Mohammed Shami is one of the best new ball bowlers in the world. He can seam the ball and swing it – at pace, with accuracy. He can hit the pad or outside edge. It’s a very good package and it is perfect for a new ball bowler.
What Shami has never been great at is slower balls. It isn’t that he doesn’t have one; he just hasn’t perfected it. And more importantly, he doesn’t really need them. With his speed and accuracy, he can do most of his work with on-pace deliveries.
In IPL 2022, he delivered 3.8% of his deliveries off pace, compared to Dwayne Bravo’s 48%. Fast bowlers deliver slower than ever before, and Shami was one of the last holdouts.
2022 is not a random year, it is PIS. Pre-Impact Sub. A dystopian T20. Now, you cannot just bowl on pace. Even if you are Mohammed Shami.
In 2022, he bowled less than 1% of his deliveries off pace in the powerplay, this year it’s more than 10%. Mohammed Shami is a different bowler now, because the IPL is a different sport.
Welcome to the Bowlpocalpyse.
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Something was off early in the year. Everyone was talking about the runs being scored, but in the back half of every game, it was clear that wasn’t quite the case. The older the ball got (even when replaced), the harder it was to score.
When you look at the numbers, you can see that this year is unlike any other on record. For the first time ever, the strike rate for the first ten has almost caught the second ten. That is not how T20 cricket goes.
It is supposed to be easier to score the longer the match goes on. But in the IPL right now, there is almost no difference.
Traditionally, teams would attack in the powerplay, but with one eye on wickets. Then after the first six, there would be the agreed-upon lull of scoring, before a slow ramp up until they hit like crazy at the death.
In 2022, the runs per over in the IPL was 8.54. That was the second-highest ever at that stage. Then 2023 was almost half a run more, 2024 was a full run more, this year it is almost a run and a half up. The Impact Sub has supersized scoring.
T20 rates were ramping up worldwide in the major leagues, but not in the IPL. There had been a gully for a couple of years in the premier competition. For only the second time ever in 2021, the scoring rate was quicker around the world than in the IPL.
The 2023 season – the first with the Impact Sub – was a small jump. Like the players didn’t understand it, but then once they did, it took off. And even as other leagues have gotten faster, they are playing T20s (shoutout to the Hundred, of course) and the IPL is playing Impact Sub cricket.
There is no other league in which this has happened. So even though a few competitions have a curve, the IPL sits out on its own.
The only league that is close is the PSL. But what is wild is that before the Impact Sub change, the PSL had outscored the IPL three years in a row. It was the fastest league in the world, the first to have 180 as a par total with their 9.2 runs an over in 2022. They have remained fast, with 2025 being more than nines as well. But the IPL has just launched itself into another stratosphere.
And it starts, at the start.
This season, the average powerplay score is over 60. It is the first league to do this, or even be close to it.