All Time Greatest Fast Bowler Ever

[SouthSwans]

Who's the best?

 

[Carbine Chaos]

Let's be honest, you could probably get rid of half those names off the bat. Johnson, Thomson, Lee, Botham, Willis, Flintoff, Dev, Bond, Akhtar, Steyn, Vass - probably the ones I'm referring to.

My vote is for Malcolm Marshall. Hard to separate a lot of those amazing Windies bowlers seeing as how I never saw them live but basing the pick on the limited footage I've seen and the stories you hear about them. Amazing record, too.

 

[Art Vandelay_]

Very tough list, tougher given that as a child of the 90's I didn't see a lot of them play. As a lefty I've picked Akram.

Is Freddie really amongst the greats though?

 

[Spitta Andretti]

Why would you get rid of Steyn, he has an amazing record, best strike rate sustained over a long career. Shoaib deserves a mention too, for having a fantastic record albeit not sustaining it for as long as some of the others.

For me with pace bowlers the number one thing is strike rate. Steyn and Waqar are head and shoulders ahead of the pack in terms of strike rate, with Shoaib and Donald being the best of the rest.

 

[SouthSwans]

 

[Spitta Andretti]

Steyn has 402 wickets in 81 tests, averaging 23 with a strike rate of 41. A wicket every 7 overs sustained across an 81 match career! And he was the star player in a number 1 ranked side for years. What else does he have to prove?

 

[footyfan1978]

No Michael Holding listed yet you have guys like Chaminda Vass.
Sorry, poll lacks any credibility and that is without even starting on the fact you ask a question of whom is greatest fast bowler ever and list no one in a poll before our time. No Frank Tyson, Ray Lindwall, Harold Larwood, Wes Hall, Keith Miller and Freddy Trueman etc, etc.

I can only comment of best fast bowler I seen but I cannot discount guys from past. Who knows what Fred Spofforth and Barnes were like? None of us.
In my time of watching Dennis Lillee the best followed closely by Richard Hadlee. They were both incredibly talented.
After that really is a toss up between quite a few like Holding, Akram and Marshall followed by Imran Khan, Roberts, Garner, McGrath and Ambrose types.
I can settle on Wasim Akram 3rd but there is so little between him, Holding and Marshall that it is clutching at straws whom was really better.

The 1970's and 1980's clearly the golden era of fast bowlers. I only saw the second half of it but I can only dream of seeing so much fast bowling class at same time again in my life. To think that Lillee, Hadlee, Holding, Roberts, Garner, Imran and Marshall all around at same time is incredible to this day.

 

[Power Raid]

curtley ambrose, joel garner, michael holding........etc etc

geez they were great

 

[JD Tomahawk]

Wild thing.... You make my heart sing.

 

[the_interloper]

I'll go Malcolm Marshall just ahead of McGrath, this is only about 1000000 times harder than asking who the best batsman is.

 

[western royboy]

Let's be honest, you could probably get rid of half those names off the bat. Johnson, Thomson, Lee, Botham, Willis, Flintoff, Dev, Bond, Akhtar, Steyn, Vass - probably the ones I'm referring to.

My vote is for Malcolm Marshall. Hard to separate a lot of those amazing Windies bowlers seeing as how I never saw them live but basing the pick on the limited footage I've seen and the stories you hear about them. Amazing record, too.

Had the pleasure (wasn't a pleasure at the time) of facing him in a game. Amazing ability to move the ball both ways with no discernible change in grip or action at terrifying pace. Effective in all types of conditions. Taken far to soon- RIP Maco.

 

[Carbine Chaos]

Why would you get rid of Steyn, he has an amazing record, best strike rate sustained over a long career. Shoaib deserves a mention too, for having a fantastic record albeit not sustaining it for as long as some of the others.

For me with pace bowlers the number one thing is strike rate. Steyn and Waqar are head and shoulders ahead of the pack in terms of strike rate, with Shoaib and Donald being the best of the rest.

