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We’ve now lost 9 of the last 11 and have very little to look forward to.

Matt Morris fell victim to some very shoddy first inning defense after Ryan Howard took him yard with a runner on. To be fair to Morris, and all things being equal, he should have walked off the mound down 2-0 having thrown 24 pitches when Jenkins lined to Nady with Burrell on first, but it went off his glove. Yet, even if Nady doesn’t make the tough catch, if he had thrown a better relay to Sanchez, Burrell, who was running from first, would have easily been gunned down at the plate for the third out.

And the score would still have been 2-0 Phillies.

But Morris lost his patience on the mound on that play, then lost the zone and his concentration.  He hit Coste on a 1-2 count, Bruntlett ground sharply back through the box and that scored Jenkins, a ground ball to Bixler off Phillies pitcher Kendick’s bat was dropped allowing Coste to score, and then Werth flied out.

Four hits, two errors, five runs, and 49 pitches later, Morris finally walked off the mound in the first.

As if wanting to add to Morris’ agony, the first three Pirates batters were retired on just ten pitches 1-2-3 and Morris was right back on the mound for the second where he threw another 22 pitches, allowed a walk and two singles, and one more run crossed the plate.

Morris’ final line: 1.2 IP, 6 H, 6 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, and 71 pitches thrown.

Considering MLB pitching coaches and managers have allowed a line like that to occur just seven times to starters in the game since 1956 (1.2 IP or less and 71 pitches or more as a starter), I think what happened says more about Jeff Andrews, John Russell, and Neal Huntington than it says about Morris.  And not surprisingly, Morris’ start was worse of the group when you look at the ER/R ratio.

It’s worth noting that Cam Bonifay was fired the day after twenty-eight-year-old Jason Schmidt was forced to throw 63 pitches in 1.2 innings in 2001 by then pitching coach Spin Williams. 

It’s also worth noting that the only other time the Pirates ever allowed a starter to throw more than 60 pitches in 1.2 innings or less since 1956 was to Jose Silva in 2000 by then pitching coach Pete Vukovich. 

In the 2.5 years prior to Silva’s start as a twenty-six-year-old, he had a 3.34 ERA (136 ER, 366 IP).  After that July 15th, 2000, start he made just 13 more starts in his career with a 7.89 ERA and then went to the bullpen the next two years and managed just 55 innings. He never pitched again in the majors.

And Vukovich, of course, was replaced a few months after Silva’s start.  It’s also interesting that just 103 times in over a quarter of a million games since 1956 a starter has been asked to throw 60 pitches or more in 1.2 innings or less.  Both times it happened in Pittsburgh, there was accountability - Vukovich was replaced and Bonifay fired. They were both out the door anyway, but these events certainly didn’t help their cause.

Also interesting is the fact both Spin Williams and Pete Vukovich had the exact same credentials at the major league level as a pitching coach when they took their position in Pittsburgh - none.  Zilch.  Just like Jeff Andrews, who is now joined at the hip with them.

Now are we going to see accountability in Pittsburgh with Andrews?  Hell no.  Accountability with Huntington?  Hell no.  Instead, it seems we are going to continue watching the systematic destruction of our starters. 

Sure, I know, it was only Matt Morris.  If you said that, you missed the entire point.

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“We’ve been losing two of every three games — that’s not acceptable. We haven’t been performing relative to our talent level.  It became evident we needed to try something different.  It wasn’t working. … We were underperforming.”  — Dave Littlefield,  September 6, 2005, when he fired Lloyd McClendon.

Underperforming.  Wow, a broken record being played every year last three.

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Dejan said in a recent article:

“On the statistics sheet, too, there is no more than modest separation in most metrics, offensively and defensively [between Paulino and Doumit].”

He was fortunate to use the word “most.”

Doumit vs. Paulino last five games for each catcher through April 25, 2008.  I think the easiest way to see how each catcher is doing getting calls from the umpires is to look at pitches that were either put in play or called strikes that were not in the strike zone from our more stable starters.

The table below shows the number of pitches thrown by each pitcher to each catcher as identified by Pitchf/x.  As you can see in the top chart, about 450 total pitches each. 

The lower chart shows how many strikes were obtained across the board by each catcher that were not in the strike zone as identified by Pitchf/x when the ball first crossed home plate.  Strikes could be obtained by the batter putting a pitch in play that was not in the zone (column #1) or a strike call received by the home plate umpire for a pitch that was not in the Pitchf/x zone (column #2). 

The location column identifies either the “Z” vertical plane of the batter’s box (pitches too high or low in the zone) and the “X” horizontal plane (pitches too far inside or outside of the zone).

For instance, Doumit and his battery mate saw 13 pitches put in play that were not in the batter’s “Z” plane strike zone (1), and 26 that were called a strike by the ump despite being outside the zone as the ball crossed the plate (2) and, combined, that was 8.4% of all pitches he received. Paulino’s total was 9.6% and that represented 1.2% more than Doumit.

Clearly, Doumit is not getting the same strike zone Paulino is. In fact, almost 6% fewer strikes as a whole. When you consider that 6% over 23,000 pitches in a year, that’s about a 45 run difference (about -5 wins) based on league averages the last few years.  That’s a serious difference.

When I went back and looked at all pitches (all pitchers) thrown using 2007 and 2008 Pitchf/x data (more than 3,000), the difference is even more significant - 9.4%.  And with some relievers it’s even higher.

I did look at the value of the balls in play from those pitches out of the zone and there was little to no difference in the number of outs between catchers.  But the sample size on that is too small yet.

Now I think it’s more than fair to ask, is Ryan Doumit a +45 run offensive machine over Ronny Paulino?  Hardly.  In fact when it’s all said and done in September, Doumit won’t be a quarter of that IF he’s even healthy and playing.  Right now he’s just seven runs better.  So every game Doumit catches the Pirates start the game off in a probabalistic runs allowed hole.

And that’s one reason why we’re not keeping games close - we’re losing the equivalent of almost two outs per game in our choice of catcher. 

We’re simply not making good competitive baseball decisions in the front office lately.  But they might be making a good financial decision in regard to Doumit.  We’ll have to watch and see where that goes.

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The Post-Gazette is attempting to lay out an argument for Morris to retire saving the team part of the $10.5M owed him.  He’s a damn fool if he does.  A damn fool.

He’s sitting around a 5 - 6 xERA which is about where Duke is at.  If I’m Morris, I certainly wouldn’t throw in the towel.  I’d first ask the Pirates to send me to Birmingham and run through the motions with ASMI’s lab just to see if there is anything obvious (arm slot, arm speed, etc).  Then I’d throw away Jeff Andrews ridiculous downhill tweaks, take a week off, and go find the best professional pitching coach in the game I had a relationship with and sit down with him over some video.

Then I’d come back hoping the Pirates could field a reasonably competitive fielding team behind me. 

Morris doesn’t just go from a 4.00 xERA pitcher in SF last year to a 6.00 in Pittsburgh without defense being the issue, and he can’t control that.

Stay on Matty.  Don’t let the media get you down.  This team isn’t going anywhere anyway so stick to your guns.  Force them to pay you if they won’t work with you.

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