St. Louis Post-Dispatch
April 6, 2001

Cards Say Result of Game Belies Morris' Performance on Mound

By Mike Eisenbath

Matt Morris threw well Thursday afternoon. Matt Morris gave up 10 runs on 11 hits, a walk and an error before leaving in the fourth inning Thursday afternoon.

One statement is opinion, held by virtually everyone in the Cardinals' clubhouse. The other is the cold, hard fact of his start in the team's 11-2 loss to the Colorado Rockies. Incongruous as those sentences seem, can both be true?

"I don't want to say anything positive," Morris said, "but I pitched real aggressively today. I did what I wanted to do most of the time with the ball. It just didn't work out at all."

Morris was starting his first regular-season major-league game since Sept. 27, 1998. Elbow surgery knocked him out for 1999 and had him working his way back in the bullpen last year.

The Cardinals knew they wanted Morris, one of the best young pitchers in the game at the time of his injury, to move back into their rotation this season. He spent all winter preparing for it and looked outstanding most of spring camp. His fastball had its old zip and sinking action. His curveball looked sharp.

His attitude on the mound, well, that never left. Morris showed his style in full flower Thursday.

"He pretty much owned the whole inside part of the plate," teammate Dustin Hermanson said. "Six or seven of their hits were jam shots that just fell in. You could tell by the way their hitters were reacting up there that he just owned the inside."

Yet everything went so terribly wrong. Morris pitched to only four batters in the fourth inning. He got none of them out. When he left, the Cardinals trailed 10-1.

He faced 22 batters. Thirteen of them reached base, including one on a first-inning error that led to four runs. Often, Morris could only shake his head. Todd Walker fought an inside pitch off his fists for a first-inning single to right. Brent Mayne and Juan Pierre did the same in the second. The Rockies beat out two infield hits in the third inning.

"It's hard enough pitching nowadays," Morris said. "Then you see infield hits, popups falling, opposite-field home runs."

Everything piled on in the fourth inning. Pierre beat out a roller to third base. Todd Walker and Larry Walker, both lefthanded batters seeing plenty of fastballs inside, each pulled the ball to right for a single and double, respectively. Morris took the count to 2-2 to Todd Helton, yet another lefty who reached out and poked a down-and-away pitch 352 feet for a three-run homer.

The results from three season-opening games in Denver looked miserable for the Cardinals' starters: 26 runs, 22 of them earned, in 10 2/3 innings.

"Matt's stuff was great," catcher Mike Matheny said. "I've been telling him and these other guys they are throwing the ball well. But pretty soon, they don't want to hear that any more. They want to get results."

What if Morris throws the rest of the season the way he threw Thursday?

"He's going to win a lot of games," Matheny said. "But to him, that means nothing right now."