Alright, so folks, last night I was watching some IPL highlights replaying old matches, right? And Vivrant Sharma came up hitting a few nice shots. Got me thinking: how good is this guy, actually? Like, yeah we see flashes, but what about his numbers over seasons? Does he crush it consistently, or nah?
Starting The Dig
First things first, I needed the raw numbers. Cricket sites, IPL official stuff – you know the places. Open browser, tap-tap-tap searching. Aim? Grab Sharma’s stats season by season. Runs, average, strike rate, maybe number of games played. Sounds easy enough?
Found his player profile page. Phew. Scrolled down to season records. Saw the tables. Okay… but just a pile of numbers sitting there. Felt a bit overwhelming, honestly. Just numbers on a screen, no story yet.
Okay Will, think. How to make sense of this? Comparing seasons side-by-side seems obvious. Is he getting better? Worse? Staying the same? Are there killer seasons and some duds?
My Basic Battle Plan
Decided to keep it super simple:
- Copy-pasted the stats for each season he played into my own spreadsheet. Manually, like a caveman. My skills suck.
- Focused on 3 main things: Total Runs Scored, Batting Average, Strike Rate. The big three for batters.
- Just laid them out year after year. Plain and simple columns.
First Face-Off: Season vs Season
Okay, so now I stared at this sheet. X-axis seasons, Y-axis numbers. First shocker? He hasn’t played that many seasons! Fewer than I thought. Small sample size, guys. Makes comparing trickier.
Looked at the Runs column first. One season jumps out – he smashed way more that year. “Oh wow, that year he was on fire!” Literally said out loud to my empty room. Big outlier. Then the other seasons… kinda okay, kinda meh runs-wise. Not terrible, not amazing. Just… there.
Moved to Average. Similar story. That one hot season, average shot up big time. Other years? Mostly in the mid-range for a middle-order hitter. Didn’t see a clear “trend” line upwards or down.
Strike Rate last. This one was more… consistent. Mostly hangs around a certain lively number. Good sign, maybe he tries to score fast regularly. But again, no massive jump season to season except that same outlier year.
Initial thought: Okay, so there’s this ONE awesome season shining like a lighthouse. The rest? Kinda blends together in the fog. Not bad, not great. Consistent SR is a plus though.
Pushing Harder: Beyond Just Counting
Felt like I was missing something. Just seeing seasons listed wasn’t enough. Needed more color.
- How many games did he actually play in each season? Maybe he played less some years, making his runs total look small?
- Who was he facing? Like, did he always get out cheaply to a certain bowler type? Too deep for my quick check, honestly.
- Home vs Away? Dunno, stats sites don’t always split it that easy.
Annoying reality check: Averages can lie. If he got not out a bunch one season in few games, the average inflates. Gotta look at Runs and Average together with games played.
Added Games Played to my sheet. Yep, see! That monster season? He played way more games! That explains the high runs. Duh, Will. But even adjusting for games, the performance was still clearly peak that year compared to others where he played similar amounts.
So, What Did I Actually Learn?
After all that clicking and squinting? It’s kinda simple:
- Vivrant Sharma’s got one stand-out brilliant IPL season. Seriously top stuff that year.
- For his other seasons? The word is potential mixed with okay performance. He hasn’t been consistently awful, but he hasn’t consistently lit it up either outside that one peak.
- His strike rate stays pretty decent. He likes to score quick, seems built into his game.
- The main takeaway? Based purely on IPL numbers so far? It’s the tale of one superstar season surrounded by moments that show he can play, but hasn’t made it stick long-term like the big stars.
Honest reflection? Did I break down his stats perfectly? Probs not, hardcore fans might nitpick. Did I spend way longer on this last night than planned? Absolutely. Coffee needed this morning. Was it kinda fun just diving into some stats? Yeah, surprisingly!
