Brett Lee might be the flavour of the month - not according to the man many "unoficially" credit as the fastest of all time.
Former tearaway Aussie paceman, Jeff Thomson, says his fastest bowling would have been clocked at about 180km/h had the same radar equipment been around in the 1970s.
Many park cricketers still argue about who was the fastest but the man they call "Thommo" was only too willing to shed some light on the urban myth surrounding him being clocked around the 100 mile per hour mark in his heyday.
It started in the summer of 1975 where Thomson's pace was the key ingredient which eventually helped Australia to a 5-1 series victory against Clive Lloyd's world-beaters.
He finished the series with an impressive 29-wicket haul and his 99.7mp/h (160.5km/h) missile bowled in the second Test in Perth confirmed his status as the world's fastest "quick".
A fast bowling competition in the same city three years later merely celebrated it.
It was January 1979 and the late Kerry Packer demanded Thomson take the field to take on a field of fast bowlers that included Pakistan's Imran Khan and West Indies' Michael Holding. The only problem ... Thomson was suspended at the time.
"Every fast bowler that could bowl fast was there," Thomson told the Canberra Sunday Times this week.
"It was serious too, there was 10 grand on it, but I'd been banned for months and I wasn't allowed to play."
"But then Packo [Kerry Packer] came over and said 'Thommo you've gotta go do this, you're supposed to be the quickest'.
"I just came straight down and bowled and was the fastest and the straightest."
Thomson's record has come under attack in recent times from Australia's latest pace sensation Brett Lee, and Pakistan's Shoaib Akhtar, with the latter having unofficially broken Thomson's record during a one-day match against New Zealand in Lahore in 2002.
Akhtar's claimed speed of 161.4km/h was questioned immediately due to the unapproved radar equipment used.
"This Shoaib Akhtar struts around like Hollywood," said Thomson, who was at the match commentating for sports broadcasting channel TWI.
"We had our engineers on the fence doing the radar gun but the Pakistanis had their own on the fence, and it was the one that said [he clocked] 161km/h.
"It was absolute bulls..t, because our blokes had the same ball clocked at 155 or something like that. It was just a rort."
Thomson, 55, criticised the radar equipment in use today, which measures the speed of the ball as it leaves the bowler's hand. That's where he gets his 180km/h figure.
While Thomson's presumptions would seem a tad overzealous to many, the Australian wicketkeepers who were unfortunate enough to have faced his rampaging deliveries found it hard to are in the ex-quick's corner.
Former Queensland and Australian Test wicketkeeper John Maclean said the old technology used to capture Thomson's speed wasn't an accurate reflection of how fast he really was.
"I think they used a radar gun but it was never set up like it is now," Maclean said.
"Look at the advantages that have been made ... all I can go by is these guys are bowling it close to 100mp/h [160.9km/h] and none of them look anywhere near as quick as Thommo used to bowl."
"When he bowled really quick, I don't even know what it would be.
"I've got no fear that he was regularly over 100mp/h and on the odd occasion, well over."
Australia's 96-Test wicketkeeper Rod Marsh, who kept for Thomson for most of his career, said he remained the quickest in his mind.
"I just find it very difficult to ever imagine anyone ever bowling as fast as Thommo," Marsh said.
- DOUG MacDOUGALL