José Alvarado
The Phillies entered the season with a new approach to closing games with José Alvarado and Jeff Hoffman splitting the majority of save situations up until midseason. The arrangement had a few hiccups early on, but by June, both relievers had settled into a nice groove when coming out of the Phillies bullpen to close it out in the ninth.
Fast forward to July and August, when Alvarado's production in high-leverage situations fell off drastically. Let's start with July, when Alvarado went 0-2 with an 8.31 ERA after allowing eight earned runs on 11 hits, while striking out eight and walking five in 8 2/3 innings. Opponents hit .306 over that span, and Alvarado only recorded one save in his 10 appearances that month.
It's a given that relief pitchers are going to struggle at times over the course of a season. The heavy workload and randomness of the role can easily set a pitcher up for failure at any time. But for Phillies fans hoping that July was an aberration, things didn't get much better in August either.
While Alvarado's ERA in August was roughly cut in half at 4.66 in 10 appearances, the hard-throwing southpaw allowed 10 hits and 5 earned runs while recording more walks (8) than strikeouts (7), and opposing hitters guessed right when they were swinging, posting a healthy .263 batting average in 38 at-bats.
Alvarado's rough couple of months also coincided with some family issues back in his home country of Venezuela, causing the Phillies to place him on the restricted list in late August in order for him to travel back home. It remains to be seen if mental hurdles played a role in his struggles, but it was ultimately Thomson and pitching coach Caleb Cotham who continued to send him to the mound when it was more than obvious to the casual fans that Alvarado couldn't be trusted in big spots.
The common theme shared between all four players on this list goes beyond the individual performances, the players were repeatedly sent out to fail when the splits and large sample trends pointed toward shaking things up and rolling with a new approach.
No one will fault Rob Thomson for being a player's manager, that's half the reason the veterans on the team responded to his leadership when he was named manager in 2022. This season won't go down as Topper's best in the dugout, and hopefully he learned some valuable lessons after watching his team go one-and-done in the postseason this year.