Steyn has 402 wickets in 81 tests, averaging 23 with a strike rate of 41. A wicket every 7 overs sustained across an 81 match career! And he was the star player in a number 1 ranked side for years. What else does he have to prove?

Geez it's not like I'm calling him a dud, he's an amazing bowler. I'm just not convinced he enters the discussion for best bowler ever compared to the select few names on there I left.

 

[PaddyO]

Marshall and McGrath for their excellence against all opposition in all conditions. Steyn now in that bracket too.

Wasim Akram, Lillee and Ambrose my personal faves.

Hadlee must be mentioned.

Waqar had an insane purple patch.

Trueman and Lindwall greats from the earlier era.

If you want to consider FC records then Larwood must come into the equation. Was royally ****ed over by the British establishment and is now incorrectly often only remembered as the antagonist of the bodyline series. FC record is insane in an era when FC was nearly as important as test cricket. Should have played a lot more tests.

 

[PaddyO]

Geez it's not like I'm calling him a dud, he's an amazing bowler. I'm just not convinced he enters the discussion for best bowler ever compared to the select few names on there I left.

5 wickets per test at a SR in the low 40s means he definitely enters the discussion.

 

[Carbine Chaos]

5 wickets per test at a SR in the low 40s means he definitely enters the discussion.

He also leaves it at some stage too, that's what I was getting at.

 

[DT_fanatic]

Steyn should be right up there considering how much the balance of the game has been skewed towards batsmen during his career

 

[Jimthegreat]

Dennis Lillee. Bowled at extreme pace. Skills were enormous and this allowed him to be highly successful still even when his pace declined late in his career. First 300 wickets just took 56 Tests. Having seen him at his very best I can't go past him. Similarly McGrath's great skills allowed him to be outstanding all the way to the end. Some other's, once they lost their pace their careers declined rapidly.

I'm at the advantage (?) of being old and seeing each one of those bowlers at their best. Some champions I didn't see were Frank Tyson, Ray Lindwall, Harold Larwood, Freddie Trueman, Wes Hall. I'm not that old...lol! The latter I saw in only in his declining years but gee he was fast.

The poll needs Michael Holding otherwise it leaves a huge gap. Imagine that was an oversight. Can't remember everyone.

 

[Slax]

There are some glaring omissions in the list and people who shouldn't be there.

My Top 5 not on the vote list

1. Michael Holding
2. Fred Tueman
3. Ray Lindwall
4. Ryan Harris
5. Frank Tyson

 

[t_94]

Malcolm Marshall

Not that anyone saw him play but S.F. Barnes would have to be right up there. Different times but was a freak of a bowler- 189 test wickets at 16.4.

 

[JackOutback]

Agree the list is far too long.

I think it comes down to Lillee, Hadlee, Holding or Marshall, with special mention to Akram and McGrath, but without really getting to watch the likes of Lillee and Holding in their prime, I'd hesitate to pick one.

 

[HBF]

No idea how you'd just pick one from that list. You could make a case for at least 6 of them IMO.

 

[iluvparis]

Very tough list, tougher given that as a child of the 90's I didn't see a lot of them play. As a lefty I've picked Akram.

Is Freddie really amongst the greats though?

Apparently Brett Lee is so anything goes.

Mike Whitney unlucky not to get a nom

 

[strewthcobber]

Thread should be renamed "Greatest fast bowlers since the mid 1970s"

There was a fair bit of cricket played before then.....

 

[Spitta Andretti]

Geez it's not like I'm calling him a dud, he's an amazing bowler. I'm just not convinced he enters the discussion for best bowler ever compared to the select few names on there I left.

He has a superior record to pretty much all of them. What is your justification for not including him? By any objective measure Dale Steyn is the best fast bowler of all time, since he has played in the worst decades for bowlers since the 1930s and yet still has the best strike rate of all modern bowlers including all the West Indies lot. And he has done all this with pure skill, he never had express pace like many of the names on the list, nor does he have the advantage of being tall.

 

[Spitta Andretti]

Ridiculous records like Lohmann's are the reason nobody takes pre-1950s cricket seriously, Bradman aside.