Atlanta Braves phenom Ronald Acuna is great on defense too

The Atlanta Braves have a boatload of young talent on the rise, but none have made a splash this season like the team’s phenom outfielder, but is his incredible offense blinding us to his defensive ability?

The Atlanta Braves have developed one of the most stacked farm systems in all of baseball over the past several years, but the biggest head-turner of them all at all levels has been Ronald Acuna Jr.

What he has done at the plate in his rookie season is the stuff of legend that all who saw will be telling future generations about. However, his presence at the plate may be overshadowing Acuna’s talent in the field.

Just to recap, though 79 games (307 at-bats) the 20-year-old Acuna has hit .290/.358/.928 with 89 hits, 21 home runs, and 45 RBI. Add 11 stolen bases on top of that and the kid is a frightening sight for opposing pitchers.

Everyone knows about his home run streak and his leadoff home run streak and his monster blast in Miami that broke a tile deep in the nether regions of Marlins Park. What people – even die hard baseball folks – aren’t really talking about as much, however, is the fact that Acuna plays the outfield like his hair is on fire.

His big diving catch in Sunday’s win over the Marlins made for a nice web gem and will likely be played over and over again on the MLB Network and ESPN highlights, but the baseball world should know that this type of caution to the wind play is typical of Acuna, and not the exception.

Acuna has been impressing with his glove for a long time … at least as long as a 20-year-old rookie has had to impress to this point. For those who saw him in the minor leagues from the Gulf Coast League all the way up to Gwinnett, it’s no shocker whenever Venezuela’s newest start player lays out for a spectacular snag in the outfield.

To date this season, Acuna is carrying a respectable .977 fielding percentage in the outfield through 77 games (76 starts). At his natural position of center field, he actually has a 1.000 fielding percentage through 10 games and the same for right field through three games.

All three of Acuna’s errors this season have come while playing left field. Now that’s not surprising with the bulk of his games having been played there, but perhaps a larger sample size may reveal more about that going forward.

Through 77 games in his 2015 rookie season, back-to-back Gold Glove winner Ender Inciarte finished with three errors and a .975 fielding percentage.

In his minor league career, Acuna showed glimpses of greatness in the field, just as he has already done with Atlanta. Through 259 MiLB games he held a .982 fielding percentage with eight total errors in the outfield.

Andruw Jones posted a .977 fielding percentage with seven errors in his 1997 rookie season for the Braves. That was through 147 games that season.

Of course, those are the simplest of statistical comparisons, but the eye test is certainly there so far. Will Acuna be the next Andruw Jones, or even Ender Inciarte in the field? It’s too early to tell, but to date, the young Atlanta Braves outfielder seems to have the potential to be as good with the glove as he is with the bat.