Stats Analysis: The darting dominance of Luke Humphries

Luke Humphries (Jonas Hunold/PDC Europe)

In his latest column, PDC Stats Analyst Christopher Kempf takes a look at Luke Humphries' incredible rise to stardom, and assesses how his exploits compare to the dominance enjoyed by Phil Taylor and Michael van Gerwen...

Humphries/Van Gerwen/Taylor comparison

Phil Taylor, Michael van Gerwen, Luke Humphries. These three players stand head and shoulders above their peers for the level of dominance they have attained in winning the PDC's most coveted titles in a single year.

Newly-crowned World Matchplay champion Humphries now holds five of the seven ranking TV titles on offer - the culmination of a meteoric rise to stardom which saw him rise from winning his first Players Championship event in 2022 to becoming World Champion and world number one just two years later.

The only similar accomplishments in PDC history are those of Van Gerwen - who won all seven ranking TV titles consecutively between 2016 and 2017, and Taylor, who dominated darts in 2009 to the point of winning five times as many titles as the second-most successful player that year.

At the high points of their careers, Michael Smith, Peter Wright, Gary Anderson, Adrian Lewis and Rob Cross have never been the reigning champion of more than two ranking TV titles at any time.

While Taylor and Van Gerwen have rightfully earned their places in the darts pantheon, how close is Humphries to joining them?

When it comes to their averages, Humphries has some way to go to match the achievements of those two darting titans in their prime.

Humphries - having played nearly 2000 legs over the past 12 months - has averaged 99.61 - impressive for sure, but a far cry from van Gerwen's 103.14 in 2016 and Taylor's 104.55 in 2009 (stage events only).

Winning more than 50% of one's legs, moreover, is a prescription for dominance in any era of the PDC, and with 827 15-darters (or better), Humphries has won 53.6% of the time.

However, with Van Gerwen and Taylor setting all-time benchmarks of 63% and 66% respectively, the 2023-24 Humphries would probably be a substantial underdog to either, if they could have played each other at their prime.

In one respect, however, the current World Champion is a better watch than Taylor and Van Gerwen, even if he would not have won as many legs in a hypothetical head-to-head match.

Humphries, making the referee's vocal cords work overtime, has thrown 690 maxima in 12 months, for a rate of 0.35 per leg, ahead of Van Gerwen's 0.33 and Taylor's 0.34.

The 29-year-old has even nearly equalled Van Gerwen's career-best stat of 79.4% checkout rate with three darts at double - a figure which, after two failed checkouts in those situations cost him the World Matchplay final, the Dutchman would surely like to recover.

Yet these are not fair comparisons, since the statistics of any dart player depend on the quality and competitiveness of the opponent.

Humphries has faced opponents averaging 95.3 points over the past year just on the ProTour - nearly 0.75 points higher than the TV opponents faced by Taylor in his dominant 2009 season.

With so little data available from the Players Championship circuit 15 years ago, we can't accurately compare Tour Card Holders between 2009 and 2024.

Nevertheless, we do know that the average Tour Card Holder of 2024 records more 12-dart legs than even the average TV event qualifier of Phil Taylor's golden years.

Any comparison of Humphries with the greats must account for the fact that winning any leg has never been a tougher prospect.

As a result, winning 70% of one's legs for an entire year - as Taylor did on TV in 2009 - is nearly impossible in today's competitive environment.

So even if Humphries has not put up the jaw-dropping numbers of Taylor and Van Gerwen in the past 12 months, his head-to-head record against other elite players and incredible haul of titles earns him the right to be considered alongside those two greats.

Since August 2023, his 5-0 record against two-time World Champion Anderson - one of the highest scorers of 2024 - 6-2 against 2021 World Champion Gerwyn Price and a 9-2 record against Van Gerwen demonstrates the struggles other players have faced in finding a winning formula against Humphries this year.

Furthermore, a stunning record of 38 wins in 41 matches in ranking TV events have secured this player - not yet 30 years old - more than one million pounds in income.

The odds of Humphries - or any other player - achieving Taylor's 84% doubles accuracy of 2009 or Van Gerwen's more than 48% accuracy on treble 19 in 2016 are extremely low, but this is all vanity.

A player can only do what is necessary to defeat the player in front of him, and Humphries has proven himself as capable of doing this, month after month, against the best in the business, as darts' all-time greats.

Follow Christopher on Twitter @ochepedia