Is Marcell Ozuna really a defensive liability for the Atlanta Braves?

Josh Donaldson versus Marcell Ozuna. Talk about a no-brainer, right?

I mean, which one would you rather have hitting fourth in the Atlanta Braves’ lineup:

The Bringer of Rain versus an underachiever?

A nearly Gold Glove third baseman versus a shaky left fielder?

At the risk of giving you numbers overload, consider these stats as cleanup hitters last season:

• Strikeouts per plate appearance: .2208 vs .0227

• Home runs with runners on base: .03285 vs. .01064

• Solo home runs: 11 vs. 22

• Other runners driven in: 60 vs. 41

• Runs scored excluding solo home runs: 51 vs. 40

• Per FanGraphs, one ranked second among all players with at least 600 innings at his position and has a Gold Glove, while the other was tied for 10th.

Pretty decisive stats, right?

OK, well here’s where the above narrative takes a little twist. Those first facts belong to Ozuna, the latter to Donaldson.

Those who want to perpetuate the myth of Ozuna as a defensive liability will point to the video of him climbing the fence to grab a Kiki Hernandez fly ball only to have the ball drop in front of him on the warning track. There’s a similar clip of a ball hit by Jesus Aguilar. Then there was his misplay of Anthony Rendon’s line drive in last year’s National League Championship Series. But those are outliers.

Just three years ago, his last season with Miami, Ozuna won the Rawlings Gold Glove for National League left fielders. (One of the other two finalists was Cincinnati’s Adam Duvall, now the odd man out in Atlanta with the signing of Ozuna.)

As bad as those three errors looked, he was hustling on each play. To be clear, Ozuna probably won’t win another Gold Glove. But he can, at a minimum, be average.

The Braves signed him to bat cleanup, and Ozuna is more than a serviceable replacement for Donaldson. Ozuna’s contract of $18 million for one year gives the Braves much more financial flexibility than the Donaldson’s deal of $92 million for four years, plus an option for a fifth year. It’s the perfect bridge to 2021. This time next year, the Braves will know much more about the progress of outfielders Cristian Pache and Drew Waters, as well as third baseman Austin Riley. Maybe with another year of maturity Ronald Acuña will be more comfortable batting cleanup next season.

Batting cleanup is a unique responsibility. It’s a run-producing spot. Donaldson never wanted to bat cleanup. To his credit, he maintained a positive attitude when he was moved from his comfort zone of batting second. Donaldson had 489 plate appearances batting fourth. Of those, 111 resulted in strikeouts, 73 in walks and 22 in solo home runs. Ozuna’s numbers: 114 strikeouts, 62 walks, 11 solo home runs.

But walks are good, right?

Well, sure, walks can be productive. But most pitchers would gladly pitch around the cleanup batter to get to the easier outs in the lineup, even if that means walking him. (Greg Maddux considered it a win to hold Barry Bonds to a single.) So walks by the cleanup batter are not as valuable as walks by, say, the No. 2 hitter, which I suspect is why Donaldson preferred batting second.

Likewise, not all solo home runs are the same. Tom Glavine often says giving up a solo home run many times isn’t a big deal to a pitcher.

Yes, Donaldson was productive as a cleanup hitter. So was Ozuna.

Donaldson brought some fun and swagger during the dog days of summer. That will be missed, if for no other reason than it made watching those August games more entertaining.

But the fun is in the winning, and adding Ozuna means the Braves should be favored to win the NL East for the third consecutive season. Most of the Vegas websites listed the Braves as such, and that was before signing Ozuna.

Before signing Ozuna, Braves general manager Alex Anthopoulos had smartly engineered a productive offseason. He added veteran pitchers Cole Hamels and Will Smith and catcher Travis d’Arnaud and brought back pitchers Darren O’Day and Chris Martin and outfielder Nick Markakis. Signing d’Arnaud and Hamels offset the losses of Dallas Keuchel and Brian McCann. The addition of Smith makes the back end of the bullpen the strongest it has been since Eric O’Flaherty, Jonny Venters and Craig Kimbrel.

The Braves won the NL East two years ago with Markakis batting cleanup. They were a strong bet to at least contend for the division this year before signing Ozuna. They are much stronger now.