Save Some for Later

Through their first 31 games, my beloved Atlanta Braves had scored just 121 runs, averaging a paltry 3.9 runs per game.  While their pitching has been relatively solid (Derek Lowe aside), allowing just 4.2 runs per contest, the anemic offense had pushed the team to a mediocre 13-18 record through the weekend, with trips to Milwaukee and Arizona ahead.  Over the last two days, however, the Braves offense has perked up; Atlanta has won two in a row by scores of 8-2 and 11-3.  While I'm certainly glad to see this mini offensive outburst, when I follow these games I can't help but (irrationally, I admit) root for the Braves to "save" some offense for a close game (of which there have been many already this year).

In college, I majored in Operations Research and Financial Engineering, which is a fancy term for some combination of economics, statistics and not getting laid.  Therefore, I understand conceptually that each baseball game should be viewed as an independent event (more or less); the fact that the Braves have scored 19 runs over their last two games doesn't necessarily mean that they'll score by one over their next two.  That being said, it is possible to approximate the number of runs the Braves will score over the season even before the first game is played.  I know that, in sports, the law of large numbers definitely applies; over the course of a long 162-game season, each team and player will have numerous hot and cold streaks, which will average out to that team's / player's expected production (again, more or less).  So, to me, it doesn't seem that crazy to hope that the Braves avoid blowout wins, instead "saving" some excess runs for closer games.

The Braves have had numerous games this year that they've lost by scores of 2-0, 5-3 or 3-1.  If, instead of beating the Brewers 8-2 and 11-3, they had won by scores of 4-2 and 5-3, they would have had ten "extra" runs to use over the course of the season, right?.  They could have won those early season games 3-2, 5-4 and 4-3 and still had a Brooks Conrad solo homerun left over!  While as a (fairly) bright person I realize this logic makes absolutely no sense, as a lifelong baseball fan I can't help but feel like there's something to it.  Troy Glaus has homered in each of the last two games, giving him four on the year; since we know that the 57 33 year-old "first baseman" (if you've seen him out there, you'll understand why the quotes are apt) isn't hitting more than twenty bombs this season, couldn't he at least save them for the ninth inning of a tie game?  When the Braves lose 3-2 this afternoon to the Brew Crew, Atlanta fans like me will be wishing they could have saved that ninth-inning Nate McLouth RBI single.