Easy to see what Jays GM Alex Anthopoulos is up to as he's already mentioned it. He wants as many young, controllable players as he can get his hands on. Nothing against Brandon League, but in this swap of Brandons I will take Morrow. Albeit, Morrow has a long injury history which explains why Seattle was willing to part with him. If you're the Jays, who are solely looking to lock up TALENT at this point, Morrow is a huge addition. Like the previously acquired Kyle Drabek, Morrow has had Tommy John surgery in the past. However, like Drabek he's an arm with #1 or #2 starter potential. Throughout Morrow's mixed up MLB career he's fanned batters at a 9.29 K/9 clip. The caveat of course is his control. His career 5.83 BB/9 needs a bit of work.
The Mariners couldn't decide what to do with Brandon, tossing him into the bullpen to close, where he got injured. They brought him back as a starter where he got hurt again. In my experience, pitchers need to be brought along to be either a reliever or a starter only. When you start mixing and matching, a pitcher tends to get injured. A reliever tends to pitch very hard for a short period of time. The starting pitcher has to pace himself a bit better. What Seattle made Morrow do was essentially the equivalent of a sprinter running a marathon, only to become a sprinter again. I think if he was handled as a long term starting pitcher, he wouldn't have been injured as often.
Anyway, this bodes well for the Blue Jays. What I like is this gives the Jays another fantastic talent in what's becoming a deeper rotation by the day. Morrow possesses a big time live arm. I'm a big believer in the quality of your pitching coach can make or break your team's rotation. Jays pitching coach Brad Arnsberg is one of the best. This deal can only mean good things for Morrow and Toronto going forward.
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