Quote Originally Posted by membengal View Post
In Philly's case, they had already seen him twice for extended appearances this spring, and sure didn't have a much firmer grasp on his stuff this time around. For what it's worth.
That's true. Isn't there some prevailing theory, though, that the pitchers start out the season "ahead" of the hitters? I don't want to curb our enthusiasm about these guys, because I'm as enthused as anyone, but I just want to know at what point their contributions will be deemed legitimate enough to be considered reliable.

Another way of putting it would be: At what point do Cueto and Volquez's performances stop being simply a question of "small sample size" and more a question of repeatable dominance?