It’s been an eventful couple of days for Braves shortstop Andrelton Simmons, who had a game-ending single in Tuesday’s 3-2 win against Toronto, then made two errors in Wednesday’s 9-1 loss to the Blue Jays.
The two-time Gold Glove shortstop made just one error in a 67-game span before making two in the first two innings Wednesday. It was only the fourth two-error game of his career.
Simmons also struck out three times in four plate appearances Wednesday, after striking out just 40 times in his previous 524 plate appearances this season. It was the first three-strikeout game of the season for Simmons, who was the second-hardest to strike out in the majors this season at once every 12.3 plate appearances, behind the Mets’ Daniel Murphy (14.2).
It was the first multi-error, multi-strikeout game of Simmons’ major league career.
Before his game-winning single Tuesday, Simmons grounded into double plays in consecutive at-bats. He had grounded into just one double play in his previous 59 games.
Simmons grounded into 25 double plays in 2014, third-most in the majors. He grounded into 18 double plays this season before Thursday, tied with two others for seventh-most in the NL.
Teammate A.J. Pierzysnki grounded into 17 double plays, tied for 10th in the NL before Thursday. But in addition to grounding into 12 double plays in his past 47 games, Pierzynski hit .341 (59-for-173) with 10 doubles, two homers and 17 RBIs, giving the 38-year-old catcher a .380 on-base percentage and .434 slugging percentage in that period.
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