{"id":2051,"date":"2009-02-16T07:01:28","date_gmt":"2009-02-16T06:01:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=2051"},"modified":"2009-10-18T21:03:33","modified_gmt":"2009-10-18T20:03:33","slug":"baseball-and-cricket-scorekeeping","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=2051","title":{"rendered":"Baseball and Cricket scorekeeping"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Keeping<\/span><\/p>\n

As part of our Keeping Score Season, it always seemed like a good idea to compare the scorekeeping of baseball and cricket games.\u00c2\u00a0 The recent passing of the Bearded Wonder Bill Frindall made it all the more fitting.<\/p>\n

For some reason, baseball and cricket are often set up as opposites, where you should like one and not the other.\u00c2\u00a0 That doesn’t make any sense to me.\u00c2\u00a0 They are both great sports so why not enjoy both.\u00c2\u00a0 Baseball and cricket compliment each other well.\u00c2\u00a0 Their similarities and differences are fascinating and the process of scoring games is a great example of this.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Historic links<\/strong><\/p>\n

Paul Dickson states in his book<\/a> about keeping score that “the urge to score is as old as the game [baseball] itself and borrows significantly from the book-keeping instincts of British cricketeers [sic]”.<\/p>\n

The man most commonly credited for bringing these cricketing features to baseball is Henry Chadwick<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Born in Exeter, his role as a pioneer in the sport is well established, even if the precise facts behind some of the creations credited to him (such as box scores) are not entirely clear.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Many sources claim that Chadwick’s pioneering measures include the introduction of a scoring system to baseball.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘The Father of Baseball: A Biography of Henry Chadwick’ by Andrew J. Schiff was published by McFarland last year and Google Books has a preview<\/a> of some of the content.\u00c2\u00a0 This includes a quote on page 230 from Robert Smith’s book ‘Baseball in America’ in which Smith states: “Chadwick invented a ‘photographic’ (i.e. shorthand) method of keeping score”.\u00c2\u00a0 Dickson stresses the importance of Henry Chadwick as well, describing him as “the ‘father’ of scoring (and the man who gave us the eternal K for strikeout)”.<\/p>\n

Lack of web resources<\/strong><\/p>\n

One big difference between baseball and cricket scoring is the disparity in online resources.\u00c2\u00a0 Baseball fans are spoiled with tutorials and free scorecards, whereas it is much more difficult to find similar quality material relating to cricket.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s a bit of a handicap for someone trying to research the topic, but it’s instructive nonetheless.<\/p>\n

I’ve been able to put together some key points and these will be explored below.\u00c2\u00a0 If you find any other resources that can shed more light on cricket scoring, please pass them on.<\/p>\n

Symbols used (in print and verbally)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A scoring system basically involves taking a shorthand account of the game.\u00c2\u00a0 Whether it’s baseball or cricket, you need to use a series of abbreviations and symbols to record every individual act that can take place.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Snitterfield Cricket Club provide a helpful guide<\/a> to the symbols used in cricket, from wides to leg byes and no balls.\u00c2\u00a0 From here we can see a good example of how scoring is used to describe the relevant sports even outside of the scoring context.<\/p>\n

When a delivery is simply blocked or goes through to the wicket keeper, that is marked down with a dot.\u00c2\u00a0 This has led to the use of the term “dot ball” to describe the event.\u00c2\u00a0 In the same way, baseball announcers will refer to a “5-4-3 double play” because of the way it is written down on a scorecard, or they will sometimes state that a batter has “K’d” rather than “struck out”.<\/p>\n

Scoring by commentators\/announcers<\/strong><\/p>\n

This raises an interesting point about the position of scoring among commentators.\u00c2\u00a0 When remembering Frindall<\/a>, his co-commentator Jonathan Agnew stated: “he brought to life this weird and wonderful world of cricket scoring that other people might find tedious and boring”.\u00c2\u00a0 Although he would chip in with comments, Frindall’s role in the team was to be the scorer and statistician and it seems as though none of the other commentators would score as well.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

In baseball, many announcers (as they are known) would be lost without having their own scorecard to refer to, even though there will often be a statistician working alongside them.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

A cricket scorecard<\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the few cricket\u00c2\u00a0scorecards<\/a> I’ve been able to find has been published by The Swiss Federation of Cricket Umpires and Scorers.\u00c2\u00a0 This scorecard has two parts to it: one to record the batting information and one to record the bowling information.\u00c2\u00a0 This sheet will record one team’s innings, so you would need to print it twice for a one-day game and four times for the longer version of the game.<\/p>\n

The batting side allows you to note down the batting lineup, as you would in baseball, but from there the scorecard reflects the many differences between the two sports.\u00c2\u00a0 You note down the duration of the batter’s period at the crease, both in terms of minutes and balls faced, before noting down the outcome of every delivery, details of how they got out and the total number of runs they accumulated.<\/p>\n

