The questions started to surface weeks before the start of the season: What if someone hits .400? Would it stand? Would it be asterisked? The conversation used the same vernacular as any other baseball debate about which numbers are valuable and which are not. But there was subtext that hinted toward a thornier matter, more existential, the question pulsing under this entire season: Does any of this matter?
Three weeks after Opening Day, the conversation feels a little more material. The Rockies’ Charlie Blackmon has hit .472 over 18 games—a sample size that typically would not mean much at all but here represents almost a third of the year.