Poor Brooks Conrad.
The Atlanta Braves second baseman, whom the team was forced to place considerable faith in when they lost infielders Chipper Jones and Martin Prado to season-ending injuries, could not have had a harder time of it during Atlanta’s four-game loss to the San Francisco Giants in the NLDS. He collected just one hit and committed four extraordinarily costly errors, including three in the team’s Game 3 loss alone.
By the fourth and final contest, Cox could not even justify starting Conrad, and the man who had very nearly become a folk hero during a strong regular season now looks like the biggest playoff goat in Atlanta since Lonnie Smith.
Believe it or not, though, Conrad might not be the biggest goat of this year’s postseason. Several key contributors of whom much more was expected faltered nearly as badly as their teams made first-round exits, and thus Conrad has plenty of company. Where among the top five losers of the 2010 playoffs does he rank? Read on.