Following the announcement of Beau Webster being named to make his Test debut at the SCG, I wanted to look at his often mentioned change from bowling off-spin to seam

Beau Webster debuted for Tasmania in first class cricket as a 20 year old in February 2014, batting 6 and bowling 5 overs of finger spin across the game.

He was a solid contributor at state level before a decision during the early days of the COVID pandemic to focus on using his 202cm frame to bowl seam up, rather than his more part-time offies.

Since this change, Webster has played for Australia A, become the second man to score 900+ runs and take 30+ wickets in shield history (behind reasonably handy cricketing polymath Sir Garfield Sobers), been named Sheffield Shield player of the season, and now named for his first Test debut at age 31.

Interestingly, his FC career is currently nearly split 50/50 pre-and-post seam.

I wanted to look at the numbers behind how this change not only impacted his bowling output, but also how it coincided with his general development as a cricketer.

*I'm pretty sure he has rolled out a few offies in FC since making the change, so not 100% accurate records

Tweakers:

Pre-seam the Slug from Snug was a solid contributor at state level, his 47 first class games seeing him average just shy of 30 with the bat, and his offies taking on average just south of 1 wicket a match, at an average of 44.7 and best bowling of 3/18.

Seam Up:

The change from seam up has seen his bowling out-put in terms of both overs bowled and wickets significantly increase, with a much improved SR and average.

However its Webster's batting that has really shone in the past seasons, coinciding with his bowling change. He now averages 48.4 since changing to seam, with 7 centuries and 14 half-centuries, and leading all-comers in the 23/24 shield season with his 938 runs at 58.62.

His SR has risen significantly as well with the bat- over that time frame, runs have come at 64.8, whereas pre 20/21 they came at 43.9. (thanks u/dashauskat for the question)

Bowling:

Bowling:

Batting:

Slug vs Bison

For interests sake, I had a look at the man he is replacing in the team teams FC record over this same arbitrary time period- 19 FC matches (which to be fair includes 14 Tests, slightly tougher competition than the 20/21 winless Deadbacks in the shield). In these 14 Tests, his 9 wickets have come at 48.7 runs apiece, sending down on average 5.25 overs across the 20 innings in which he's bowled (to match his batting average at 35.78).

Over FC cricket since Webster decided his 6 foot 7 frame was better suited to seam up than spin, he has averaged nearly 9 runs more an innings with the bat, and averaged 9 runs better a wicket (while bowling on average over 3 times the number of overs than Marsh). Obviously FC to Test is a very big jump, but he is definitely in the right sort of form to make an impact in the New Years Test and shoulder a full bowling load as needed- handy particularly with concerns over Starc's fitness. Webster looks to be the first Tassie all-rounder to feature in the Test team since James Faulkner's single Test in 2013 (correction thanks to u/hardcoreuf0)