HOUSTON -- Kade Morris ran into trouble early and often in his Major League debut Saturday. The right-hander was tagged for nine runs in four-plus innings in a 13-2 loss to the Astros at Daikin Park.
Morris allowed nine hits with three walks and four strikeouts. The Astros hit three home runs off the rookie, with two coming as part of a five-run second.
“That just sucked,” Morris, the A’s No. 12 prospect, said. “It’s as plain as it gets. First one, I wanted a good one. Just couldn’t get it done.”
The Astros jumped on Morris early for six runs in the first two innings.
Both Oakland manager Mark Kotsay and Morris cited the location of his pitches as where things went wrong.
“Just location. Put it in a bad spot, give them a cookie,” Morris said. “A solo shot doesn’t hurt you, but the walk before the solo shot does.”
He had runners on second and third with one out in the first, but limited the damage to a sacrifice fly to Isaac Paredes.
After escaping the first, which included getting Jose Altuve for his first career strikeout, Morris had a chance to exhale, but things unraveled in the second.
“It was, ‘Let’s go now.’ Unfortunately, crooked inning right after the first one,” he said. “I kind of wasn't able to breathe. But I was trying to respond rather than react. I wasn’t able to.”
Lamonte Wade Jr. jumped on the second pitch he saw from the young right-hander and deposited it into the Crawford Boxes in left field to begin the second. Morris followed by surrendering two walks and a single while recording one out in the next four batters, before Yordan Alvarez sent a low changeup to the right-field seats for the Astros’ first grand slam of the season.
“In general, execution of the pitches is the story today,” Kotsay said. “Obviously, with Yordan, bases loaded and nowhere to put him, it’s a tough matchup for Kade in that situation. He left the changeup kind of out over [the plate] that Yordan hit out. It’s a big at-bat.
“For his first outing, it’s a tough at-bat for him to challenge Yordan in that situation. He did get some swing and misses today. There was some positive to the outing. But unfortunately, first time out, execution became a big part of the result.”
Morris was 5-3 with a 4.45 ERA with Triple-A Las Vegas before his callup on Tuesday. He had mixed results this season with the Aviators, allowing two or fewer runs in six of his 11 starts, but over his final two outings, he surrendered one run in 13 innings.
Morris admitted to some nerves, but added, “After I got going, I felt good.”
Morris threw 36 sinkers out of his 90 pitches, getting three whiffs and a strikeout on it. He also threw 16 sweepers, 16 sliders and 11 four-seam fastballs.
“Everything felt good,” Morris said. “A couple breaking balls that I hung over the middle of the plate. That’s not a good recipe for success. I think going on this next week, getting better at locating some of the stuff down and getting it out of the middle of the zone.”
He finished with eight whiffs on 39 swings overall, and the Astros recorded nine hard-hit balls off the rookie. Houston batters had an average exit velocity of 85 mph off Morris.
"Sinker is his best pitch, and you saw a lot of balls get hit to the left side of the infield today,” Kotsay said. “When the ball was down, it was on the ground. When it was up, it was elevated. Wade’s homer to left field was a sinker that was up, I think, out over. It’s more about height. For Kade, using the sinker in the bottom of the zone.”
For Morris, the game was a learning experience.
“Get back to work,” he said. “I think this one hurts. Take it to the house tonight, but come back tomorrow ready to work.”