Rajasthan Royals (RR) Vaibhav Sooryavanshi had a stellar IPL 2026 season, scoring 776 runs with a strike rate of 237.30 with one century and five fifties. He had scored two brilliant knocks of 97 and 96 in the IPL 2026 playoffs against Sunrisers Hyderabad and Gujarat Titans, respectively.  

Seeing Sooryavanshi’s brilliant outing in the IPL 2026, which was the 15-year-old’s first full season for RR, former IPL chairman Lalit Modi has claimed that if money doesn’t get into his head, he could be the biggest superstar on the planet, bigger than any Bollywood or Hollywood superstar.

Sooryavanshi won five awards in the IPL 2026 ceremony, including the Orange Cap for most runs, Emerging Player of the season, and the Most Valuable Player award.

The cricket community as a whole praised his performances, and several pundits and former players hailed him as a generational talent. According to Modi, Sooryavanshi might eventually get a double century in Twenty20 cricket and surpass the top movie stars in the world in popularity.

"I am looking forward to that day (Sooryavanshi's double ton). You will make a 200, I promise you. Don't let money get into your head. You will become the number one superstar on the planet, bigger than any Hollywood and Bollywood star on the planet," Modi said on the Wisden podcast.

Sooryavanshi not only became the youngest and first uncapped player to amass more than 700 runs in a single IPL season, but he also broke Chris Gayle’s record of 59 sixes in a season, hammering 72 maximums in IPL 2026. His strike rate of 237.30 is the highest ever recorded by any Orange Cap winner in the 19-year history of the league.