6 Braves who went cold at worst possible time, and 1 who didn't
By Josh Wilson
The Atlanta Braves were cold. Ice cold. They scored eight runs in just four games, the lowest amount of runs scored this entire season over that long a span for the normally-prolific offense. Five of the eight runs came in one of the games.
As one Twitter user pointed out, some of the biggest stars combined for a 1.473 OPS in the series. Nick Castellanos and Bryce Harper exceeded that on their own for the Phillies.
There is plenty of blame to go around. These Braves went cold, with one player remaining as consistent as ever. Even so, his performance wasn't enough to hold them over as the Braves were axed in four games, their magical season ending as devastatingly as it did the year before at the hands of the same division rival.
Eddie Rosario
We're talking about cold bats in this article, but let's also briefly hit on Rosario's defense. In Game 3, an early ball was sent to the left center gap and Rosario jogged it out. The ball would have been a tough play, but still, Rosario seemed disinterested in even giving it a college try.
The left field position was a sore spot the whole series. Brian Snitker will unfairly catch blame for starting Kevin Pillar in Game 4, but Rosario was not a good option, either. Rosario went 1-for-7 and struck out three times. He slashed .143 across all three metrics and had an OPS of just .286.
Rosario was also a complete non-factor against the Phillies last year, going 0-for-8. In 2021, Rosario was a postseason hero. Where did that go?