MLB Playoffs 2011: Naming the “All-Choke Team”

The first round of the playoffs have come and gone, and already we've added to the wildly large group of great players who have choked in the playoffs.

The time for the "All-Choke Team" is now, with a player at all nine positions who, despite being great in the regular season for a number of years, could not get it together for the postseason.

Billy Wagner

Wagner was a great pitcher, and is still a very good pitcher, however it is a different story in the postseason.

In seven postseasons with four different teams, Wagner has appeared in 14 games and yielded 13 runs in 11.2 innings.

Not great stuff for one of the most prolific closers of all time.

Roy Campanella

Roy Campanella was a great catcher for the Brooklyn Dodgers, but in the postseason, it was a different story.

In five World Series, Campanella hit a pedestrian .237 in 114 at bats, 40 points below his career average.

Rod Carew

Rod Carew hit .328 in nearly 10,000 career plate appearances.

In 50 playoff at-bats over four separate playoffs, Carew hit .220 with only four extra-base hits.

This first baseman just couldn't seem to put it together for October baseball.

Craig Biggio

Craig Biggio is one of the best second basemen of all time. He holds numerous MLB records, all in the regular season.

In the playoffs Biggio was a different story. He hit .234 in 167 at-bats is not what a future Hall of Fame player should have on his resume.

Alex Rodriguez

This one should be particularly obvious.

Alex Rodriguez joined this illustrious group with a pair of terrible strikeouts in clutch situations in Game 5 against the Tigers.

Other than a good postseason in 2009, Rodriguez has been awful over the past two playoffs, tallying 11 hits in some 50 at-bats as the Yankees had a pair of first-round playoff exits.

Orlando Cepeda

Orlando Cepeda has some of the best all-time numbers for a shortstop. He could hit for power, average and he could play defense.

He could do all of those things in the regular season,, but couldn't do any in the playoffs.

In 22 playoff games, Cepeda hit .207 with only three home runs.

Barry Bonds

Steroids, blah, blah and blah, we all know Barry Bonds' numbers and we all know what he allegedly did or didn't do.

What we do know is that he couldn't cut it in the playoffs throughout his career.

In seven postseasons, Bonds was good in only one.

In 2002, Bonds hit eight home runs and had 16 RBI in 17 games.

In his 31 other playoff games, he had one home run and eight RBI in over 100 at-bats and hit below .200.

Mike Cameron

Mike Cameron has been a quality player for a number of years and a good contributor to a number of playoff runs.

Unfortunately, Cameron's performance has been a different story in the playoffs. Hitting .174 with one home run in 92 at-bats isn't great for a career.

David Justice

The subject of the film Moneyball was very good in the regular season, but despite making it to the playoffs 10 times in his career, he wasn't able to contribute on any consistent level.

Justice played in 112 playoff games with nearly 400 at-bats. That's nearly an entire season, but he only hit 14 home runs with 63 RBI.

Compared to Justice's averages of 25 home runs and 90 or so RBI, that quite a drop off between regular seasons and the playoffs.