There is a long and storied history of certain players seemingly having a life mission of destroying the Atlanta Braves. It seemed like Ryan Howard homered in every game he played against the Braves when he was with the Phillies. Mike Piazza was basically the only reason why the Mets were even a relevant consideration for Atlanta during his playing days. More recently, Trea Turner and Bryce Harper have given the Braves fits and even Lane Thomas has proven to be a tough guy for Atlanta to handle in key moments.
However, a new name has entered the fray in the wake of the Dodgers sweeping the Braves over the weekend. The good news is that is wasn’t former Brave Freddie Freeman or the all-world Mookie Betts although both of those guys are still problematic. The bad news is that the guy that emerged as a true Braves killer was Shohei Ohtani who also happens to be probably the best hitter in baseball right now.
Shohei Ohtani’s dominance of Braves could end up being a huge problem
During the Braves’ three game road series against the Dodgers, Ohtani went 8-12 with three homers and six RBI. While there are a lot of reasons why that series went sideways for Atlanta and some of them were self-inflicted, Ohtani was the biggest threat by far. Given that Ohtani is under contract with the Dodgers for a long, long time, that presents a serious problem if they can’t figure out how to contain him.
