ATLANTA — The first time Andrelton Simmons set eyes on Didi Gregorius, what he noticed was not Gregorius’s strong throwing arm, his fleet feet or anything he did with a bat in his hands. They were, after all, only 5 years old.
“It was the green shirt,” Simmons said with a laugh.
The reason it stood out is because it was long-sleeved, and in Curaçao, the Caribbean island where they grew up, the weather was so warm that all year round there was rarely a reason to wear a shirt with short sleeves, let alone long ones.