Somewhere around May 21 I was surprised to learn that the Indian Premier League (IPL) had reached its 76th match and I hadn’t seen a single one. I saw headlines, possibly snippets of the batting of 15-year-old prodigy Vaibhav Sooryavanshi. I meant to tune in to one of his games to see him, but never got around to it. As much as I am a huge cricket fan, it has all become too much: too many big scores, too many sixes, and too much cricket.

I never thought that’s something I’d ever say. I became a cricket adherent as a seven-year-old because my mother followed the sport, mostly by radio. And until the advent of the countless Twenty20 leagues (T20), I could never have enough cricket.

The franchises have changed the landscape to the point that nobody can keep track of all the cricket being played, let alone follow all the action. In addition to the IPL, there is the Caribbean Premier League (CPL), Big Bash League (BBL), Pakistan Super League (PSL), Bohra Junior League (BJL), Lanka Premier League (LPL), Nepal Premier League (NPL), South Africa’s premier T20 league, The Hundred, the Global T20 Canada, Major League Cricket, and quite a few more. Games run rapidly into each other and individual performances, no matter how striking, are often a blur.

It was inevitable that the T20 leagues would have taken a toll on the international game. We have seen players forsake international duties in favour of the leagues. As I write this, for instance, England pacer Jofra Archer is unavailable for the first Test in the upcoming series against New Zealand because of commitments to the Rajasthan Royals in the IPL. We have also seen that elite players, such as Nicolas Pooran from the West Indies, retired from the international game while continuing to turn out for various T20 leagues.

Cricket is eating itself. In a way, it’s like the organism that feeds so voraciously on its host that it runs the risk of severely weakening it or relegating it to irrelevancy.

There seems to be nobody at the helm of world cricket, nobody steering the ship, nobody making decisions for the greater good. And so cricket stumbles along, its path beset by uncertainty, excess, and a yearning for profit. Cricket cries out for good governance. That’s the only way to make the rough patches smoother.

The principle of scarcity in economics states that the less there is of a product, the more valuable it will be. Conversely, the more abundant a commodity, the lower it is valued. Sixes in cricket use to be relatively rare. That made them all the more cherished. It made them special. But are they still special considering the frequency with which they now occur? Has big hitting become so commonplace that it is in danger of losing its appeal?

Perhaps. There may be some signs of trouble. TV viewership for this year’s IPL dropped substantially. Average viewership dipped by 26 per cent, while the number of advertisers fell by 31 per cent. The streaming numbers are up, but viewers normally tune in and out, probably to check the scores, and so fewer people are planting themselves in front of a television to watch a whole match. What is not in question is that there is some amount of viewer fatigue affecting the sport.

In other words, too much cricket and too much big hitting may be overwhelming us. In 1999, during the Coca Cola Challenge final at the Kallang Cricket Ground in Singapore, Jamaican right-hander Ricardo Powell struck 124 off 93 balls against India to bring West Indies from a perilous 67/4, chasing 255, to a spectacular four-wicket victory. Powell struck nine sixes and eight fours in a brutal display that was quite novel at the time. He was inundated with high praise, Australian commentator Ian Chappell even mentioned Sir Vivian Richards in comparison.

But West Indies fast-bowler Michael Holding was more cautious than most. He mentioned the fact that Powell hit more sixes than fours and that “was not how the game is normally played”. The great fast bowler was right, of course; sixes were a batsman’s scarcest currency of trade. But he was only right according to the way the game was played at the time. Cricket has changed, and batters hitting more sixes than fours nowadays is commonplace, especially in the game’s briefest form.

The average number of home runs per game in the American Major Leagues is less than two. Teams still have to eke out runs innings by innings if they want to win games. But what if that average were to rise to 10? Would the home run be as highly valued or as momentous?

The clear answer is no. Home runs would become commonplace, run-of-the-mill, and the excitement that greets each hit into the stands would subside.

Some purists already think the surfeit of six-hitting is not good for the game. The bigger bats, shortened boundaries, trained-to-the-minute batters, and the more aggressive outlook that has led to the increased frequency of sixes have drawn the ire of many concerned over the direction of the modern game. They think that much of the game’s technique and artistry is being replaced by brute force and arithmetic.

T20 cricket has contributed much to the sport, especially from a financial standpoint. It has allowed a number of players to earn a good living playing the game they love. But for those who have been long-time fans of the game: Does following cricket now bring more satisfaction than it did prior to the proliferation of the T20 leagues? I know how I would answer that question, though I could well be in the minority.

garfield.v.robinson@gmail.com