Braves bring some momentum back to Atlanta; evidence for not looking deep into early stats

That was definitely the way the Braves wanted to end the series against Houston after botching (literally) the first game. Atlanta continued the trend of knocking up on Wandy Rodriguez tallying 6 hits and 4 runs (3 earned) against the Astros top lefty.

Randall Delgado proved to be an effective 5th starter for the Braves going 5 innings and allowing 5 hits and 2 runs. Delgado also struck out 6 batters and walked two. I still don’t believe that is the best outing he can give us but since he still needs more time to develop as a pitcher and he is only starting in place of Huddy for a bit, it is definitely okay.

With the exception of Michael Bourn most of Atlanta’s hitters are starting to heat up and at the rate they are going it shouldn’t be long before people start to talk about how ‘the offense isn’t really that bad’. There are definitely still some things to work on, especially when lefties are on the mound against us but the team has proven they can score runs and help out the pitching staff.

Small Sample Sizes People

It seems like every year the media, fans, and even some good writers will look too much into the first couple games to judge a player or team’s performance. Here are some fun stats to think about before you decide to boldly predict a player’s year:

• Before last night Jason Heyward had a .200 batting average. After picking up three hits last night though he bumped the average to .316
• Brian McCann is batting .158 at the time. If he had compiled just 2 more hits at any time so far this season he would be at .263
• Same goes for Dan Uggla. Now he is batting .174. Tack on two more hits and his average goes to .261.

The important thing to realize here is that you need to give at least a month before seriously deciding that a player could have a rough year. It also wouldn’t hurt to look at things besides batting average. There are too many different variables (including luck) involved in baseball to determine a player’s worth in 20 at bats.