Oh, cricket has two sorts of “bowlers,” fast bowlers (Nolan Ryan) and spinners (Sandy Kaufax).
A right-handed leg-spin bowler throws with a YUGE amount of counterclockwise spin, so the ball takes a vicious left-hand turn when it bounces. A right-handed off-spin bowler throws with a YUGE amount of clockwise spin, which makes it bounce to the right.
Spin bowlers usually bowl at the start of an innings because the pitch is still smooth, so they can predict how the ball will bounce better. The fast bowlers come up later because by then the pitch will have been roughed up, which makes spin bowling less predictable.
And there is no rule requiring the bowler to bounce the ball in front of the batsman. Throwing straight at the wickets would be called bowling “on the full.” But bowlers almost always elect to bounce the ball because it takes a batsman with an uncommonly skilled eye to detect the spin on the ball before it’s too late.
And unlike baseball, if the batsman get hit by a pitch, it’s HIS fault, not the bowler’s. The reason batsmen wear so much more padding than batters is they get hit pretty commonly. There’s not been an MLB player killed by a pitched ball since 1920. There was a first-class cricketer killed by a bowled ball in 2014. The batsman was struck in the neck, a bit lower than his helmet covered, rupturing his vertebral artery.
After familiarizing myself with Cricket, I came to the conclusion it takes a lot more skill to be a good Cricketer than to be a good baseball player.
A good Cricket batter cannot make a mistake in a period of about an hour and a half, if he wants to reach a “Century” (100 Runs), which most teams will require at least one of their batters to get a Century if they want to win the match.