CHARLIE'S IN CHARGE
MORTON STRIKES OUT 14, WALKS NONE OVER 7 INNINGS TO LEAD ASTROS PAST RANGERS 6-1.
There was no visceral reaction, no words escaping his mouth or change in demeanor to combat what he encountered.
Charlie Morton raised his glove and signaled for a baseball while Brian McCann stepped between a perturbed Ranger and the Astros pitcher.
Morton’s 81st pitch slipped from his right hand. The four-seam fastball sailed near the ankles, behind Nomar Mazara, the Rangers’ three-hole hitter with an average hovering near .300.
Mazara moved his hips and shuffled his feet to avoid it. When it found the backstop, Mazara gazed at Morton. The Minute Maid Park crowd grew ornery. Two were out and the bases were empty in a tworun game in the sixth inning. Perhaps it was retaliation for Cole Hamels’ beaning of George Springer on Friday and Doug Fister’s plunking of Carlos Correa on Saturday.
Mazara stood, nodding and mouthing some indiscernible words. Morton only wanted a new baseball, not to be thrust in silly theatrics amid the best start of his career.
Morton received one and threw three pitches. Mazara swung through two. The third measured 98.1 mph, the fastest of Morton’s sublime start. Mazara watched it paint the inside corner, offering only a half-hearted checkswing once it met McCann’s mitt.
Morton exited the mound with no emotion. There was no staredown of Mazara or inclination to escalate this rivalry. No, Saturday night only belonged to Morton. Gold standards
The veteran spun the best regular-season start of his 11-year major league career, seven innings of one-run baseball punctuated by 14 strikeouts in a 6-1 win over the Rangers.
“He was great,” manager A.J. Hinch said. “He was pretty locked in with his breaking ball. That was a good matchup for him when he could demonstrate that he could throw it in the strike zone and (get) a few chases below.”
Morton lowered his ERA to 2.03. Two teammates, Justin Verlander and Gerrit Cole, are the only two with lower ERAs in the AL.
His punchout of Mazara in the sixth was the 12th of his magnificent evening. It tied a career high. He broke it one inning later when Joey Gallo swung funkily on a 2-2 curveball, such a norm Saturday against baseball’s most strikeout-prone offense.
Forty-five of Morton’s 105 pitches were curveballs, eliciting 12 swings and misses. Eleven were called strikes. Eight of his 14 strikeouts ended with a curveball, handcuffing a Rangers lineup of five lefthanded hitters.
“A lot of curveballs,” Morton said. “All curveballs, and I felt like my fastball was pretty good. My command wasn't great but stuff-wise; I thought it was pretty good. If lefties don’t know I'm going to throw them curveballs by now, then I don’t (know). I threw them a lot of curveballs, and it worked.”
Seven days ago, Morton required 35 pitches to escape the first inning against Arizona. Four walks in the frame derailed his start before it could begin. He somehow mustered five innings but with the poorest command of his season.
“I had a problem with my timing,” Morton said. “It was just one of those games where you just battle to find the zone, and I try not to take that into my next start or something like that. If I get hit around, I try not to take it into my next start, be objective about it. I didn’t really make any changes.” Rangers were missing
Twenty-three of Morton’s 66 strikes were swung upon and missed, another career high on an evening littered with them. His two-seam fastball moved expertly — five were cut on and missed; four more were called strikes — while his fourseamer maxed at 98.1 mph.
Only twice did Morton encounter trouble. Ronald Guzman knocked a 1-0 four-seam fastball into the right-field bleachers with two outs in the third, the lone run on his line.
Delino DeShields smoked the next pitch, this one a two-seamer, into left field for a double. Shin-Soo Choo struck out looking to render it moot.
Choo, Gallo and Rougned Odor each faced Morton three times. Nine strikeouts were recorded. Odor’s third ended Morton’s seventh and final inning, stranding Jurickson Profar in scoring position.
“It was fun to see him finish his outing with such conviction,” Hinch said, “making one last really good breaking-ball pitch to Odor with the most stress that he had all night.”
Three of the five Astros starting pitchers have struck out 14 or more hitters in a game.
“Any time we get any runs for these guys, it’s good,” DH Evan Gattis said. “They’re doing their job incredibly well, and we want to get them runs.”
Gattis’ third-inning single and fifth-inning solo home run were ample support for Morton. Brian McCann’s solo home run in the fourth inning aided. Correa’s two-run shot in the eighth broke it open.
An inning earlier, Morton departed to a hero’s ovation, 36,482 screaming after Odor swung at the buried breaking ball.
Pitching coach Brent Strom shook his hand. Teammates flooded the man who often refuses to praise his resurgence or platitudes, congratulating him on another evening they were on display.
“Hey, you have a smile,” Gerrit Cole joshed him .
“If you let a bad outing get to you too much and you let a good outing get to you too much, it's not a good thing,” Morton said. “I'll do what I normally do and prepare for the next start.” chandler.rome@chron.com twitter.com/chandler_rome