Recent comments in /f/sports

5m1tm t1_jacw7jw wrote

Reply to comment by whoareyouguys in New Zealand defeat England by 1 run in the 2nd Test Match at Wellington by IntoThePeople

No problem! :D

Yeah so the thing is, ideally, you would want to "keep rotating the strike" (i.e., giving the strike to the other batter. It's a common cricketing phrase), because it "keeps the scoreboard ticking" as they say in cricket parlance. And when you're chasing, it's obviously helpful since 1 run regularly would keep getting deducted from your target. But it's only advisable to do this if the person at the other end is a specialist batter or an all-rounder (cricketers who can both bat and bowl), or atleast a tailender who can bat a bit decently. Anyone who comes after the 8th wicket falls is usually not any of those things, and you would obviously not want to lose 10 wickets in a chase coz that means losing the match. So you "farm the strike" (another common cricket phrase) in order to protect the tailenders at the other end.

Cricket is a game of permanent cost-benefit analysis for both teams on the field, in all aspects of the game.

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5m1tm t1_jacv44z wrote

Reply to comment by NobodyLikesthePens in New Zealand defeat England by 1 run in the 2nd Test Match at Wellington by IntoThePeople

Yeah it is wild haha. But that's the beauty of it. Because of its duration, it challenges both teams to do well over a sustained period. It's truly a very challenging format. The winner is almost always be the better team of the two over 5 days, because you simply remove the possibility of a team winning "because it was their day" haha. Plus, for quick entertainment you got the two limited-overs formats, especially T20Is (the shortest format of international cricket).

Cricket is like a buffet that way. You can pick and choose what you like, and watch that. But I've never ever seen a hardcore cricket fan not love Test cricket (the 5-day format), because the more you get into cricket, the more you understand why Test cricket is so revered.

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5m1tm t1_jacunqp wrote

Reply to comment by njd19634 in New Zealand defeat England by 1 run in the 2nd Test Match at Wellington by IntoThePeople

I replied to another comment on this comment thread and the same answer applies here so I'm just pasting that comment of mine here:

Foakes was trying to protect the tailender at the other end because tailenders obviously can't bat nearly as well and England couldn't afford to lose easy wickets. That's why he was taking singles only towards the end of the over, to minimise the balls that the tailenders faced so as to minimise their exposure to the NZ bowling.

It made total sense what Foakes was doing. In fact, it would've been stupid to not do that.

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5m1tm t1_jacud83 wrote

Reply to comment by whoareyouguys in New Zealand defeat England by 1 run in the 2nd Test Match at Wellington by IntoThePeople

Foakes was trying to protect the tailender at the other end because tailenders obviously can't bat nearly as well and England couldn't afford to lose easy wickets. That's why he was taking singles only towards the end of the over, to minimise the balls that the tailenders faced so as to minimise their exposure to the NZ bowling.

It made total sense what Foakes was doing. In fact, it would've been stupid to not do that.

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FSchmertz t1_jacqbd1 wrote

Reply to comment by CloudDweller182 in Jessie Diggins is first U.S. cross-country skier to win individual world title by smackslips

Guessing you have a few less people than the US?

If you have less to pick from, you're less likely to find the "best in the world."

It's just that the US didn't have that many X-C skiers in the past, and still doesn't have a lot of places with the necessary snow for it.

Signed Captain Obvious? ;)

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