Most Valuable Player (MVP) by CricHeroes
By: Abhishek Desai
Tags: Cricket, Apps, Algorithms

Most Valuable Player (MVP) by CricHeroes

Why MVP?

One of the primary objectives of the CricHeroes App is to give recognition to passionate amateur Cricketers. We believe they are the real HEROES of Cricket. Because of them, Cricket is a religion in countries like India and cricketers have a GOD-like status.

The most important and obvious way to give recognition is to declare Player of the Match automatically at the end of every match getting scored on CricHeroes. Players can further share this achievement on social media and others can appreciate this award on the CricHeroes App. We are doing this since the beginning and cricketers love it!

Now, so far the calculation of declaring Player of the Match was very primitive. It was not taking into account various aspects of a match like the number of wickets, batsman strike rate, bowler strike rate, fielder contribution, etc. To solve such discrepancies and recognise heroes of the match fairly, we have designed a comprehensive algorithm to find out Most Valuable Player of the match and tournament.

We have tried to take into account as many parameters as possible but since Cricket is a very complex game, we may have missed some scenario. And hey, this is just the first version of MVP so if we have missed something, please let us know.

So without further ado, let’s explore how CricHeroes MVP calculation works.

Batting MVP Score

First, let’s see how MVP Points for a Batsman are calculated.

For the sake of simplicity, we are considering 10 runs as 1 MVP Point.

Now for a batsman, the most important thing is the number of runs scored but we should also consider his batting order. E.g. Top-order batsmen get more opportunity to bat so they are expected to score more runs than lower-order batsmen. That defines the concept of Par Score.

This is how we have defined Par Score for an 11-player team.

Batting Order — Percentage of Team Total

1–14.00%

2–13.00%

3–13.00%

4–12.00%

5–11.00%

6–9.00%

7–7.00%

8–6.00%

9–4.00%

10–3.00%

11–2.00%

So if the team scores 300 runs in 50 overs, Par Score for an opening batsman is 42 runs (14% of 300 runs). If that batsman scores more runs than his Par Score, he should get a bonus for the same. Here is how it works.

Match Type — Par Score Bonus

0–20 Overs — 2%

21–35 Overs — 4%

35–50 Overs — 6%

51+ Overs — 8%

Test Match — 8%

If the opening batsman scores 60 runs, his basic MVP score will be 6 and his Par Score bonus will be (60–42) * 0.06 = 1.08.

But now what if the batsman has scored these runs faster (or slower) than overall team strike rate? He should be rewarded (or penalised) for that too.

Match Type — SR Bonus / Penalty Percentage

0–20 Overs — 8%

21–35 Overs — 6%

35–50 Overs — 4%

51+ Overs — 2%

Test Match — 2%

Continuing the same example, let’s assume he took 70 balls to score 60 runs. That means his Strike Rate (SR) is 85 and since the team scored 300 runs in 300 balls, team’s SR is 100.

Here is the formula for calculating the SR Bonus / Penalty.

((Player SR) / (Team SR)) * (Player SR) — (Team SR) * SR Bonus Percentage

As per our example,

(85/100) * (85–100) * 0.04 = 0.85 * (-15) * 0.04 = -0.51

He gets negative points as SR Bonus because he scored slower than his team.

Finally, the formula for calculating total Batting MVP points is:

Total Batting MVP Points = Basic MVP Score + Par Score Bonus + SR Bonus

Putting values of our example, it will be:

Total Batting MVP Points = 6 + 1.08–0.51 = 6.57

Bowling MVP Points

Now let’s calculate MVP Points for a Bowler.

For that, we need to define base runs per wicket for different types of matches.

A standard T20 match score is 162 runs. This is based on thousands of matches scored on CricHeroes so far in various locations, circumstances and players. Keeping this as a starting point, let’s define base runs per wicket.

First, we can’t distribute 162 runs evenly between 11 players. You can’t expect the first and the last batsman to score an average of 15 runs in a match. But we can distribute them as per the following table.

Batting Order — Percentage — Runs

1–100.00% — 18 runs

2–100.00% — 18 runs

3–100.00% — 18 runs

4–100.00% — 18 runs

5–80.00% — 14.4 runs

6–80.00% — 14.4 runs

7–80.00% — 14.4 runs

8–80.00% — 14.4 runs

9–60.00% — 10.8 runs

10–60.00% — 10.8 runs

11–60.00% — 10.8 runs

Generally in a team, the top 4 batsmen are the strongest and score most runs. So if we consider their strength as 100%, we can consider the strength of middle-order batsmen as 80% and lower-order batsmen as 60%.

Based on the above logic, here is the Base Runs Per Wicket for various types of matches.

Match Types — Base Runs Per Wicket

0–7 Overs — 12 Runs

8–12 Overs — 14 Runs

13–16 Overs — 16 Runs

17–20 Overs — 18 Runs

21–26 Overs — 20 Runs

27–40 Overs — 22 Runs

41–50 Overs — 25 Runs

51–99 Overs — 27 Runs

Test Match — 25 Runs

This means, in a T20 match, if a bowler takes the wicket of an opening batsman, he gets rewarded 18 runs per wicket i.e. 1.8 MVP Points (Remember, the base is 10 runs for 1 MVP Point). But if he takes the wicket of a number 9 batsman, he gets rewarded 10.8 runs per wicket i.e. 1.08 MVP Point.

But before giving points, we also need to consider if the wickets are assisted or unassisted.

Bowled, LBW, Hit Wicket, Mankaded is examples of an unassisted wicket for which the bowler gets full MVP points. In case of the assisted wicket like Catch Out, Stumped, the bowler gets full MVP points and the fielder also gets an additional 20%.

