Charlie Morton, Pirates Blown Out by Phillies

looks like he may be pitching himself into a career in the pen. He’d be a nice fit there with his stuff and only having to face a limited number of hitters….if only we weren’t in desperate need of starting pitchers…

I was at this game, which is also where I saw my first bucco game…when howard took Capps deep for the win last summer. Just a solid reminder of what I signed up for.

Also, Charlie, you totally neglected to mention that it was dollar dog night. I feel this is essential to explain the electric atmosphere. (It actually was a tough ticket, sold out game on a monday night).

FYI I ate 4

the Pirates getting down early big and just mailing it in. You would think these guys would have some pride or at least act like they want to stay in the big leagues. So many guys on this team are on maybe their last shots at being big league players I can’t believe they don’t try harder.

I never – ever – used to give up on games. I would listen to the last pitch unless something else genuinely came up. But if I was, say, driving or working on the house or whatever, I’d stick to it, no matter how ugly the game. This year, from the first blowout loss, I’m happy to tune out as soon as they have that one ugly inning. I might check in later just to make sure that no miracle was occurring (usually it’s just gotten worse since when I tuned out), but that’s it.

I can’t tell you how strange this is, and how surprised I am that this has happened after 17 years of relentless misery. I assume that I’ll come back when they start winning, but I wonder if I’ll ever be quite as diehard.

I was utterly certain that Charlie Morton would get pelted by the Phillies’ offense, allowing 10 runs (but only 6 earned). I was hoping that I’d be wrong, but it was a another blowout loss nonetheless.

I realize that last night’s loss and the overall failure of the 2010 season cannot be pinned on any one player, but I can’t imagine any plausible reason for the Pirates to give Morton more than 2-3 more starts. consider that in his 8 starts, Morton is 1-7, while in games Morton does not pitch the Pirates are a .500 team (15-15). I don’t like to wish ill on anyone, but at this point, I hope Morton is (still) tipping his pitches or that he’s injured, because then at least there’s a logical explanation for such a terrible performance.

I disagree that Morton has “ace” stuff. #3-4 in the rotation if he puts everything together, IMO. Don’t even ask me how likely that is at this point, because I have no idea what he’s going to do from here out.

To be fair to Morton, he came into yesterday with 3 quality starts and got pounded by one of the two best hitting teams in the majors. A ton of quality pitchers get destroyed by that line-up. He has to get back on track after this one, though.

He was trying to explain to Bob Walk about Morton’s terrible LOB%, BABIP, and HR/FB%, and how those tend to regress back to the mean, and all that, so that there should be hope for Morton since he’s been so damn unlucky.

It was kind of funny, since it was Bob Walk after all.