The Andrelton Simmons highlight page is baseball pornography. For such a repository of rewatachability, the descriptions of the varying things he does from his shortstop position for the Atlanta Braves are comically simple. "Simmons' barehanded play," a recent one says. "Simmons' sliding stop," another advertises. "Simmons' strong throw," a third offers. This is like walking into a Bentley dealership with a cardboard sign out front that says: "Cars."





There are more. "Simmons' diving grab" and "Simmons' nice catch" and is there a three-word limit on these things? Actually, exceptions to that rule do exist. There is one clip, from Aug. 17, called "Simmons' big double play." It dehydrates a play about which a million words could be written to just four.

It was the top of the 14th. The Braves and the Washington Nationals were tied at seven. There were runners on first and second and pitcher Craig Stammen stood at the plate. He faked bunt, which sent Simmons toward third base to cover on the wheel play. Stammen then yanked his bat back an executed the slash play perfectly, bouncing a ground ball toward the middle of the field and seemingly into center field until this blur comes racing back from near third.

Andrelton Simmons isn't all that fast. More important, he thinks geometrically, knows instinctively the perfect angle to play every time, and on this one he was running right toward the second-base bag. He believed he would get a force play, and he did, stepping on the back with his right foot and leaving his body in impossible position to make a throw to first base. Simmons' hips and legs faced right field. The anatomy just didn't work.

Except the way Simmons stepped on the bag, with his foot was pointed toward first base, allowed him to seamlessly pivot his torso back to the infield and throw out Stammen. This was athleticism, artistry and ballet, the new best ever from a guy who one time fielded a ball and flipped it behind his back – to himself.

[Photos: MLB playoff elimination tracker]

Defense is the bastion of the baseball hipster, and Simmons is their ironic T-shirt and beard. The movement within front office and sabermetric circles to quantify what a player does in the field as well as they do what he does in the batter's box and on the mound has led to a revolution in the appreciation for fielding. And it has prompted a question that has no answer but is nevertheless fun to consider.

Is Andrelton Simmons having the best fielding season ever?









The greatest objective measures for such things, it is believed, are property of the teams around baseball that invest millions of dollars into computer programs, analysts and other tools that help create proprietary metrics that give the best measure of how much a player contributes defensively. So it is best to start there with a simple question: Is Simmons the best shortstop in baseball today?

An executive from one of those teams' front offices says metrics and scouts agree unequivocally. It's not like he has no competition, either. Jose Iglesias did this. Troy Tulowitzki is a wizard. A dozen others merit mention. None is Simmons, though. None has the combination of glove, arm, feet and instincts, the fearsome foursome of fielding. Check out the highlights page. Yes, it's SFW.

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