Defense and pitching: Could the first make the second better for the Orioles?

We certainly know that Orioles pitchers didn't collectively do very well in the 2018 season. Baltimore ranked last in the American League with a team ERA of 5.18, well over the league average of 4.27. The starters' ERA ranked last in the league at 5.48, with the AL average at 4.39. The bullpen ERA was 4.78 to rank 14th and above the league norm of 4.09.

But as longtime Orioles fans know, the team won often back in the day due to strong pitching and defense, and the two work hand in hand. The defense was not good last year and that didn't provide much help to the pitchers.

In going through stats found at Fangraphs.com, O's pitchers were third-best in the AL in 2018, allowing a hard contact percentage of 31.6 percent. Only Houston (29.2) and Boston (31.3) allowed fewer hard-struck balls.

But the Orioles rated last in the AL in Batting Average on Balls in Play. Baltimore was 15th in the league at .310 with Kansas City at .309 and Toronto at .306. BABIP counts hits, but not home runs, by the way. It records the batting average of balls in play that are non-homers. Another way to say that is it computes a percentage of time a team turns those balls into outs. And the Orioles were last at it. They also rated 14th in the AL last year in Defensive Runs Saved and last in Ultimate Zone Rating.

Oakland led the AL allowing a BABIP of .270 and the A's ranked among the league leaders in DRS, ranking first, and UZR, ranking second. Oakland's defense turned more balls put in play into outs than the Orioles and no doubt that helped an A's pitching staff that ranked sixth in team ERA at 3.82.

The last Orioles team to rank well in BABIP was the 2014 AL East champions. That club allowed a BABIP of .280, which was third-best in the American League. That club led the AL in DRS and was third in UZR.

By comparison, the 2017 Orioles allowed a .302 BABIP, which was sixth-highest in the league and the 2016 Orioles allowed a BABIP of .299, which was sixth-highest. But no recent O's team allowed the highest BABIP until the 2018 club. Certainly, there are factors beyond defense at work here, but that club simply allowed too many balls that were likely turned into outs by many clubs, find their way to becoming hits. That just made a poor pitching staff have to work even harder.

Here are some other numbers about the Orioles 2018 pitching staff. It rated fourth in the AL in throwing the most fastballs, firing one 57.8 percent of the time. The Orioles rated sixth in sliders at 19.8 percent, tied for 14th in curveballs at 6 percent, 12th in cut fastballs at 2.4 percent and fifth in changeups, throwing one 12.1 percent of the time.

We could see the Orioles throw more curveballs in the coming season. It seems clubs are spinning the ball more in recent years and getting some positive results from that, and Houston rated first in the AL last season, throwing curveballs 16.2 percent of the time. No doubt that was important to the Astros staff and new O's general manager Mike Elias certainly has noted the disparity of curveballs thrown between the staffs in Baltimore and Houston last season.

Can the Orioles put a better defense around their pitchers in 2019 and will those pitchers be throwing more curveballs?