If the Atlanta Braves can’t find the offense they want, then maybe load up on defense?
There are, after all, three aspects to this game: pitching, hitting, and defense. Ideally, you’d like to be solid in all three departments, but it’s not always possible. The Atlanta Braves may be okay — or at least in better shape than in 2020 — with their starting pitching.
We know there’s at least one hole in the offense… an Ozuna-shaped hole. The real trick is whether he’d have to wear a glove even if he is re-signed.
In that case, the Braves could be adding offense while subtracting defense… which might not be the best idea.
By most accounts, there aren’t a lot of big bats around this Winter on the free agent market. It’s pretty much down to Ozuna and Springer. Springer’s price is going to be out of reach and Ozuna’s defense… well, you’d better hope the Universal DH makes a return to the National League.
But what if the team took a different tack? What if they choose to go with elite defense instead of extra offense?
At this point, such an outfield (Inciarte, Pache, Acuna) is already in place. Austin Riley — even if his bat never comes around — is certainly more than competent at third.
Given the pitching-to-contact guys in the rotation, how bad could that be?
To help answer this question, I rolled up every team in every season between 2000 and 2020 on fangraphs, sorting the entries by their total defensive rating. There’s some interesting results.
- Of the 630 entries, the best defensive team — as a whole — over that stretch was the 2012 version of the Atlanta Braves.
- Atlanta was also 9th and 12th on the list in the seasons of 2001 and 2005, respectively. In 2000, the team ranked 29th
- Over those seasons, the offensive metrics were not that great for these Braves’ teams… the peak result was a -3.3 (0.0 is supposed to be average) for the 2005 team.
So Atlanta has actually tried this “all defense” approach before — whether conscious of it or not. So how did they do?
- 2012 Braves. 94-68 record (2nd place)
- 2001 Braves. 88-74 record (1st place)
- 2005 Braves. 90-72 record (1st place)
- 2000 Braves. 95-67 record (1st place)
Interesting. Let’s see if that correlates with some other “defense-first” clubs:
- 2001 Rockies (numbers ~between the 2000 and 2012 Braves)
- 2000 Rockies (same defense, but horrid offense)
- 2011 DBacks (4th best defensive team; -14.5 offense score).
- 2010 Giants (14th best D-team; -31.8 offense)
- 2004 Dodgers (10th best D-team; -19.9 offense)
I picked these five without looking… now let’s see how they did overall:
- 2000 and 2001 Rockies finished 4th and 5th respectively, with 82-80 and 73-89 records. Ugh. However…
- 2011 DBacks finished 1st with a 94-68 record.
- 2010 Giants finished 92-70 and ended up winning the World Series.
- their 2016 team could have been used as a comparison point also: they went 87-75 and finished in 2nd place.
- 2004 Dodgers went 93-69 and finished in 1st place.
So that’s… not a terrible trend. I did not include pitching considerations in this stat search, and that undoubtedly played a big factor (in Denver, most likely). That said, these are teams that weren’t offensive juggernauts and they found a way to win with elite defense plus pitching.
So if Atlanta ends up not getting that big bat this Winter or decides to go trade for a more elite OF defender (like a Kevin Kiermaier) or juggle things on the left side of the infield to bring in Andrelton Simmons, then don’t despair.
They could still make that work — there is ample precedent for a pitching-and-defense team.