1)  Way more tries after 3 rounds than last year!  73 last year compared to 100 this season, that's a whooping 40% increase.  However, the caveat should be mentioned that the results last year were skewed by the disruption to the kiwi teams.  Only the chiefs have scored less tries this year than last after 3 rounds (7 versus 8) and overall the kiwi teams have scored 17 more tries in 3 rounds than they did last year which is the majority of the increase right there.  If you throw in the bizarre statistical outlier of the Brumbies only having scored 2(!!!) tries in 3 rounds in 2007, which is way way lower than their usual scoring rate, then having the ABs back and the Brumbies scoring at roughly their usual rate (9 in 3 games this year similar to the 8 in 3 in 2006) gives you 24 out of the 27 extra tries.

2)  OK, so if a comparison with the early rounds last year is biased then I'll try a better like-for-like comparison between 2006 and 2008 i.e. comparing non-RWC cup years.  Again this year is up after 3 rounds 100 vs 85 (18% increase).  The interest here is that the difference is accounted for entirely by the Blues and the Crusaders.  If you remove the tries from these two teams from the log then its 69 tries exactly after 3 rounds in both years.  In fact no two teams have ever been so responsible for the percentage of tries scored after 3 rounds in the S14.  31% of all the tries scored this year have been from just two teams!  The third most prevalent try scorer (Cheetahs/Brumbies joint on 9) have half the number of tries as the leading try scorer the Blues.

3)  This fits the picture that apart from the high quality of the Blues and Crusaders games, which are universally admired by even those who, like me, have reservations over some of the ELVs there has been more kicking in-field.  My point being that ball in play time has increased by at least 10% according to any of the stats I've seen on other rounds but the numbers of tries being scored are not being inflated which suggests that the extra play is largely not increasing the attacking content of the game - in the games not involving the elite teams.  This is the point made by Dodge many many times on the forum!

In general, the tries scored statistic is showing that whilst the Blues are joint record holders of number of tries after 3 rounds with 18, you also have teams like the Bulls (2 scored) and the Stormers (1 scored) who are having big problems crossing the line.  There are more tries but the try scoring is more sharply peaked towards fewer teams.  Your interpretation of these results (bar the obvious point about limited data sets) should be based on how much importance you attach to tries as a reflection of entertainment/quality and to what extent you find the narrower distribution of scoring teams a bad thing.  Not to mention how you think this will pan out in time - will more teams play like the Blues and Crusaders?