There was something about Fernando Tatis that Mets fans and commentators did not want to embrace. It was too easy to compare Tatis to other reclamation projects like Brady Clark, Abraham Nunez, and Sandy Alomar, Jr. Tatis was just another old player trying to relive past glory. So used to the idea of these projects failing, nobody held out any hope that it might succeed this time, but it has.

If Tatis does nothing else this year, even if he starts batting .150 down the stretch and loses his spot in the lineup permanently, this project was definitely a success. Tatis had a good year to clobber baseballs down in Triple-A New Orleans to refine his power, then he moved up and amazingly, clobbered some baseballs on the major league level. Sometimes those statistics do carry over. Sometimes it really is that easy.

In 177 at-bats, Tatis has a .316 average with 9 HRs and 33 RBIs. At first glance, his power might remind of 2007’s Damion Easley. Easley hit 7 HRs in his first 74 at-bats that year but then finished with 10 HRs in 193 at-bats, numbers more in line with his career averages.

Admittedly, Tatis could just be on a streak as well. He had 1 HR in his first 90 at-bats. Since then, he has 8 HRs in his last 87 at-bats. But Tatis has career statistics that suggest he could keep up his power, at the very least. In 2002 with Montreal, he had 15 HRs and 55 RBIs in 381 at-bats. That’s more or less his statistics as a Met doubled. In 2000 with St. Louis, he had 18 HRs and 64 RBIs in 324 at-bats. So even after his mammoth 34 HR year in 1999, he showed the potential to slug. It’s just his batting average and on-base percentage, which he hadn’t shown he could keep respectable again until now. In 2000, his OBP was still good (.379), but his batting average had slipped to .253. In 2002, he batted a miserable .228 with a .303 OBP.

Career-wise, Tatis has walked, keeping his OBP around 100 points higher than his batting average. This makes his current average of .316 and OBP of .361 interesting, as its one of the shorter gaps of his career. Perhaps he feels the hot streak and wants to go after pitches to slug. But for example, in his mammoth 1999 year, he had a sparkling .404 OBP, over 100 points higher than his average. In 2000, he had a .379 OBP, again over 100 points higher. So maybe if pitchers begin to pitch around him, he’ll take the walks, rather than take ugly swings and lose his hot streak.

Ultimately, one can continue to doubt the legitimacy of Tatis if they wish, but this is a hot streak any logical Mets fan should want to ride out. Carlos Delgado might be coming out of his slugging stupor. Does that mean riding out his streak wasn’t worth it? Of course not. Let’s ride this one out, as well.