WASHINGTON – After watching Andrelton Simmons flail with increasing frequency at pitches out of the strike zone, Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez replaced the shortstop in the lineup for Wednesday's series finale against the Nationals and pitcher Stephen Strasburg.
He was 2-for-14 in his career against Strasburg, but lately it hasn’t really mattered whom the struggling Simmons has faced. He’s been a mess at the plate, taking huge, off-balance cuts that literally leave him on the other side of the plate after some particularly violent swings and misses.
“Just give him a little breather, today and tomorrow,” said Gonzalez, whose Braves have a day off Thursday before a three-game series at Texas. “It’s one of those things, when you start seeing signs of frustration, swinging at stuff (out of the strike zone), you go, You know what, let’s pull back a little.”
It’s been a rough season offensively for Simmons in his second full year in the major leagues. After hitting .248 with 50 extra-base hits including 17 home runs and a .692 on-base-plus-slugging percentage in 2013, the Gold Glove shortstop has hit .238 with 26 extra-base hits (seven homers) and a .611 OPS in 2014.
Before Wednesday, his OPS was tied with teammate B.J. Upton’s for fourth-lowest in the majors among 152 players with enough plate appearances to qualify.
“With a young player like that, he could get something in the next two weeks and carry it the rest of his career,” said Braves hitting coach Greg Walker, who has been on Simmons since April to try to be a more controlled hitter and not swing so hard all the time. “Has he made a big step forward this year? No. The big thing for me mentally is that he’s allowed himself to get frustrated this year more than he should have.
“He’s young,” Walker added. “He’s going to hit in this league a lot. But he has to decide what type hitter he wants to be. And I think his frustration has led him to overswing . He’s off-balance, he does a lot of things fundamentally incorrect. I give the kid a little bit of a break, because he came through the minor leagues so quick and has been on this stage with a lot of pressure. He puts too much pressure on himself. But he’s a great kid. He’s an unbelievable talent, but it’s just a process.”
Simmons’ stats have been dropping at an alarming rate, while the number of wild swings has been on the rise. After hitting .375 (18-for-48) with eight RBIs, five walks and a .434 on-base percentage in his last 12 games before the All-Star break, he had a .176 average (26-for-48) with 15 RBIs, nine walks and a .223 OBP in 41 games since.
“He takes so much pride in hitting and doing well that sometimes it just eats at him,” Gonzalez said. “And we tell him all the time, I say, you can change the game defensively. You don’t have to worry about doing more than what you’re capable of doing…. Like the other day against (Nationals reliever Craig) Stammen, he tries to hit a (high pitch) 700 feet.
“But you know what? He’s a young kid that wants to really well, and he cares. We’ve seen it defensively, when he makes an error in the first inning and they score a run and we end up losing by one run, he wants to leave the lights on so he can take 100 more ground balls. So he cares. And he takes the offense the same way.”
Simmons went 4-for-15 with two doubles and a homer in a three-game stretch Aug. 21-23. In 14 games since then, he was 7-for-52 (.135) with no extra-base hits, two RBIs, two walks, 11 strikeouts and a .167 OBP.
In some ways, hitting 17 homers in his first full season in the majors – after hitting six in more than 1,000 plate appearances in his three-year minor league career and three in 49 games as a rookie in 2012 – might have been detrimental to Simmons’ immediate development. Because now he often looks like he’s trying to hit a homer when a base hit or a walk is all the Braves need from him.
“We recognized early this year that he was caught in-between, from one day to the next,” Walker said. “One day he’s trying to use the whole field to be a .280-plus hitter, which is what we think he should be. And the next day he’s falling all over the batter’s box, falling down when he swings, swinging at balls over his head. And those two (hitting profiles) don’t match up. So we let him know, we confronted him early in the year and said, ‘Listen, you’ve got to decide who you want o be.’ And his frustration – he demands too much of himself.
“He’s so good defensively and the defensive side of it comes so easy to him, that the offensive side doesn’t come that easy and he gets frustrated with it, and he’s a young player that’s going to have to go through it. And I think he will. But he’s not there yet. I just had a conversation with him in there while ago. I said, We’ve got a chance to go to the playoffs; that should be your focus, let’s get to the playoffs. For the rest of the way. Just forget what’s happened so far this season, learn from it, and let’s play the rest of the season and see what happens. But he’s just a young kid that’s learning. He’s going to get it, but he’s not there yet.”
