Abraham Benjamin de Villiers is a South African former international cricketer, and a current commentator. AB de Villiers was named as the ICC ODI Player of the Year three times during his 15-year international career and was one of the five Wisden cricketers of the decade at the end of 2019. He is regarded as one of the greatest cricketers in the history of the sport and as one of the best batsmen of his era. de Villiers began his international career as a wicket-keeper-batsman, but he has played most often solely as a batsman. He batted at various positions in the batting order, but predominantly in the middle-order. Regarded as one of the most innovative and destructive batsmen in the modern era, de Villiers is known for a range of unorthodox shots, particularly behind the wicket-keeper. He made his international debut in a Test match against England in 2004 and first played a One Day International (ODI) in early 2005. His debut in Twenty20 International cricket came in 2006. He scored over 8,000 runs in both Test and ODI cricket and is one of the very few batsmen to have a batting average of over fifty in both forms of the game. In limited overs cricket, he is an attacking player. He holds the record for the fastest ODI fifty, fastest ODI century, and fastest ODI 150.

In cricket, a players' batting average is the total number of runs they have scored divided by the number of times they have been out, usually given to two decimal places. Since the number of runs a player scores and how often they get out are primarily measures of their own playing ability, and largely independent of their teammates, batting average is a good metric for an individual player's skill as a batter. The number is also simple to interpret intuitively. If all the batter's innings were completed, this is the average number of runs they score per innings. If they did not complete all their innings, this number is an estimate of the unknown average number of runs they score per innings.