Twins Video
Zebby Matthews was Twins Daily's #20 prospect coming into the 2024 season. He pitched at three minor-league levels (Cedar Rapids, Wichita, and St. Paul) before joining the Twins starting rotation in mid-August. Matthews was arguably the fastest-rising Twins prospect of 2024, and one of the highest climbers in all of affiliated baseball.
However, there was another pitcher who started the season in the Kernels rotation who followed closely behind Matthews at each level. Andrew Morris started the season outside of the Twins Daily Top 20 prospect rankings, just one spot behind Matthews.
Matthews was selected in the eighth round of the 2022 draft. Morris was the Twins' fourth-round pick in the same draft, out of Texas Tech.
They both participated in a pre-draft college workout in mid-June that year. They both signed in Fort Myers on the same late-July day. They both made one appearance for the FCL Twins that season. Matthews made one appearance for the Mighty Mussels. Morris made an appearance for them in the playoffs.
After one start in 2023, Morris went on the Injured List with some right bicep tendinitis, so he missed about six weeks before rejoining the Mussels in mid-May. At that time, Matthews was putting up video-game numbers for Fort Myers and was promoted to Cedar Rapids in late May. He spent the rest of the season with the Kernels. Morris was promoted to the Midwest League near the end of July and joined their rotation. They were both instrumental in bringing the Kernels their first Midwest League championship in over two decades.
Let's jump to 2024. Both of these pitchers start the season back in Cedar Rapids. The two pitchers dominated the competition and quickly moved up. Matthews moved up on May 6th. Morris moved up on May 21st.
Again, both pitchers were dominant in Double-A. Matthews was promoted to Triple-A St. Paul on Jul. 19. Morris was promoted to the Saints on Aug. 13. That's the day that Matthews was called up to the big leagues, after Joe Ryan went on the injured list. Matthews made his debuts, recorded many firsts, and experienced the ups and downs of MLB. Seeing how these two work, it just might not be too long before Andrew Morris jumps up to the big leagues and gets to experience all those things.
Background
Andrew Burke Morris was born in New York City on Sept. 1, 2001. He moved all over the place. Lived in Alaska for awhile. Spent his high school years in Colorado. He chose to attend Division II Colorado St. in Mesa. He was pitching fall ball games when he was still 16, since he is a year younger than his high school graduation class. After three solid years there (18-2), he transferred to Texas Tech where he went 8-2. The Twins made him their fourth-round pick in 2022. Signed him for $500,000, and I bet they remain completely thrilled to have made that selection.
Some Basic Stats
Morris has put up some incredible numbers in the Twins' minor leagues the past two seasons. At Fort Myers in 2023, he went 3-1 with a 2.59 ERA and a 1.05 WHIP. He moved up to Cedar Rapids and went 5-1 with a 3.28 ERA. In a combined 84 1/3 innings, he had 79 strikeouts and just 19 walks.
In seven Kernels starts early this season, he went 3-1 with a 2.15 ERA and a 1.11 WHIP. In 12 games for Wichita (10 starts), he went 6-3 with a save, a 1.90 ERA, and a 1.02 WHIP. With the Saints, he made seven starts to end his season. He went 1-1 with a 3.48 ERA and a 1.13 WHIP. In 133 combined innings, he had 133 strikeouts and just 32 walks. Simply put, most years, he would run away with the Twins Minor League Pitcher of the Year award with those numbers.
He spent a lot of 2024 in Matthews's shadow, and understandably so. But his performance, at three levels, didn't go unnoticed by Twins Daily writers, as he jumps up to become our sixth-ranked Twins prospect (and this writer's #4). Obviously the coaches and the front office noticed. They don't jump push players up unless they are deemed ready. Morris proved them right.
The Stuff
I spent far too much time staring at Morris's Statcast data from his final three starts. I had too much to do to dig deeply into all seven of his Saints starts, so I decided to check out the last three games. Why? because by then, he was approaching 120 innings pitched and had to be tiring late in the season. Right?
Well, I came away from that research incredibly impressed, and here are some reasons why.
The Pitches
Morris primarily throws four pitches. He has a four-seam fastball, a slider, a change up and a curveball. Each pitch is unique, and there may even be a third breaking ball in there as well, which is obviously intriguing.
The Fastball - His fastball averages about 94 mph, but he throws it anywhere between 92 and 97. It is a pitch that rides in on a right-handed batter, so you can see why it might be a potentially great pitch used up above the zone.
The Slider - He throws his slider almost as much as he throws his fastball. In fact, in one of the three games I reviewed, he threw nine more sliders than fastballs. His slider is intriguing to me because of the variance in its velocity. Of course, it should be noted that it is possible that a few calls each game give the wrong pitch type and may not always get corrected. But in each of his games, he slider came in anywhere from 82-92 mph. The slider gives about the same amount of horizontal break away from a right-handed hitter as the fastball moves toward them. Enough to keep the ball off of an opponent's barrel.
