Before, the Sherman was the only tank you built as usf, so in order to balance it and add more utility to the rest they tweaked the stats.
Sherman is mainly used for AI firepower, the rest is extra, and it can still hold itself with AP rounds.
Also the panzer 4 is fine, and does great against infantry.
I find it hilarious when they tell you the main gun misses too often, the same people will tell you that the T34 is good, even though the main gun doesn't hit shit.
I stopped counting the number of wipes I got with the panzer 4, even though it can miss, when the main gun hits it really does damage and wipes infantry with much ease.
I don't know when was that "before" and if it ever existed outside your mind because from my memories before we were building Sherman to go toes to toes with Pz4s, not only to deal with infantry and then Jackson to deal with Panthers and biggest cats.
Today, well, just read people on this thread, everyone is happy with the Sherman stat vs infantry and keep telling you the sherman is not there to fight Pz4, just serve as protection to forbid Pz4 to dive into your ground.
Pz4 anti infantry stat are as good as the Sherman without having to switch ammo and ShadowLinkX37 can show whatever video he wants, Sherman suffer the same bad-luck momentums vs infantry with the same regularity.
So my question still stand, the Sherman was better vs Pz4 and various changes brought it where we are. And since people like to introduce the Cromwell in the conversation, as well it was far better vs Pz4 before.
Ostheer and OKW have in the same tier natural counters for allied medium tanks named Stug and Jpz4 but no one bother to build them if they see a sherman on the field since Pz4s are better fighting medium armor.
On the other hand, and it is approved by the posters here, shermans are at best a stop gap vs medium armor so the natural go for USF to counter Pz4 is the Jackson.
So why this difference?
Why Axis faction aren't forced to use their anti medium tank tools if you build a sherman, Pz4s are more than enough while providing the same anti infantry results. And why USF which doesn't have anti medium tank tool is forced to build the super expensive Jackson primarily designed to counter heavies and super heavies just to counter medium tanks.
And please stop responding me about AI stat, all Mediums have good AI, if the sherman were over the top like the brumbar/bulldowzer are, I'll completely agree with the sherman being bad AT, but that's not the case, so AT performance matter.