San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
‘THE SKY IS THE LIMIT FOR’ MOREJON
Lefty has tremendous upside but injuries have limited progress
Adrian Morejon was 17 years old in July 2016 when the Padres signed him for $11 million, still their largest bonus awarded to an international or domestic amateur prospect. He was bumped from short-season Tri-city to the low Single-a Midwest League weeks after Mackenzie Gore signed for $6.7 million as the No. 3 overall pick in the country. Morejon was six weeks removed from his 19th birthday when the Padres made him the youngest pitcher in the California League and was not yet old enough to buy his own celebratory beer when the Padres pushed him to the majors after the 2019 Allstar break.
The real arrival is still to come.
The 22-year-old Morejon knows it.
“I don’t think I feel so much anxious about it, to prove anything,” Morejon said through team interpreter David Longley. “I’m more just confident that I know I have the stuff to contribute and I know I can help the team. …
“I believe in myself.” Saturday showed another reason why a lot of people have believed in Morejon for quite some time and just why the Padres’ confidence continues to grow heading into a season in which their young pitchers may have to contribute as much as ever.
After giving up a firstpitch homer to Diamondbacks All-star Ketel Marte, the left-handed Morejon retired seven in a row, including three straight by strikeout. A two-out single and a shift-beating double tested him in the third inning, but Morejon brushed that threat aside with a swinging strikeout of clean-up hitter Christian Walker for his fifth punchout.
No, these games don’t count.
Moments like those, however, do when you’re a young pitcher just off the fast track.
“That’s an area I’ve grown in,” Morejon said after limiting Arizona to a run on four hits and no walks in three innings. “I think a lot of it starts with the fact that when men got on base, I would try to do too much. I would try to throw harder. I would try to make a perfect pitch and it wouldn’t go well for me.
“Now I’m not so much focused on doing more or throwing harder or trying to get a strikeout because that’s what I feel I need to do. I can pitch to contact and not get off my game.”
His game had made a name for Morejon well before the Padres made him a priority in their 2016 international spending spree.
His résumé included MVP honors at the 15U World Cup while pitching for Cuban national team, with a 124-pitch complete-game win over the U.S. in which Morejon struck out 12 batters against one walk really opening eyes.
For good reason, Morejon hasn’t approached that kind of workload in a single game since defecting from Cuba.
In fact, he last completed six innings in 2018 at High Single-a Lake Elsinore.
Discomfort in his flexor and later his triceps sent Morejon to the injured list
twice that year. He started the next year in the Double-a Texas League only to have trouble with his lower back and shoulder again sideline him for three weeks.
Morejon returned from Amarillo’s injured list as an “opener,” pitched exclusively in relief upon his jump to San Diego and finished 2019 again on the injured list because of that bothersome shoulder. Everyone’s innings were limited by the pandemic in 2020.
The result: Morejon’s workload has never topped 651⁄3 innings in a season and he’s thrown just 271⁄3 innings in the majors over the last two years.
Which made his offseason all that more important as he prepared for a real opportunity to make his first opening-day roster.
“I feel like I focused on that a lot in the offseason,” Morejon said. “Not so much focused on exactly what was said or any guarantee that might be made and more on what the team’s going to need in terms of innings. I just wanted to prepare for them and I feel like I have. Whatever the team needs me to do, if they need me to throw more innings than I have, then I feel like I’m ready for that.”
His innings to date have both teased at Morejon’s enormous upside and reminded everyone just how young he is.
Take, for instance, his first three appearances last year after the Padres called him up from the alternate site.
Morejon struck out four over three no-hit innings in a start in Texas, gave up three runs before he was yanked in the second inning in his next start and then spun three shutout innings in relief at Coors Field.
Admittedly, Morejon’s 6.26 career ERA says his poor days to date have far outweighed his good ones.
“The two things that are the toughest to develop and take the most time are young catchers and starting pitching,” Padres manager Jayce Tingler said. “I start with the expectation that some of these guys come into their peak at later points. It’s our job … what can we do to speed up that process a little bit?
“When you look at the body of work that Morejon did last year, I thought he took a significant two or three steps forward. They key is not to stay there.”
Morejon certainly has the stuff to take giant leaps forward. His knuckle-change became a social media sensation last year. He added a tumbling slider in 2020 to a holster of secondaries that include a plus curveball and a traditional change-up. The offering that really makes the Padres salivate is an easy fastball clocked as high 98.4 mph in 2020.
Problem is, Morejon’s heat has been pounded.
In fact, that 98.4 mph heater resulted in a 339-foot homer, one of seven that Morejon yielded in just 191⁄3 innings last year.
Opposing hitters’ .806 slugging percentage on his firmest pitch is pretty telling that it’s simply catching way too much of the plate, making it all that much harder for Morejon’s to get to any of his many put-away pitches.
One hopeful fix: Further differentiating the action between his running twoseamer and the carry on his four-seamer.
“How his four-seamer would play at times was more like a two-seamer,” Tingler said. “A lot of his focus in the offseason has been trying to separate the two pitches. He gets a lot more ride, more carry on the fourseamer and then letting the two-seamer naturally run its course and run . ... He can get a lot of ground balls with the two-seamer, but if he can be able to get some carry on the four-seamer and ride it at the top of the zone, we think that can be a difference maker for him.”
Of course, how Morejon makes a difference remains to be seen.
There will be innings to be had as the season stretches back out to 162 games. Slowplaying Dinelson Lamet’s return to the rotation could mean there are one or two spots up for grabs, depending on if the Padres start the season with a five- or sixman rotation. Morejon is in competition with two other young left-handers — Gore and Ryan Weathers — and will have experience and versatility on his side.
The bullpen, too, is a very real possibility, especially in the early goings before the established starters are fully stretched out.
“I believe he’s going to throw a lot of meaningful innings for us,” Tingler said. “He’s still just 22 years old. He’s still growing. He’s still learning. He seems to be learning very quickly and he’s got a calm heartbeat about him even in pressure moments.
“The sky is the limit for him. He’s going to dictate where that workload goes.”