(UPDATE: Till 31st January 2020 we used to divide MVP points 75/25 between the bowler and fielder(s).)

We also reward bowlers for taking more than 1 wicket in a match. For every additional wicket, they get a 10% bonus of that wicket’s MVP Point.

A bowler gets a bonus if he gets the batsman out before he reaches his par score. Percentage of the difference between batsman’s par score and his actual score is awarded to the bowler as a Par Score Bonus. We have defined percentage for various Match Types in the following table.

Match Type — Par Score Percentage

0–20 Overs — 2%

21–35 Overs — 4%

35–50 Overs — 6%

51+ Overs — 8%

Test Match — 8%

So if an opening batsman scored 25 runs in a 50-over match before getting out bowled, which is less than his par score of 42 then bowler’s bonus will be as below:

Par Score Bonus = (42–25) * 0.06

Now same as a batsman, a bowler is also rewarded/penalised if his Strike Rate (SR) is lower/higher than team’s SR.

In this case, Strike Rate for bowler is different than Bowling Strike Rate. Here we are only concerned about how many runs a bowler gave in how many deliveries. It has nothing to do with wickets. This way we reward a bowler who has given less runs compared to other bowlers.

Here is how it distributes:

Match Type — SR Bonus / Penalty Percentage

0–20 Overs — 8%

21–35 Overs — 6%

35–50 Overs — 4%

51+ Overs — 2%

Test Match — 2%

The formula is:

((Team SR) / (Player SR)) * (Team SR) — (Player SR) * SR Bonus Percentage

But in case of maiden overs, we can’t calculate SR bonus as Player SR will be 0. So we have devised a different mechanism to reward bowlers for this.

Basically, in a 7-over match, we give 1 maiden over the same value as 1 wicket and it goes on from there for different types of matches as per below table.

Match Type — Number of Maiden Overs to be considered as one wicket

0–7 overs — 1 maiden overs

8–12 overs — 2 maiden overs

13–16 overs — 2 maiden overs

17–20 overs — 2 maiden overs

21–26 overs — 2 maiden overs

27–40 overs — 3 maiden overs

41–50 overs — 3 maiden overs

51–99 overs — 6 maiden overs

Test Match — 6 maiden overs

So the final formula is:

Total Bowling MVP Points = Wicket Base MVP + Additional Wicket Bonus + Par Score Bonus + SR Bonus + Maiden Over Bonus

Let’s take a final example to calculate total bowling MVP points.

A bowler takes 3 wickets in 4 overs conceding 40 runs in a T20 match. He also bowls 1 maiden over. His team scored 120 runs. 1. He bowled the opening batsman out in 15 runs.

2. His second wicket is number 5 batsman at 10 runs as Catch Out.

3. His third wicket is number 9 batsman as Caught Behind at 1 run.

Now, let’s break this point by point:

1. First let’s calculate Basic Bowling MVP Points = 1.8 + 0.72 + 0.54 = 3.06

2. Since he took multiple wickets, we need to give him Additional Wicket Bonus = 1.8 + 0.72 + 0.072 + 0.55 + 0.055 = 3.186

3. He also gets Par Score Bonus for getting the batsmen out cheaply

Par Score Bonus = (16.8–15) * 0.02 + (13.2–10) * 0.02 + (4.8–1) * 0.02 = 0.036 + 0.064 + 0.076 = 0.176

Revised Bowling MVP Points = 3.186 + 0.176 = 3.362

4. Now he gave away 40 runs at the strike rate of 167 while his team’s SR is 100 so he gets penalised for this.

SR Bonus / Penalty = (100/167) * (100–167) * 0.08 = -3.2

5. And he bowled 1 maiden over in T20 match. Now we are considering 2 maiden overs as 1 wicket in a T20 match. So he gets (1.8/2) = 0.9 as maiden over bonus.

So finally we have,

Total Bowling MVP Points = 3.362–3.2 + 0.9 = 1.062

Complex? Yes, we know but fair too!

Fielding MVP Points

Let’s not forget fielders now. Fielder gets points in assisted and unassisted wickets.

In assisted wicket types like Catch Out, Stumping, fielder gets 20% of the total MVP points for that wicket based on formula explained above in Bowling MVP.

(UPDATE: Till 15th June 2018 we used to divide MVP points equally between the bowler and fielder(s). After 31st January 2020, we are giving an additional 20% to the fielders and giving full MVP points to bowlers for assisted wickets.)

In case of an unassisted wicket like Run Out, fielder gets full points for that wicket (if it is a direct hit) along with Par Score Bonus same as a bowler.

So to continue above example, if a fielder gets the opening batsman run out (direct hit) in 15 runs and the team’s total score was 120 then that batsman’s par score was 16.8.

In this case, fielder’s bonus will be as below:

Par Score Bonus = (16.8–15) * 0.02 = 0.036

Total Fielding MVP Points = Wicket Base MVP + Par Score Bonus

Total Fielding MVP Points = 1.8 + 0.036 = 1.836

Finally, how do we decide the Player of the Match?

So far we saw how we calculate MVP Points for each player in the match. Now for declaring player of the match, the winning team gets the precedence.

So if a winning team player is in the Top 3 MVP list, he becomes Player of the Match.

In case, there is no player of the winning team in Top 3 MVP list, the leader becomes the Player of the Match even though he is from a losing side. There is a great chance that he played outstandingly even though his team lost.

Alright, that’s it then. As mentioned before this is just a start and we will get better from here. If you have any doubts or comments, please ask us in the comments section. Also, all the tables in this article are for example purpose, we may keep tweaking them so don’t try to calculate your MVP points using the above tables as a reference.

Let’s reward the real HEROES of Cricket with CricHeroes.