When the Oakland A’s went 7-3 on their recent East Coast road trip, it was easy to find areas for praise. The lineup scored 60 runs, the rotation did enough to keep the team in games, and the bullpen went above and beyond to play hero multiple times. However, one department that didn’t get much attention was the defense, which was quietly steady throughout.
The A’s still made a handful of fielding miscues during the road trip, because no team is perfect, but overall they took care of business on that side of the ball. They won several close games, and in some of them the difference was that Oakland simply made fewer mistakes than their opponent.