Baseball Defense

markj111

Which team had the best defense in 2007?

November 30, 2007

In The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2008, I rank the Toronto Blue Jays as the top defensive team of 2007. According to the Plus/Minus System we developed at Baseball Info Solutions, the Blue Jays led the major leagues with a plus/minus score of +92—which means the Jays made 92 more plays than could be expected of the average major league team.

The double play combination of Aaron Hill and John McDonald was especially dazzling. Together they posted a +22 and a +26, respectively, while anchoring Toronto's middle infield. Hill won the 2007 Fielding Bible Award at second base and McDonald finished third. The corners chipped in +25, the outfield (with 2007 Fielding Bible Award winner Alex Rios) tallied +11, and in the end the Toronto Blue Jays dusted off the competition as the clearcut best team defense in the majors last season.

Here are the top ten defensive teams of 2007, according to the Plus/Minus System:

Team 2007
Plus/Minus
Toronto Blue Jays +92
New York Mets +73
Atlanta Braves +68
Kansas City Royals +66
Arizona Diamondbacks +54
Detroit Tigers +45
Chicago Cubs +36
St. Louis Cardinals +36
Oakland Athletics +25
San Diego Padres +24

The Mets at number two makes sense. The Mets were second in all of baseball at handling bunts with Gold Glover David Wright at third base. Gold Glover Carlos Beltran anchored the outfield defense.

At number three, the Braves posted the best outfield plus/minus score for the third year in a row. They scored a +69 in 2007 after their +63 and +61 in 2006 and 2005. Now that’s consistent! For 2007 they had the Fielding Bible Award winner Andruw Jones at +24 in center field. Jeff Francouer was the runner-up for the award in right field and had a +10 plus/minus figure. Willie Harris was absolutely awesome (+21) after securing the bulk of the left field job in May. Now take a look at their throwing arms. They ranked number one in Major League Baseball in intimidation factor by allowing just 45.4% of runners to attempt an extra base on a single or double, plus they had 21 baserunner kills as a unit, tied for sixth best in baseball.

But the Royals at number four? The Royals, who finished 69-93? Kansas City was actually the most proficient team at turning groundball double plays in 2007, converting on 47% of all groundballs in double play situations. This is mostly attributed to their stellar middle infield combination of Tony Pena, Jr. and Mark Grudzielanek.

Just a word about the Plus/Minus System: At Baseball Info Solutions, we track every play of every major league game and record detailed information on each play, such as the location of each batted ball, the speed, the type of hit, etc. A player gets credit (a “plus” number) if he makes a play that at least one other player at his position missed during the season; he loses credit (a “minus” number) if he misses a play that at least one other player made. Team plus/minus totals are calculated and ranked by cumulative scores at middle infield, corner infield and outfield, along with rankings on double play efficiency, skill in handling bunts, and throwing.

Complete details of these results are in The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2008.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright © 2007 by John Dewan.
Permission to reprint or broadcast this information is granted only if used in conjunction with the following citation: "Used with permission from John Dewan's Stat of the Week™, www.statoftheweek.com."

Barndog

I would figure that double plays turned would be related to opportunities to turn double plays -- and those are more numerous with so-called ground ball pitchers.

Anyway, it would seem that great defense is not a required characteristic of winning playoffs teams using the formula.

TomGshotput

How does +/- compare with batting average on balls in play. I've always thought of that as the best measure of team defense