16-0 Game · Published 8 October 2026
What do the most successful drafted sides have in common? We took a snapshot of the public all-time regular leaderboard on 8 October 2026: the 30 best regular seasons, one per captain, with every selection. Captain names are left out; only the squads are analysed.
The records
3 of the 30 are perfect 16-0 seasons and 7 reached sixteen wins in total. The rest are near misses: a defeat or a washout somewhere along the way.
Their XI ratings run from 88.5 to 96.0, averaging 93.8. Only 70 different players appear across the 330 selections.
Every card at its peak
In every one of the 30 XIs, all eleven cards carry that player's highest rating anywhere in the game. In practice the top of the board is a Prime-rating board: Prime values each player at their best season, so famous names arrive at full strength wherever the spin lands.
The floor matters as much as the peak. The weakest player in these XIs averaged 84.9 and was never below 72. 25 of the 30 used all four overseas places.
Who they picked
The twelve players below appear most often across the 30 XIs. Overseas players are marked; they compete for the same four places.
| Player | XIs (of 30) | Peak rating | Overseas |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jasprit Bumrah | 23 | 96 | No |
| Virat Kohli | 22 | 97 | No |
| MS Dhoni | 19 | 95 | No |
| Rishabh Pant | 17 | 95 | No |
| Sunil Narine | 16 | 95 | Yes |
| KL Rahul | 15 | 95 | No |
| Andre Russell | 13 | 96 | Yes |
| Bhuvneshwar Kumar | 13 | 91 | No |
| Jos Buttler | 12 | 96 | Yes |
| Shubman Gill | 11 | 95 | No |
| AB de Villiers | 10 | 96 | Yes |
| Chris Gayle | 10 | 95 | Yes |
The shape of a record side
Counting the slots each XI filled, the two most common builds account for 24 of the 30 runs.
| Build | Runs | Average XI rating | Average wins | Average title odds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 bat · 1 keeper · 1 AR · 2 pace · 1 spin | 13 | 94.2 | 15.2 | 48.9% |
| 4 bat · 1 keeper · 2 AR · 3 pace · 1 spin | 11 | 93.9 | 14.9 | 47.6% |
| 5 bat · 1 keeper · 1 AR · 2 pace · 2 spin | 3 | 92.9 | 15.3 | 43.4% |
| 5 bat · 1 keeper · 0 AR · 3 pace · 2 spin | 2 | 91.5 | 14.5 | 38.1% |
| 5 bat · 1 keeper · 2 AR · 2 pace · 1 spin | 1 | 94.5 | 15.0 | 50.2% |
Does a higher rating mean a better record?
Splitting the 30 runs by XI rating, the higher-rated fifteen averaged 94.9 and won 15.1 matches; the lower-rated fifteen averaged 92.6 and won 15.0. The perfect seasons split 1 and 2 between the two halves.
At this level the ratings are tightly bunched, so the difference between a 15-win and a 16-win season comes down to a single match. Rating gets a side onto this board; it does not decide the order within it. Small samples like this one also move easily: one new perfect run would change the split.
5 of the twelve most-selected players are overseas, which is one reason the four overseas places fill so consistently among these runs. Our study of the overseas cap looks at that rule in detail.
What the wider community picks
The leaderboard service also counts selections across the squads of its top saved runs. In that larger sample of 319 squads, Jasprit Bumrah was picked in 62% of them and Virat Kohli in 62%. The eleven most-picked players are shown below.
| Player | Role picked in | Squads | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jasprit Bumrah | PACE | 197 | 62% |
| Virat Kohli | OPN | 197 | 62% |
| MS Dhoni | WK | 187 | 59% |
| Bhuvneshwar Kumar | PACE | 133 | 42% |
| KL Rahul | OPN | 124 | 39% |
| Rishabh Pant | WK | 119 | 37% |
| Sunil Narine | SPIN | 112 | 35% |
| Andre Russell | AR | 103 | 32% |
| AB de Villiers | FIN | 92 | 29% |
| Jos Buttler | FIN | 89 | 28% |
| Shubman Gill | OPN | 85 | 27% |
Rating is not the whole story
Pricing these XIs with the game's odds model gives title chances between 26.4% and 57.6%. The three perfect seasons came from XIs priced at 50.5%, 47.0%, 45.6%; the side with the best odds, 57.6%, finished 15-1. A great XI makes 16-0 possible, but the season still has to be won one match at a time.