those cases, we have to let the numbers go.”
Looking at players from a completely statistical point can have its pitfalls, but Cheema believes the Moneyball approach has flourished at Islamabad. The franchise has, after all, clinched two titles already and have qualified for the play-offs in each of the past editions.
“With regards to a statistical and data-driven approach backfiring, I don’t think that has been the case so far,” Cheema says.
“We have won the titles two times in the four years. One year we didn’t win because three of our players got banned due to various reasons. Last year, we simply lost to a better team. We had the last pick in the PSL draft in the season and that did play a part in where we finished ultimately.”
One aspect that is often debated in T20 cricket, is the value of fielding with experts greatly differing with their opinions on the subject. Some advocate the importance of having 11 excellent fielders in the squad and stress the importance of saving every run. Others, like former India stalwart Rahul Dravid argue that having specialist batsmen and bowlers is of greater value than concentrating on the fielding.
For Cheema, the answer is somewhere in the middle.
“We believe that there needs to be a certain threshold when it comes to fielding and you can’t drop beyond that,” he said.
“However, within that threshold, if you have some with an elite specialist skillset with the bat or ball, then you can often overlook their shortcomings in the field. In a T20 team, you can generally hide one or two poor fielders in the field, who in the grand scheme of things still make an overall positive impact.
“For example, we have had Mohammad Irfan and Samuel Badree in our team. Both of these players are not considered as elite fielders or even above average fielders.
“However, what they bring to the team with their bowling is enough to offset any runs they might concede in the field. We look at the overall numbers. We see how many runs Irfan might concede in the field and then we look at how many runs he might save while he is bowling. So you have to consider both aspects.”
Islamabad’s success with the Moneyball model hasn’t gone unnoticed in the PSL with Multan Sultans going big on the approach for the ongoing edition. Having roped in Andy Flower as the head coach, Multan have also brought in England’s performance analyst Nathan Leamon. Holder of a Mathematics degree, Leamon’s work with the national team has earned him wide acclaim over the years. Incidentally, he is also the founder of cricket analytics firm CricViz.
Given their changed approach, it is not really a surprise to see Multan Sultans currently top the charts in the fifth edition of the PSL.
This success has only affirmed Cheema’s belief in sports analytics and data-driven approaches being the future of cricket.
“If you look at baseball, initially there was a lot of skepticism about whether this approach would work but in the end it was widely embraced,” he says.
“Same was the case with basketball. For many years the approach was doubted before it became common. Even football over the last few years is catching up with his idea when you look at some of the transfers that Liverpool have made.
“In every sport, there is an orthodoxy which is averse to the idea initially. But when you look at cricket, you can’t really separate the numbers from the sport.
“The amount of numbers available in cricket is extraordinary and it is only a matter of time when that approach becomes widely accepted.”
