Don’t pay attention to spring stats

Hey everyone, here’s your annual spring training reminder.

Don’t get excited when you see Mark Teixeira is batting .666 and don’t get mad when Curtis Granderson is hitting below the Mendoza line.

In spring training, stats are not normally a good tell of how a player is actually doing, or how they are going to do in the regular season. There are plenty of examples out there of players having terrible springs that come out in April hotter than a sauna.

So what do you watch for? Key word in that is “watch.” In order to really tell how a player, or a team for that matter, is doing, you need to watch them play. Observe their tendencies. If you notice Robinson Cano isn’t hitting anything outside pitches to left field, that’s a problem. See if Alfredo Aceves is leaving his curve up in the zone too much.

I know it’s tough with YES Network’s inconsistent radar gun, but try and keep track of velocity. See if the speeds translate to the regular season.