Marcell Ozuna comments on his struggles at the plate

Marcell Ozuna has been dismal in all aspects this season. He rarely plays defense because he’s such a liability in the field, giving him one job — to hit the baseball — something he’s been worse at than any other player in baseball to this point in the season.

Over 63 plate appearances, Ozuna has only recorded four hits (.073 average). He has almost grounded into as many double plays (3) as he has hits and ranks dead last in fWAR among all major leaguers. Most of his at-bats are extremely uncompetitive as well. Ozuna walks into the batter’s box to a chorus of boos, flails hopelessly at three pitches, and walks back to the dugout with his head down to an even louder barrage of insults.

It’s become almost painful to watch, and as I wrote about yesterday, I’m not sure how the Braves can keep this going for much longer. Ozuna has been putrid offensively for over two years now, has had multiple off-the-field incidents, and couldn’t be disliked more by his own fan base. The Braves could have cut the cord over a year ago, and nobody would have batted an eye.

But they haven’t, and the reason has to be because of what is going on behind closed doors. By all accounts, Ozuna is liked within the clubhouse, and Brian Snitker has mentioned on several occasions how hard Ozuna has worked to try to turn things around. The results may not be tangible yet, but the 32-year-old outfielder remains shockingly optimistic about his future outlook.

“I’m working hard to get out of the slump I am in,” Ozuna said. “I know this is not going to be forever, I hope to get out as soon as possible and be able to help the #Braves go to the World Series and win it, which It’s the most important goal for me.”