Ok, so there isn’t actually any medal, but that doesn’t matter. Since tonight is the annual Allan Border Medal night, I decided that I’d run through the stats from the first edition of the Big Bash League and crunch the numbers to see who were the top batsmen, bowlers, fielders and all-rounders based on my ‘bash factor’ formula. Unlike the ratings that appear on the rest of the site that are based on a career’s worth of stats, these rankings are purely based on the performances in this year’s BBL.

Batsmen

No huge surprises in the batting ranks with the exception of Chris Gayle who managed a couple of ducks late in the tournament which put a large dent in his ranking (pre-ducks he was sitting at 111, he finished in 9th with a rating of 76.37). Travis Birt’s consistency brought him out on top, closely followed by Mitchell Marsh thanks to a late run.

1. Travis Birt – 113.49 – Hurricanes
2. Mitchell Marsh – 107.93 - Scorchers
3. Owais Shah – 97.48 - Hurricanes
4. Herschelle Gibbs – 93.55 – Scorchers
5. Aaron Finch – 92.02 – Renegades

Bowlers

Back in December who would have predicted that Hoggy would be the stand-out bowler of the tournament? Starc was brilliant in the games he was available for, and Faulkner was provided some relief for the Stars after their import Dernbach failed to fire.

1. Brad Hogg – 88.14 – Scorchers
2. Mitchell Starc – 80.18 – Sixers
3. James Faulkner – 70.46 – Stars
4. Shahid Afridi – 69.48 – Renegades
5. Alister McDermott – 64.37 – Heat

Fielders

As you would expect wicketkeepers fill most of the top spots, with Steve Smith the only non-keeper sneaking into the top 5. Ronchi cleared out at the top, having the Scorchers quartet of Hogg, Beer, Coulter-Nile and Edmondson bowling towards him definitely helped.

1. Luke Ronchi – 108.71 – Scorchers
2. Adam Crosthwaite – 64.86 – Strikers
3. Matthew Wade – 62.28 – Stars
4. Brendon McCullum – 53.77 – Heat
5. Steven Smith – 52.92 – Sixers

All-Round

The all-round rankings only take into account batting and bowling, but it is hardly bullet-proof and there is currently nothing done to ‘adjust’ the rankings based on whether a playing is a “bowling all-rounder” or a “batting all-rounder” – that’s something to investigate ready for next year. As a result of this the rankings heavily favour bowlers. Afridi and Hussey are probably the only two that had ‘true’ all-round rankings, but the same formula applies to all so the result is what it is (will try and make it better next year). Of the other ‘true’ all-rounders, Dan Christian ranked 6th with 41.79, Johan Botha 38.86 (7th) and two others that would have definitely been in the mix had their bowling been better were Andrew MacDonald 37.95 (9th) and Moises Henriques 37.29 (10th).

1. Scott Coyte – 62.05 – Thunder
2. Shahid Afridi – 57.98 – Renegades
3. Naved-ul-Hasan – 55.12 – Hurricanes
4. David Hussey – 54.13 – Stars
5. Alister McDermott – 52.84 – Heat

The ‘BBB’ Medal

He didn’t make the top ten for batsman (finished 13th with a ranking of 63.34). He didn’t make the top ten for bowlers either (finished 14th with a ranking of 42.72). He did make the top ten for fielders finishing 8th with a ranking of 45.43. And all tallied up he achieved an all-round rating of 54.13 to finish 4th. No one else finished with a better ranking across all four categories, so I think it pretty understandable why David Hussey was named player of the tournament – and why I’m awarding him the (non-existent) BBB Medal.