I don’t know if anyone’s making “Braves 2022 loss” bingo cards, but if they did, I’m not sure “bonafide bullpen implosion” was something worth marking. At least not until tonight, as the Atlanta relief corps yielded seven runs in the game’s final three innings to the San Diego Padres, turning a one-time 6-4 advantage into a disappointing 11-6 defeat.
Look, this is a tough recap to write, because the game morphed on itself in the nearly four hours it took to come to a conclusion. It started out the way many games do: with barreled outs and some backbreaking soft contact by the Braves’ opponents.