DETROIT -- The list of active Major League pitchers with 400 or more career starts can be counted on one hand. It includes two former Tigers, Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer, and one new Tiger, Charlie Morton, along with Clayton Kershaw.
Morton’s 401 career starts have run the gamut. He remembers striking out seven consecutive Yankees to begin a start with the Astros in 2017, but didn’t survive the sixth inning after a four-run fifth. He also tossed six quality innings for a win with the Pirates in 2012 without striking out a batter.
The 41-year-old right-hander has nearly seen it all. But Saturday’s 7-4 loss to the Angels left him shaking his head.
Seven consecutive strikeouts, 10 for the game. Five consecutive baserunners soon after the strikeout streak. Just three outs on balls in play.
“That's probably one of the weirdest outings of my career,” Morton said. “Just the strikes, working ahead, swing and miss, and then you look back and like, man, I gave up six runs in that.”
It’s a bizarre outing with illogical numbers, but it fits well into a crazy stretch for the Tigers that has seen their lead atop the AL Central whittled to five games. Detroit’s fifth loss in eight August games, combined with Cleveland’s fifth straight win with a 3-1 decision over the White Sox, means the Tigers have their smallest division lead since May 27, and with two fewer games left to play than the Guardians.
As manager A.J. Hinch said Friday, they’re in a race to get as many wins as they can. Saturday felt like one that somehow got away.
From the 3-2 curveball Morton flipped on Yoán Moncada to end the first inning with a lone run allowed, he zoned in. The Angels, owners of MLB’s highest strikeout rate, went hacking. Morton, mixing curveballs and fastballs, took advantage, fanning Jo Adell, Luis Rengifo and Travis d’Arnaud in the second inning, then Gustavo Campero, Zach Neto and Nolan Schanuel in the third. None reached even a two-ball count.
“At the same time, it was a bunch of swing-and-miss, a bunch of strikeouts,” Morton said. “I'm in the zone a bunch, getting ahead early.”
Morton was within two outs of the American League record for consecutive strikeouts in a game, shared by former Tigers Tyler Alexander in 2020 and Doug Fister in 2012. Mike Trout ended those aspirations with a groundout to short to lead off the fourth inning. Then Taylor Ward’s single got the Angels to turn the tables.
The curveball that froze Moncada in the first inning hit him in the fourth. After chasing curveballs in the dirt on his second-inning strikeout, Adell did it again for strike two in the fourth inning, then crushed an elevated one for a three-run homer.
“The curveball is always a weapon,” said Adell. “It’s a money-maker for him and it gets you off that fastball. … I got one of the few mistakes. So I was glad to be able to do something with it.”
Said Morton: “In an ideal world, I get that down and I pin it down and away, or just off, get him to chase. But I've faced him a few times already this year, and he's seen my breaking ball. And the swings he was taking on it, you look back and you wish maybe you would've been a little more aggressive with the location with that pitch.”
Morton stranded runners at the corners with another Campero strikeout and a Neto flyout. He took the mound for the fifth inning in a 4-4 game, but after a Schanuel single and a called third strike on Trout, Morton hung a curveball to Ward that was slugged over the left-center-field wall for a two-run homer.
“There wasn't a lot of four-seam at the top, up and above, top of the zone,” Morton lamented. “I didn't really establish any of that. I go back and look at that and I think pretty much every hit that I gave up tonight in those counts, I don't think that I elevated multiple times in any of those at-bats.”
Not since Aaron Nola on June 30, 2021, had a pitcher put up double-digit strikeouts with one or no walks and still given up six or more runs in less than five innings. It’s small consolation for him.
“I think I'm critical [of myself] because I'm new to the team, and the position that the team is in,” Morton said. “I'm critical to that degree, because of that reason.”