Take 5

Five games into the Wild Things' season and what have we learned:

* The Internet video streaming of the season opener didn't work, but it has worked for the last 4 games. The picture quality is poor. The focus, or lack of it, is a major issue.

* The old baseball mantra is play .500 ball on the road and the Wild Things can do that by winning the final game of the season-opening six-game road trip tonight at Joliet.

* Hitting has been a major problem. Actually, it has been a major problem for longer than just the first five games of this season. The Wild Things haven't finished in the top half of the league in team batting average since 2008. They've had the worst batting average in the league in three of the last five years.

So it's probably no surprise that Washington enters today with the worst batting average in the league at a mere .169, even after playing three games at Gateway, which is definitely in the top-3 hitters ballparks in the league. Again, it's only five games, but if you're a longtime Wild Things fan, then you have to be thinking "Here we go again."

Even with the miserable team batting average, Washington can finish the first road trip at .500. That's a positive.

* Strikeouts are a big reason for the low batting average. They have whiffed 48 times in five games. This continues a trend from last season when only Evansville's hitters had more strikeouts than Washington's.

* The Wild Things already have lost one catcher to injury. Kyle Pollock was placed on the 14-day DL after playing in only the season opener. Eddie Sordono has caught the last four games. Washington had two other catchers, John Fidanza and Stephen Sunday, in spring training. Fidanza was placed on the suspended list and Sunday was released by Washington and signed by Florence. To replace Pollock, the Wild Things acquired catcher Alex McKeon from Laredo of the American Association. Laredo owed Washington a player (actually, two players from the Matt Sergey trade last season). McKeon spent the last two seasons in the Boston Red Sox organization but played in only 39 games.

* Washington's bullpen has been good. It's on a streak of having allowed a run in only one of its last 11+ innings.