Charlie Morton hasn’t had an illustrious career, but he’s had a good one.
In his 18th MLB season, Morton has produced about 31 wins. He’ll retire with something similar to a 147-134 career record and a 4.13 ERA. His career strikeout rate is a little shy of 9 per 9 innings, and his walk rate is around 3.5. Morton got groundballs on about half of his bats balls.
You can split Morton’s career into two parts, though. Brought up originally by the Braves during the heyday of the sinker, Morton was the next
greatest thing along those lines. He didn’t pitch long in the majors for Atlanta, eventually traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates for *sighs heavily* Nate McLouth in an ill-advised that cleared the way for Andrew McCutchen and the few years the Pirates were actually good. Morton would pitch in Pittsburgh for most of the next decade before being acquired by the Phillies in 2016. This is when his career turned around.
Largely abandoning the sinker and focusing more on his four-seamer, Morton went from groundball specialist to a strikeout king. The Astros would sign him after a very brief stint in Philadelphia, and he revived his career. He peaked in Tampa Bay in 2019 with a 6 win season. He came to Atlanta in 2021.
Morton was good over 4 seasons in Atlanta from 2021-2024. He remained very effective into his mid-30s, although his later seasons caused some frustration here and there. Atlanta let him hit free-agency last offseason, and he signed with Baltimore before getting traded to Detroit. He hasn’t been very good, which is how he ended up here for a batter finale.
Game Notes
Time: Sunday, September 28 at 3:15 p.m. EDT
Location: Truist Park, Atlanta, GA
TV: FanDuel Sports Network South/Southeast
Streaming: MLB.TV audio
Radio: 680 AM/93.7 FM The Fan