The Curveball - Morris throws from a high, over-the-top release point. He is able to generate a lot of spin, and his slow curveball drops off of the proverbial table. He only threw 9-13 of these pitches in each of the three games I dug into. The velocity ranged from 73-77 mph But it is crazy how much drop it gets.
Something In Between - I mentioned earlier that there just might be a third breaking ball potentially. I saw that because, as you look at his movement charts, the slider and curveball are joined by a pitch that has its own distinct area. This chart comes from his September 12th star in Columbus. There are three pockets of breaking pitches. Obviously the slow curve gets the -54+ drop (blue), but there are two different pockets deemed "sliders." Is one a cutter? Is one a slider that he just takes a little something off of, decreases the velo a couple of ticks, and gets 10-12 more inches of drop?
The clusters thee are a bit too distinct (and the velocity gap a bit too big) to think of it as one pitch he's just tweaking, I think. When you look at the relationship between movement on the pitch and velocity, some of the mystery burns off.
It sure looks like he has what we'd generally call a cutter, sitting around 90 MPH and with much more lift than a slider usually has. Then, he has the true slider, which sits more like 83-85. That's exciting. If you consider them distinct, both of these pitches grade out really well. There were 196 pitchers who threw at least 80 cutters at Triple A, according to Baseball Prospectus. THey have pitch-modeling grades for that level, and Morris's cutter ranked seventh among them in PitchPro, which takes into account release point, velocity, movement, handedness, count, and location. There were a whopping 455 pitchers who threw at least 50 sliders, and Morris's ranked fourth. That suggests he could have two elite offerings packed into what we first thought was just one pitch tyoe.
The Changeup - In the final three games, Morris threw his changeup 14, 17 and then 10 times. The velocity of that pitch was between 85-91. Frankly, if there is a pitch that could use some work, it might be the changeup. Typically, you'd like to see at least an 8-10 mph lower velocity than the fastball. He is generally closer to maybe 4-6 mph slower than the fastball. If he can take just a little bit of velocity off of the changeup, it might be more of a swing-and-miss pitch and really keep a hitter off-balance. However, I am also very much intrigued by this pitch. Go back to the charts above and look how much arm-side run he gets on the changeup (green dots in the Baseball Savant image, purple in the one from TruMedia).
The Mix - With this four- or five-pitch mix, I think Morris has a chance to be a big-league starter. He has enough velocity. He gets the movement needed to work his fastball up in the zone. He has, apparently, a slider and a cutter, and he can really keep a hitter guessing when he throws them a low-70s curveball. The changeup is arguably the pitch he can most work on, but it already has shown a ton of potential. How to use his pitch mix to his advantage will always be the question, and something to work each game to figure out with his catchers.
The Release Point - This is the other thing from looking at the Statcast numbers that excites me about the potential of Andrew Morris. In looking at Morris's release point, it shows what pitchers and pitching coaches mean when they talk about tunneling. Morris releases his pitches over the top, and his point of release is within a small range. In other words, when the ball comes out of Morris's hand, the batter can't tell from the release point if he's going to get a 97-mph fastball or an 87-mph changeup or an 89-mph cutter or a 74-mph curveball.
Control & Command - In Cedar Rapids, Morris struck out 27.9% of batters faced. In Wichita, the number dropped a bit, to 25.2% and in his time in St. Paul, he struck out 19.6% of batters. That is certainly to be expected as a young player moves up and starts facing much more experienced hitters. In addition, his walk rate jumped from 4.5% in Cedar Rapids, to 5.6% in Cedar Rapids, to 8.0% in St. Paul.
In Cedar Rapids, he threw 71.1% strikes. In Wichita, that number fell to 67.1% strikes. In St. Paul, it was a still solid 67.2% strikes. He clearly has very good control and doesn't hurt himself with walks. If anything, it'll be a matter of cleaning up his command a bit. Being a bit more consistent with location inside or just outside the strike zone.
What to Expect in 2025?
By pitching at three levels in 2024, including the highest minor-league level, Morris has put himself into consideration for a call-up at any point during the 2025 season. What the Twins do this offseason in terms of their pitching staff will be a huge factor. Will Pablo Lopez, Bailey Ober, and Joe Ryan all be back? Will the Twins trade Chris Paddack? Would they really move Griffin Jax into the rotation? Is Louie Varland going to the bullpen? Can Simeon Woods Richardson duplicate, or maybe even improve upon his 2024 rookie stats? Matthews and Brent Headrick will likely get opportunities to start. The Twins also just added Marco Raya and Travis Adams to their stable of potential starters that are already on the 40-man roster.
That said, if Morris shows more improvement and starts out the season strong at Triple-A, he can force the Twins' hand a bit. And, I'm sure the Twins would love for him to make their decisions difficult!
For much more Twins Daily content on Andrew Morris, click here.
Interested in learning more about the Minnesota Twins' top prospects? Check out our comprehensive top prospects list that includes up-to-date stats, articles and videos about every prospect, scouting reports, and more!
View Twins Top ProspectsFollow Twins Daily For Minnesota Twins News & Analysis
- mikelink45, Mike Sixel, DocBauer and 11 others
-
14
Recommended Comments
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now