Morton vs. Lohse (listed)
I am sure this will not be a popular pick today. With the current Brewers streak, it would seem probable that the majority of bets will placed on the Brew Crew today. What can you do?
The Poor Man's Roy Halladay (Morton) takes the mound for the Pirates. I always get a kick out of seeing him pitch since he replicated his windup/throwing motion.
Charlie Morton posted a 7-4 record to go along with a 3.26 era for the Pirates last year in 116 innings of work. On the road he was 5-2 with a 3.61 era. These are pretty good numbers although nothing spectacular. However, Morton does have characteristics that are not mediocre, both bad and good.
You see Roy Halladay getting a left handed hitter out in the picture above. That is one thing Morton has not been to duplicate. Left handed hitters make his life a living hell. Lefties had a .432 ob% and .844 ops against him in 2013. That is bad, very bad. In the off-season, he did work on adding another Halladay imitation change-up to his arsenal to help with left handed hitters. Maybe he will be more effective this year. Or maybe not.
On the positive side, he doesn't give up many home runs and has an outstanding ground ball rate. Oh yeah, he is also outstanding against right handed hitters:
2013 vs RHH
.223 avg .264 ob% .287 slug% |
.552 OPS |
So far this year, the righties are hitting just .188 (granted it was the Cubs twice)
So he gives up very few hits to right handed hitters and when he does give up a hit, it is almost always a one-bagger. Morton allowed only 10 extra base hits in 247 AB against right handed hitters last year.
Why is all this so significant? Here is what the Brewers lineup looked like last night against Volquez (a right handed hurler):
Right
Right
Right
Right
Right
Right
Right
Left
Right
Maybe they bring Overbay and Schafer (lefties) into the lineup, but those B teamers are a combined 4-30 on the season. Other than that, there aren't many options for the Brewers. They are going to be coming from the right side, like it or not.
Now that we know all of this information, we can understand why this happened last year:
2013: Morton vs. Brewers (3 starts)
15 2/3 innings.......... 1 earned run.......... 0.57 era |
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The innings look low, but he actually only went 2 innings in one of those games, because of a 2 hour rain delay. He went 7 and 6 2/3 in the other two games. He pretty much shut them down.
On the other side, Kyle Lohse is pitching for the Brewers. Most of us will remember him from his time spent in St. Louis where he proved to be a very valuable piece of the puzzle. He was 11-10 a year ago with a 3.35 era for the Brewers. He was 7-4 with a 2.97 era in 16 starts at Miller Park. Obviously that kind of home performance is hard to go against. BUT, BUT............
The Pirates team has a .342/.390/.540 line against Lohse.
.930 OPS |
|
He also had 3 starts (one of them that same rain delay) against the Pirates in 2013:
12 2/3 inn: 7 ER 4.97 era
18 HITS 1.89 WHIP
6 BB
The Pirates can and HAVE hit him.
I don't know a heck of a lot about umpire Victor Carapazza. What I do know is that Charlie Morton performed well in his zone in the one start with Carapazza behind the plate. It was last year and it was one of only 3 games where Morton didn't allow a walk in 2013. Morton gave up 6 hits and 2 er in 7 innings of work. Loshe had him for 2 games in 2011 totaling 12 innings. He gave up 7 er on 12 hits and 4 walks.
- Pirates are 4-0 in Mortons last 4 starts vs. Brewers.
- Pirates are 4-1 in the last 5 meetings when Morton faces Lohse.