June 20, 2011
Attitude adjustment saved Morton's MLB career
by Kevin Henkin/
Pirates starter Charlie Morton (Redding, Conn.) nearly quit the game a year ago, but has fashioned one of baseball's best comeback stories this year. (photo: Getty Images)
Editor’s note: This story originally appeared in the June 2011 issue of New England Baseball Journal.
If there are indeed seven circles of hell, then Charlie Morton can probably provide you with concise directions through each of them.
Last year, the Redding, Conn., native suffered through one of the worst seasons by a major-league pitcher in recent history. In 17 starts for the Pittsburgh Pirates last year, Morton posted a record of 2-12 with an ERA of 7.57. As bad as those numbers appear to be, they don’t begin to tell the story of how such a talented pitcher had sunk to such lows.
Looking back on the frustrations of last year, Morton said, “It was just a bad situation. It got to the point that I would wake up the day I was going to pitch and not know what was going to happen out there on the mound. It was a bad feeling.”
This season, however, Morton is in the midst of penning one of the best comeback stories in all of baseball. It’s almost impossible to compare the Charlie Morton of this year to the player who seriously contemplated walking away from the game last summer.
Perhaps what was most perplexing about Morton’s struggles is that his career had begun with such promise. Coming out of Joel Barlow High School as a long, lean highly-touted pitching prospect, Morton was drafted in the third round of the 2002 MLB draft by the Atlanta Braves.
He spent the next 6½ seasons steadily progressing through Atlanta’s minor-league system until he was promoted to the big club in June 2008. He remained in the Braves’ rotation for the rest of that season but was traded to the Pirates the following June. Morton showed some potential over the course of 18 starts for the Pirates in 2009, and he headed into 2010 with sky-high expectations.
Those expectations quickly fell back to earth as Morton struggled mightily in the first two months of the season. Although none of his pitches were consistently effective, his sinkerball in particular was getting hammered to the point where he was eventually banned from throwing it by then-pitching coach Joe Kerrigan. At the time, Morton had mixed feelings about that decision.
“The sinker was a pitch that I threw in certain situations, and I think it gave hitters a different look,” he said. “It wasn’t necessarily a whole different pitch, but it was a different look. It’s the same reason why pretty much most of the guys in the major leagues throw a two-seamer.”
After Morton’s 10th start on May 27, at which point he was 1-9 with a 9.35 ERA, he was placed on the disabled list by the team. The official reason was listed as “shoulder fatigue.” In reality, mental fatigue and flawed mechanics were the reasoning behind Morton’s removal from the active lineup.
He was sent to the team’s spring training facility in Bradenton, Fla., for a week to work on his throwing motion and to re-incorporate his sinker into his arsenal of pitches. He also spent some time discussing the emotional impact of his struggles with Bernie Holliday, the mental conditioning coordinator for the Pirates.
“That was a pretty important week right there,” Morton said, “We were trying to gain momentum for me in the right direction, but it wasn’t a fix-all or anything. It was just a start of trying to rebuild.”
From there, Morton was sent to Pittsburgh’s Triple-A affiliate in Indianapolis to make forward progress, but he continued to pitch poorly there for several more starts.
That’s when Morton’s father paid a visit while Charlie was on the road in Norfolk, Va. In a spartan hotel room before Morton was set to start the game that night, the two of them discussed whether Charlie should consider doing something else with his life besides throwing a baseball for a living.
“I remember my father asking me, ‘Do you have anything else that you might want to do?’” Morton said. “That was the first time where it was like, you’ve got to make a decision about what to do. It had just become such a disappointment.”
That evening, Morton found some much needed relief in his performance.
“I pitched really well that night,” he said. “That was the first time that I had pitched well in a long time. And then I strung together five or six starts where I pitched really well and they called me back up.”
Morton was kept in the Pirates’ rotation for the remainder of the season and finished fairly strong, going 1-1 with a 3.99 ERA over his last five starts.
“All in all, I think I pitched pretty well at the end of the year, and I kind of re-established in my own mind that I was able to pitch in the big leagues,” Morton said. “But I still worry. I mean, I still remember what happened before.”
Morton carried that wary confidence into spring training this year. When he arrived, he was presented with a compilation video of his past pitching performances, including some from all the way back to his high school days. The video, compiled by minor-league pitching coordinator Jim Benedict and Pirates pitching coach Ray Searage, was a revelation to Morton.
“It showed how I was manipulating my body to try to force an arm angle that would allow me to throw downhill,” Morton said. “I was kind of tilting my torso to get my arm higher and higher, and it was just unnatural. I mean, I didn’t know that. This whole time, I’m 6-5, I throw hard and I’m thinking I’m supposed to be a downhill power pitcher.”
Morton’s sinkerball, more than any other pitch, was positively impacted by the change.
“When we started to see what was coming out of my hand when I lowered the arm slot, it was like an untapped resource,” he said. “It was surprising to see the sinker move the way it was and to see the life on the ball. And even though I dropped my arm down, the velocity was still there. Everything was still there. There was just more movement.”
Although Morton can still ring his fastball up to 95 mph, the effectiveness of his sinker has allowed him to become primarily a groundball pitcher and the results have been highly positive.
Through his first eight starts this year, Morton had a 5-1 record with a 2.62 ERA. He also held the highest groundball percentage in the National League at 62.2 percent.
Beyond the adjusted mechanics, Morton also highlights the importance of his changed mental approach as a driver behind his recent success.
“I spent so much of my career worrying about what everybody else was thinking,” he said. “It’s funny, now that I’m pitching well, I couldn’t care less what other people think. It’s not all in your head but a lot of it is. To get back on track, I think I had to get mentally right first. I had to get OK. Then I could start to build on things physically, mechanically, making adjustments pitch to pitch and all those little things. But really, it all started with adjusting my attitude.”
Kevin Henkin can be reached at feedback@baseballjournal.com
