Just a few quick items in connection with today's Major League Baseball action...

When I saw the Houston Astros were pinch-hitting for Brad Ausmus late in this afternoon's game against Arizona, it reminded me of a write-up I was planning to do.

A little while back, a discussant known as "TechTown" on the RaiderPower.com Texas Tech sports chat site pointed out that Ausmus had gone through a 0-for-40 hitting drought in late June and early July. Hence, it was no surprise to me when Ausmus was lifted today.

Looking at Ausmus's statistics, for the last couple of years and for his career, he's roughly a .250 hitter. That means that on any given official at-bat, he has about a .75 probability of making an out. Raising .75 to the 40th power (for the length of the slump) yields .00001 as the probability of Ausmus's drought, assuming independence of at-bats (i.e., that the outcome of any one at-bat has no effect on the next at-bat, like coin-flipping).

In other news, the Cubs recorded their first home four-game sweep of the Cardinals since 1972, and the Mets swept the Braves in Atlanta for the first time since 1985.