The Rays have crafted a reputation as one of the sport’s best organizations at finding undervalued talent. That typically manifests in frequent roster churn via trades and waiver claims. Given their budgetary limitations, the franchise has been decidedly less active in free agency. Last offseason, Tampa surprisingly stepped up to ink one of the better players available on the open market: right-hander Charlie Morton. The early returns couldn’t have been better.
In December 2018, the Rays added Morton on a two-year, $30MM guarantee. That’s hardly overwhelming money for most teams, but it no doubt accounted as a major splash by Rays’ standards. Morton’s $15MM salary counted for about a quarter of the club’s $60MM season-opening payroll last season, according to Cot’s Contracts. It was a major gamble for a front office lacking the resources of most of its rivals across the league. Nor was this a situation of a low-payroll team stepping in only after a free agent’s market fell way below expectations. Entering the offseason, the MLBTR staff projected a two-year, $32MM deal for Morton that almost perfectly aligned with the guarantee he actually received.
Morton’s age (he’d just turned 35) was the impetus for the contract’s short term. His performance over the prior two years had been fantastic. With the Astros from 2017-18, he spun 313.2 innings of 3.36 ERA/3.53 FIP ball with strong strikeout and ground ball numbers. His days as an unexciting back-end starter in Pittsburgh were long behind him. Morton had reinvented himself in Houston, sitting in the mid-90’s with a hammer curveball.
Nevertheless, even the Astros were reluctant to completely buy Morton’s late-career renaissance. They declined to offer him a $17.9MM qualifying offer. It was a bizarre move at the time that only looks worse in hindsight. That decision proved beneficial for Morton as a free agent, since his suitors needn’t worry about losing a draft pick to sign him. It proved equally beneficial for the Rays.
Would Tampa have still ponied up for Morton if doing so would’ve cost them their third-highest pick in the 2019 draft? Unclear. (They ended up selecting Campbell University right-hander Seth Johnson with that selection, if you’re curious). Fortunately, they didn’t have to make that decision.
Morton was brilliant in year one in Tampa. He tossed a career-high 194.2 innings with career-best marks in ERA (3.05), FIP (2.81), strikeout rate (30.4%), and both fWAR (6.1) and bWAR (4.9). He finished third in AL Cy Young voting, behind only a pair of former Astros’ teammates, Justin Verlander and Gerrit Cole. Morton was no doubt one of the biggest reasons the Rays advanced to an ALDS.
What does the future hold for Morton in Tampa? Hopefully, he’ll be able to play out his final guaranteed year under contract in 2020. If MLB doesn’t come to an agreement on a return to play this season, his situation will be more in flux. Morton’s contract calls for a club option of up to $15MM in 2021, one the Rays would almost certainly exercise given his 2019 dominance.
In February, though, Morton indicated he wasn’t sure he’d want to continue playing beyond 2020. How a potentially cancelled season could impact his thought process isn’t yet clear. Whatever the future holds, it’s apparent the Rays have already gotten a return well above and beyond the cost to bring Morton aboard.
When the Phillies signed him years back I thought we were just getting an innings eating rotation plug. Man they shoulda held onto him
I know, right? We got what, 35 innings out of him before he got hurt?
Yea he didn’t pitch many games for them at all. But if they would have been patient, they definitely would’ve had one hell of a rotation piece. Definitely underrated pitcher past few seasons. TB seems good at finding gems of pitchers
While I agree that TB seems good at finding gems, they didn’t in this case – he was already “found” by the Astros with whom he had already turned his career around. 🙂
He seems like one of those guys that needed the right situation to make things come together. You could say this about a lot of guys, but he may not have ever developed into who he is if he stayed in Philadelphia.
He was a gem because clearly the Astros didn’t value him enough to re sign him and help their rotation post cole. They let him walk so clearly teams didn’t think too highly
They didn’t sign him. They traded a low level minor leaguer to the Pirates for him.
Thank for that correction. Do you happen to know who the player was just curious
David Whitehead. Can’t be nearly as upset at the Pirates for this trade though compared to Glasnow or Cole.
Some pitcher David Whitehead- in 3 seasons with Pitts minors never got above AA and his ERA was never below 7.00 – hasn’t pitched since 2016
The Pirates only did this as a salary dump as he was making $ 10M per year for pitching 60% of the time.He made it through only a few starts for the Phillies.
He was known as Ground Chuck in Pittsburgh.
He always had ability but I am not sure that he was ever fully invested with the Pirates.
Anyone know if ATL was bidding on him. Seems like a huge miss considering his link to team initially and desire to be closer to family along with short term deals. what he did in HOU established him as having top of rotation ability. They wouldn’t have had to have Keuchel and now Hamels had they gotten him on a similar deal as TB (had he been interested).
I think he’s from New Jersey. Did the Yankees have any interest in him. Probably not that’s when Cashman and Yankees were being cheap and worried about the luxury tax.
I think his in-laws live in NJ but I think he was living in FL.
I remember when the Rays signed him it was mentioned that Morton lives in Bradenton, about 20 miles south of the Trop. It’s also where the Pirates have spring training. Part of the sell was that he could be at home during most of the season.
I did like Morton in Pittsburgh but was happier when he left to become the pitcher he should have been while in Pittsburgh. Astros let the guy pitch, something Pirates wouldn’t allow happen. Guys like Cole, Morton, Glasnow, etc. where held back from pitching to their strengths. It’s a shame to see them being highly regarded elsewhere, but happy for all former Pirates prospects making a splash elsewhere. Just tells you how “off” the organization is. We shall see if their is a new change that was needed years ago with this new front office and coaching. Time will tell
That is great after the fact but Searage was very good at turning other team’s pitchers around.
Morton was hurt much of the time.Sometimes it is the pitcher also.
Searage was given credit for Burnett,Volquez,Vasquez,Happ,Melanson,and Nova who all turned their careers around pitching with him as their pitching coach.
Cole and Glasgow were young pitchers who came into their own with other organizations.Yes,Searage seemed to do better with other team’s rejects than he did with his own young pitchers.He may very have run his course as the Pirates must develop them as they do not have enough money to sign big name pitchers and take the obvious chances with them as many teams do,
The last two years showed little improvement but Searage was considered a fine pitching coach before then.
Most of the pitchers you mentioned lost a bit on their power stuff. So it made sense to change them a bit. But name at least one young pitcher who benefited from Searage. I’ll wait
Wolfe-So they were not as off as you say they were if they were good at reclaiming pitchers.
Morton was better after they got him from the Braves so he was improved.
Cole was an excellent pitcher for two years so do you think that he did it on his own?Glasnow could not get the ball over the plate which has nothing to do with a location scheme.Nobody told him to throw all balls.So,yes,they did help young pitchers but could have been a lot better at it.And they did go downhill for the last couple of years like I said before but to bash that coaching for longer than that is just being negative.
Their record on developing pitchers was not as good as many teams but that could also indicate a scouting and selection problem also.I just note a lot of negativity on this website and respond accordingly.Not every team is as good as the Astros,Rays,and Dodgers at developing young pitchers.
Nice signing!
How many championships have the Rays won?
NONE
Quit blubbering over them
No kidding.Since 1991 only one small market team has won a World Championship,and it was not the Rays,nor six of the seven others.