I literally put together a whole post on this topic... viewtopic.php?f=63&t=39979 Even with climbing K/HR rates, balls are still put in play very often, 63.8% of PAs in 2019 ended with a ball in play vs 36.2% which ended in a K/BB/HR/HBP. There were 186,516 plate appearances in 2019. Take out the strikeouts (42,823), walks (15,895), home runs (6,776) & hit by pitch (1,984) and you are left with 119,038 PAs ending with a ball in play. Remove the singles (25,947), doubles (8,531) & triples (785) and that leaves 83,775 balls in play which were converted into outs or errors, 195% of the strikeout total. As long as there outs to be made in the field, it will always be advantageous to convert as many of them as possible. And by my count, 12,541 of those singles were infield singles that the Brewers gave up last year. Hoping better defense cuts down on those in 2021.