In their Daily Dish, Baseball America is taking note of Lancaster's Jay Austin:
It can be a trap to make too much of a player's splits, even for an entire season's worth of performance. But for raw teenagers playing pro ball for the first time in a full-season league, there can be an adjustment period as they get used to playing every day and receive professional-level instruction on a daily basis for the first time in their lives. Astros center fielder Jay Austin's second-half last year with low Class A Lexington—he hit .245/.296/.308 in 228 plate appearances in the first half, .291/.346/.418 in 207 PAs in the second half—might have been a sign of a breakout waiting to happen. Yesterday Austin, 19, was a double short of a cycle, going 3-for-5 with a home run, a triple and a single for high Class A Lancaster, raising his season numbers to .281/.360/.483 in 23 games. There's an asterisk that has to go next to any hitter playing in the Lancaster launching pad, but it looks to be true improvement for Austin, who is showing better control of the strike zone, making solid contact and showing basestealing efficiency with 10 steals in 11 attempts.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
