Q. How much did the rain affect things?
A. A lot. Have rarely seen fielders slip-n-slide like they were doing Saturday.
First play, Jack Wilson nearly skidded his throw off the wet grass into the dugout -- wowzer of a save by Hannahan. A bit later in the game, Adrian Beltre ran across from 3B and lobbed the ball over to 1B like a water balloon. Adrian also had a fairly simple bouncer go off his chest, and then he slipped trying to recover it and crawled a little ways after it, before giving up.
Kevin Millwood, who averages 90.3 mph on his fastball per fangraphs, averaged 87.9 mph tonight throwing through the rain, from the wet mound.
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Q. Was Morrow's command as bad as it looked?
A. Yup.
He threw 44 strikes and 36 balls, and had a good 7-10 strikes taken away from him by the umpire. So 51-54 strikes, vs. 26-29 balls, would seem okay.
But Johnson was holding his mitt thigh-high, right down the middle, all night -- and then lunging for the ball wherever it showed up. In the second, Brandon started out throwing 12-for-13 balls, or something like that. It was brutal.
His FB was all over the place, he couldn't throw a split for a strike at all, and the curveballs were slipping out of his hand.
It was a miracle that the Rangers didn't score 8 runs with the baseball as slippery as it was; after all, Millwood is a Master Of His Craft, and he was out of the game after 3.2 innings and 5 runs scored.
Morrow coped better than Millwood did, for the same reason that 320-lb. linemen beat 270-lb. linemen in the snow. It was wet out there, but Morrow still had a laser-beam fastball.
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Q. Did he synch in at all as the game went on?
A. After 3.1, or was it 3.2 innings, it was as though somebody flipped a light switch on. Suddenly Brandon started hitting his target, started throwing strikes, started getting his breaking balls over the plate, and the Rangers started swinging-and-missing a lot.
In the 4th and 5th, Morrow threw 22 strikes and 9 balls, as it started raining harder. I'd have liked to have seen him in the 6th, but no doubt his uniform was as wet as if he'd been in a pool for a half hour.
Interestingly, at 3.2 innings, Morrow started confidently grooming the mound. Before that, he was sort of stiffly staring in at the catcher all night. It's fascinating to watch where a pitcher looks between pitches. Morrow wasn't having any fun before 3.2 innings, but after that, he was.
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Q. How were the breaking pitches?
A. During the flash we saw after the 3.1-inning point, he was tossing the 87 split for strikes at will and throwing the 81 overhand curve for strikes also.
Once he did, the Rangers were visibly "in between" -- late on the fastball and early on the offspeed.
Overall, that last flash of 5-6 batters were exciting. It was fun to see Morrow set them up with offspeed and then blast a FB way by them. Looked Verlander-ish.
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Q. How was his makeup?
A. As Dave N. was going apoplectic in the booth over Morrow's two walks, Morrow himself was staying surgeon-calm about the rain and the umpires. Adair was out, Johnson was out, and Morrow just kept at it. And he found the adjustments, about twelve batters in.
You wonder how much the Closing Experience will help. The third inning must seem very peaceful by comparison now.
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Q. Next time out?
A. Well, the M's play indoors the rest of the season, so let's give this one a pass and count the called strikes on the change and curve next time.
Cheers,
Dr D