The baseball season is only a week old, but teams like the Tigers, Brewers, and Reds have made bold statement, while the Twins, Rangers, Phillies, and Pirates have… well, they’ve also made bold statements. There are many levels of translation from the input of raw talent to the output of wins — talent to on-field events, on-field events to runs, and runs to wins, for example. And like a game of telephone, the results don’t ways reflect the input. Below are some teams with interesting records and/or run differentials. I’ll try to determine which is the better indicator of success (or lack thereof) so far.
Team — Record — RS/RA — Comments
NYY 1-4 25/22; Outscoring the opponents by three runs doesn’t usually result in a losing record, although 15 of the Yankees run came in the Opening Day blow out of Barry Zito. Just ten more runs in four games is pitiful. I don’t expect the Yankee offense to continue that trend, however. What must continue for New York to win their division is the quality starting pitching.
DET 5-0 39/12; No flukey conversion between runs and wins here. Detroit has throughly clobbered opponents by an average score of 8-2.5. While the warnings about Chris Shelton are obvious, this really has been a team effort so far. If I were a teacher trying to pump out report cards as fast as possible, my comment would be “The Tigers are a pleasure to have in the division. Keep up the good work!”
OAK 4-2 25/28; Remember, without the Zito-Yankee game, this team has a 4-1 23/13 mark. Sure, you can’t completely ignore those 15 runs, but the A’s returned the overkill favor against the Mariners, allowing three hits over the past two games. No fluke here, just an matter of extremes.
ATL 3-3 48/47; Not only do the Braves lead the majors in scoring runs, they’ve also given up the most — by far. Is this a sympton of post-Mazzone syndrome? Probably not. The offense is not this good and the pitching is not this bad (although, it’s still potentially not good.) These are not your older sibling’s Braves.
PHI 0-4 13/26; Scoring three runs per game is just not going to cut it. Anyone think that’s going to continue, however?
MIL 5-0 23/14; Do thoughts of the Brewers and Tigers produce the same fuzzy “yay-underdog!” feeling in your stomach, too? While the Brewers were everybody’s favorite surprise team of the year, they really haven’t dominated any games so far, averaging a 4.5-3 victory over five games. That’s not very Tigers-like. However, you’ve got to like the pitching, and Ben Sheets hasn’t even joined the rotation yet. Carlos “Chris Shelton” Lee’s going to need some help eventually, and the Cardinals are only 2-3 with only a slightly worse run differential. As Nick Bakay would say, advantage… Tigers.
PIT 0-6 29/39; Sure, being outscored by “only” ten runs shouldn’t lose you six games, but the team really is pretty bad. If Pittsburgh’s not going to win games when it plays decently, this season could be really ugly.
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Sky is a baseball fan and racket sport afficianado living in upstate NY. His favorite color is orange and is just about ready to give up on his life-long dream to become the next Magnus ver Magnuson (World's Strongest Man). His favorite baseball teams are the Yankees and Red Sox, proving that there's hope in the Middle East.