Adventures in sample sizes.

I dropped a .295/.312 on Joe last week, but managed to win the offensive counting stats.  Mark Texeira slugged .179 over that span and struck out what feels like forty seven times.  His "slump" is approaching two and a half months in duration.

I watched the entirety of the Morrow-Vazquez duel yesterday.  Javy's looked pretty sharp over his past two starts, with 3 earned runs in 14 innings and a ton of strikeouts.  He was carrying a no-hitter into the 6th until a 2-run HR broke the standoff.  I made sure to take the time to complain to Mike about my missed opportunity to acquire Vazquez, who seems to have rediscovered some of his control.  Of his past five starts, only one was bad, and four were fantastic.

Speaking of 14 amazing innings, Brandon Morrow's only given up two runs during that span, and the second run was basically Scott Downs' fault.  Eight strikeouts against the Yankees.  There was an earlier report after the Tampa victory that his control problems were resolved when he dialed his fastball back to 92mph.  I'd like to note that this report is total bullshit.  Morrow was averaging 96+ only on his two starts at the end of May.  His velocity charts for the past two games are identical to his first six or seven starts when he was walking five dudes a game, averaging 94 but occasionally touching 96-97.  I can't seem to derive any relevant PitchFX data to suggest causes for the recent improvement, but I will note that despite the 5.48 ERA, his xFIP is only 4.01.  If it's just a matter of bad luck that he's now beyond, it could mean I finally have something to reliably replace Lackey.

Because Scherzer isn't reliable.  14 strikeouts against A's, only 3 against the Royals with 5 ER.  I don't know what his deal is.

After eight games, Buster Posey is .433/.452/.567.  What does this mean?  Nothing, but now I don't know what to do about Carlos Santana's impending call-up.  Santana theoretically has more power and better contact, but he doesn't have the play time guarantee that Posey does, and he doesn't have eight sparkling MLB games to compare against Posey.