The bowling side is particularly interesting as it shows that every ball is, in effect, recorded twice.\u00c2\u00a0 If the first ball of the game was hit for four, you would note this on the batting side and then note down the same thing in the bowling analysis box (listed here in the “Over No.” column).\u00c2\u00a0 The analysis box is illustrated well in the Snitterfield guide, showing how you record every ball of every over.<\/p>\n

A simple example of some completed lines from a cricket scorecard are available in a Junior Cricket scoring guide<\/a> from New Zealand.\u00c2\u00a0 On the final page, you can easily see how the first over faced by Waugh is replicated in the first bowling analysis box for Hadleigh and so on.<\/p>\n

Every ball counts<\/strong><\/p>\n

Every single ball is a unique event in cricket, which isn’t quite the case in baseball.\u00c2\u00a0 As stated in the BBfB<\/a>, you can take an accurate account of a baseball game without recording every ball, something which would be hard to do with cricket.\u00c2\u00a0 However, it is certainly possible to record every ball in baseball (as we shall see later this week) and that extra effort leaves you with an incredibly detailed scorecard.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s that sort of detail that a cricket scorecard should always provide because you need to be able to account for every run.<\/p>\n

The importance of totals<\/strong><\/p>\n

Baseball scorers will be familiar with the task of totting up totals at the end of every half inning, as well as completing batter and pitcher totals at the end of the game.\u00c2\u00a0 This process is just as important with cricket scoring, if not more so.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

A cricket score can run into the hundreds and it is absolutely essential that the scorer makes sure every one is recorded and counted correctly.\u00c2\u00a0 This is highlighted in the Cricket Victoria Cricket Scoring guide<\/a> where they refer to the process of ‘Balancing the Book’.\u00c2\u00a0 They have an equation by which you can balance the batting and bowling totals, which is a similar process to the equation used to ‘prove’ a baseball scorecard.<\/p>\n

The Cricket Victoria guidance also shows two further similarities between cricket and baseball scoring.\u00c2\u00a0 Firstly, as you would expect, there is a strong link between a knowledge of the rules of the relevant game and the process of keeping score.\u00c2\u00a0 Secondly, it is not the scorer’s job to notify the umpire of any errors that may have been made (e.g. bowling a seven ball over).<\/p>\n

Bill Frindall’s own system<\/strong><\/p>\n

The final main similarity between baseball and cricket scoring is that there is endless scope for creativity.\u00c2\u00a0 The basic principles stay the same, but from there you can modify the system in whatever way you wish.\u00c2\u00a0 Frindall’s system was based on an earlier method by Bill Ferguson that is described as a ‘linear system’.\u00c2\u00a0 Further details can be found in several books written by Frindall and a review<\/a> of one of these by the Independent glories in “the awesome complexity of Frindall’s personalised match-scoring system”:<\/p>\n

“This bears scant resemblance to the basic tablet of bowlers’ and batsmen’s names familiar to all village cricketers. Frindall uses three different sheets simultaneously: 17 bespoke codes gloss the scorecard with further information on the type of delivery and shot (or attempted shot), but Frindall also records the stroke’s direction and notes on the fielding. This enables him to come up with a precise breakdown of, say, how often Andrew Flintoff has been dropped at third slip when mowing a Glenn McGrath bouncer towards cow corner. <\/em><\/p>\n

Wickets cause pressure points, when about a dozen entries have to be made in two minutes. ‘The secret is to keep calm and establish an order of action’, Frindall confides. ‘Scoring relies on rhythm’. <\/em><\/p>\n

As an exercise in data capture, his rhythm method is remarkable”.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Baseball and cricket together<\/strong><\/p>\n

In his obituary<\/a> of Frindall, former England bowler Angus Fraser stated:<\/p>\n

“Only in cricket, with its obsession for statistics and records, could the rather anoraky image of a scorer, the person who chronicles each and every ball of a game, be transformed into that of a celebrity”.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I’m not sure if there are any baseball-scoring celebrities, so Fraser’s point may be accurate.\u00c2\u00a0 However, that description of an “obsession for statistics and records” applies just as well to baseball as it does to cricket.<\/p>\n

That’s exactly why if you’re a fan of keeping score of one of these two sports, you will find it interesting to learn about the other.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As part of our Keeping Score Season, it always seemed like a good idea to compare the scorekeeping of baseball and cricket games.\u00c2\u00a0 The recent passing of the Bearded Wonder Bill Frindall made it all the more fitting. For some reason, baseball and cricket are often set up as opposites, where you should like one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[85,560],"class_list":["post-2051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-keeping-score","tag-cricket","tag-keeping-score"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2051"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5584,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051\/revisions\/5584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}