House That Hank Built
Fansided

The defense of the Atlanta Braves has not been the same in 2019

By Jake Mastroianni

NEW YORK, NY - AUGUST 03: Johan Camargo #17 of the Atlanta Braves reacts after making an error on Todd Frazier #21 of the New York Mets groundball in the ninth inning at Citi Field on August 3, 2018 in the Flushing neighborhood of the Queens borough of New York City. (Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images)
NEW YORK, NY - AUGUST 03: Johan Camargo #17 of the Atlanta Braves reacts after making an error on Todd Frazier #21 of the New York Mets groundball in the ninth inning at Citi Field on August 3, 2018 in the Flushing neighborhood of the Queens borough of New York City. (Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images) /
facebooktwitterreddit
Prev
1 of 3
Next
PHILADELPHIA, PA – APRIL 27: Ronald  Acuna Jr. #13 of the Atlanta Braves makes a diving catch on a ball hit by Odubel Herrera #37 of the Philadelphia Phillies in the bottom of the third inning at Citizens Bank Park on April 27, 2018 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Mitchell Leff/Getty Images)
PHILADELPHIA, PA – APRIL 27: Ronald  Acuna Jr. #13 of the Atlanta Braves makes a diving catch on a ball hit by Odubel Herrera #37 of the Philadelphia Phillies in the bottom of the third inning at Citizens Bank Park on April 27, 2018 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Mitchell Leff/Getty Images) /

Last year the Atlanta Braves had one of the best defensive teams in all of baseball with three Gold Glove winners. But they look completely different in 2019.

One of the biggest head-scratchers in the 2019 season so far for the Atlanta Braves has been the lack of good plays on defense.

I’ll be honest and tell you I’m not huge on analytics, and I don’t think there has been a great metric created yet that can properly judge how good a team is on defense.

But as someone who has watched every Braves game this season, I can tell you that I don’t need any stats to tell me they aren’t as good as they were a year ago.

Last year it seemed like the Atlanta Braves made all the routine plays and sprinkled in some great plays every now and then.

Now it seems like they make most of the routine plays and almost none of the great plays.

How many times this year have we seen Ronald Acuna Jr. or Ender Inciarte slide or dive for a ball and it pop out of their gloves? Enough so that Acuna decided to swap gloves, and then he promptly had another ball pop out of his glove.

These are plays that the Atlanta Braves were making on a nightly basis in 2018.

Dansby Swanson has still made some very solid plays, but then he’s also booted a couple that have proven costly — like Tuesday night.

And while Freddie Freeman is almost always reliable at first base, he’s whiffed on a couple of balls this year that we’re used to seeing him scoop up.

I don’t know exactly what is going on with our defense, but it’s frustrating. Maybe we used all our good luck last year and the baseball gods are evening things up this season?

Whatever the case may be, the defense has to get back to playing at an elite level to help out the young pitching staff.

Home/Braves News