I’m not sure if the world is made up of either big picture people or little picture viewers, but I know different fans choose one camp over the other. I’m also not exactly sure when small sample size became part of sports jargon. I figure the past decade of political polling had something to do with it.

We’ve always known about sample sizes, but we didn’t talk about it in those exact terms until recently. It seems like baseball players are more apt to play to smaller sample sizes because of the sports comfort with stats and shorter careers.

Hundreds of professional baseball players play well beyond an initial, small sample size, and others succeed despite poor starts to careers. There is no set of numbers that define the small sample size, but as Justice Potter Stewart said, ” I know it when I see it.”

I got to thinking about the novelty after reading about the Braves trade for outfielder, Jarred Kelenic of the Mariners. It seems like only two months ago that I was writing about Kelenic and his terrific series at Wrigley against the Cubs.

Every season since the ’58 Tigers, every team has had at least one player with a small sample size. Stories have been written about position players that went 1-1 over their entire ML career. Nobody ever projected the players to go 300-300 over the course of a much longer career, but that doesn’t mean we don’t appreciate their limited success.

Fans constantly root against opponents that have success against the teams they root for, and in most cases, these are very small sample sizes. Some of us mistakenly believe that if we acquire that player, that limited success will necessarily transfer when they arrive.

Without delving into Kelenic’s specific prospect status since being drafted by the Mariners, it’s okay to say they had high hopes for him. When Kelenic went 5-9 with three solo homers against the Cubs, the local media saw him differently. That he is a semi-local (Wisconsin) and that he really had no history against the Cubs mattered. His swing looked pretty good and he was hitting well at the time. The fact that his career numbers are pretty lousy didn’t matter. We saw a guy who was on a hot run and quite frankly what he did elsewhere didn’t matter. In 872 career at-bats, he‘s slashed .204/.283/.373 with 32 homers and 109 RBI. And that includes his best season (this year)) .253/.327/.419 with 11 homers and 49 RBI in105 games. That’s hardly setting the world on fire.

Obviously, the Braves see something in Kelenic that Seattle may no longer see. And for sake of the argument, I think they are looking beyond the small sample size from their games this season. In three games against Atlanta, he batted 4-12 with a solo homer and four runs scored. I’ve already read that he’ll be a part of the outfield mix, but they haven’t turned anything over to him yet. Who knows what the Braves will get, but I think there’s a belief that they have the key to unlocking players true value. (nod to John Maddon).

As I said upthread, people root for the underdog, the unknown player without projecting or extrapolating. Other fans and some in the media will immediately dismiss any success and predict sure failure or a return to normal.

Rather than citing more recent examples of small sample size, I thought I’d jump back to 1983 when we talked about guys getting September call-ups. Even though he made his ML debut on August 22nd, Carmelo Martinez’s Cubs career didn’t extend beyond 1983. Nobody was crying, “Rookie of the Year,” but Cub fans bought into Martinez’s limited success. In 29 games and 89 at-bats, he slashed .258/.287/.494 with 6 homers and 16 RBI. Nobody knows what his future would have been with the Cubs because he was traded in the offseason to San Diego for starting pitcher Scott “He’s a good looking right hander” Sanderson. The two teams would play in the NLCS in 1984 with the Padres advancing to face the Tigers in the World Series. Over a 9-year ML career, he would slash .245/.337/.408 so maybe the Cubs knew what they were doing?

When any top prospect gets off to a disappointing ML start, the media is quick to cite the career starting slumps of HOF’ers Ryne Sandberg and Willie Mays. They never mention small sample sizes, but the assumption is that the current prospects have a route to success. Of course, there are several players that get off to truly lousy starts that never really put together good careers. It’s all relative as I never played a game of professional ball.