The 2005 draft might have a constellation named after it one day, but the 2006 draft is starting to look just as impressive. Tim Lincecum, Clayton Kershaw, and Kyle Drabek all went in the first round, with Evan Longoria and Drew Stubbs representing the hitters who have developed so far.
Brandon Morrow And Max Scherzer: Who Is Better?
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Two more from the first round in 2006, Brandon Morrow and Max Scherzer, are going head-to-head Monday night in tomorrow. Which leads to a Monday midday musing ... If you had to choose one going forward, which one would it be?
It’s a freakishly tough decision, actually. They’ve got more similarities than differences. Consider:
- Even though both have high-voltage pitching talent radiating from their right arms, they’re both pitching for their second organization.
- They’re both hard throwers, with Morrow averaging a 93.4 MPH fastball last season, and Scherzer averaging 93.1.
- Both are fastball/slider/change-up pitchers, with Morrow occasionally mixing in a curve. Both throw their fastballs about 60% of the time.
- According to FanGraphs, Morrow has gotten hitters to chase 26.3% of the pitches he’s thrown outside of the strike zone for his career; Scherzer has a 26.5% mark.
This is like one of those weird cases of twins separated at birth, where they meet when they’re 40 and discover that their favorite movie is “Deathrace 2000,” they both named their dog Mxyzptlk, and they both eat aerosol cheese straight from the can. There isn’t a whole lot to separate them. If you want to pick one, you have to really, really like or dislike the pitching motion of one or the other.
Yeah, I’m no scout, so I couldn’t analyze those motions, but I thought it was worthwhile to include those slow-motion clips in case you could. If I had to write scouting reports for both, they would both include the phrase “throws real, real hard-like.” Actually, that’d probably be the entire scouting report, and it would be written in crayon on a cocktail napkin.
So if you had to choose one -- absolutely had to -- really, the only thing that separates them is this:
Days on disabled list in careerMorrow: 37
Scherzer: 18
Well, then, that’s a good tiebreaker ... except that includes only trips to the MLB disabled list. Scherzer had a little shoulder inflammation in the minors that kept him out for 30 days, which puts them pretty much dead even. Again.
At this point, flip a coin. Both are fantastic young pitchers -- soon, they should both be among the best in the American League if they aren’t already. It isn’t often that potential aces are on the trade market before they enter their arbitration years, so both the Tigers and Blue Jays should feel lucky that they were able to swing trades for potential aces without emptying their farm systems.
Wait, I have to choose one? Fine. Give me Max Scherzer because he has an “X” and a “Z” in his name, and he has two different colored eyes. That’s just how close these two pitchers are -- it takes meaningless factlets to decide between them. Maybe Morrow could write a screenplay or go back to school to get a degree in Puppet Arts to bridge the factlet gap.
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