BATON ROUGE — Nate Simon of Tulane and Jared Bradford of LSU were named Tuesday as the Louisiana Sportswriters Association Baseball Players of the Week.
Bradford, a junior right-hander from Hueytown, Ala., was named Pitcher of the Week as he delivered a brilliant outing versus Lipscomb on Sunday, leading LSU to an 8-4 victory. Bradford limited the Bisons to two runs on three hits in 7.1 innings with one walk and 13 strikeouts. The strikeout total represented the highest by an LSU pitcher since April 2, 1999 when Kurt Ainsworth recorded 16 Ks in a win at Tennessee.
Bradford threw 99 pitches in Sunday’s outing after firing 20 pitches on Friday in a relief role against Lipscomb. He worked 1.2 shutout innings on Friday, allowing one hit with three strikeouts. In the two appearances combined, Bradford allowed two runs on four hits in nine innings with one walk, 16 strikeouts and a .143 opponent batting average.
Simon, a sophomore outfielder from Redmond, Wash., was named Hitter of the Week as he batted .500 (6-for-12) with a 1.000 slugging percentage on the strength of two doubles and two home runs in helping lead Tulane to a 4-0 mark. He had at least one hit and one RBI in all four games, and he opened and closed the week with home runs, marking the first two round-trippers of his career.
Simon went 3-for-4 with a double and a home run in last Tuesday’s 8-3 win over LSU, and he had two-hit outings in Friday and Sunday’s games against Wright State.