The Pittsburgh Pirates have released veteran pitcher Matt Morris.  The Pirates have decided to go in the young pitching rotation direction and see how well that works out.  And to be honest, I don’t think that is a bad decision.

Morris struggled all year long for the Pirates.  A short season with a 0-4 record and a high 9.67 ERA, Morris was pretty much asking to be released.  The decision to cut him will cost the Pirates more than $10 million, besides what they already have paid him this season. Morris is making $10,037,283, or about one-fifth of the Pirates’ payroll, and has a $1 million buyout for 2009.

What do you think Pirates fans? Lets our Pirates Blog know what you are thinking about Matt Morris being released.

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The Pittsburgh Pirates just couldn’t get the home team advantage going for them on Monday as they lost to the Florida Marlins by a score of 10-4.  With Matt Morris struggling to get his season going, the Pirates failed to take home the win and continue to play bad baseball.

Xavier Nady led the Pirates with two RBI in the game.  Ronny Paulino and Matt Morris both managed to pick up a RBI as well during Monday’s game.

Morris was the opening pitcher for the Pirates throwing for four innings and giving up nine hits, eight runs, and walking one in his third loss of the year.  The Pirates brought in Franquelis Osoria, John Grabow, and Evan Meek to pitch the last five innings of the game.  Osoria gave up two earned runs and five hits in his two innings of action.

Tonight the Pittsburgh Pirates will go up against the Florida Marlins one more time before taking on the St. Louis Cardinals starting on Wednesday.

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Matt Morris once again got hammered and the Pittsburgh Pirates once again lost, this time to the Los Angeles Dodgers by the score of 11-2.  Morris was only able to last 4.2 innings as he gave up seven hits and six earned runs.  As a starting pitcher, you can’t put your team in a big hole like that if you want the team to win.   Hopefully Morris will figure out what is going wrong and fix it before his next start.

Phil Dumatrait pitched 1.1 innings in relief of Morris and gave two hits an two earned runs.  Evan Meek pitched the final two innings and gave up four hits and two earned runs.  I don’t know how long Meek will stay on the Pirates roster, he has sucked it up almost everytime he has been called on.

Freddy Sanchez and Ronny Paulino had an RBI each for the Pirtes.  The entire Pirates offense struggled against the Dodgers pitching staff and could never get anything going.

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The Pittsburg Pirates lost to the Chicago Cubs once again and this time it was by the score of 7-3.  The Pirates record now stands at 3-6 after being swept by the Cubs in the three game series.

The Pirates did have a 3-1 lead after the first inning, but after that they couldn’t get anything going against the Cubs pitchers.  Freddy Sanchez, Xavier Nady, and Jose Bautista all had one RBI each for the Pirates.

Starting pitcher Matt Morris did pitch seven innings but he allowed 11 hits and seven runs.  Only four of the seven runs were earned however as the two Pirates errors really hurt.  Evan Meek pitched final two innings of the game without allowing a run.

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The Pittsburgh Pirates lost a heart breaking game to the Florida Marlins on Friday evening as Mike Jacobs hit a walk off homerun for the Marlins.  The Pirates once again played in a one run ballgame and came up just short.

Chris Gomez‘s two-run single and Nate McLouth‘s run-scoring double gave Pittsburgh’s a three-run second inning but the Marlins quickly tied it up at three in the bottom half of the inning.  In the fourth inning, Ryan Doumit connected for his first homerun and put the Pirates up 4-3 but that didnt’ last long as the Marlins once again tied the game in the bottom half of the inning.  There wasn’t any other scoring in the game until the Jacob’s walk off homerun.

Matt Morris didn’t pitch too badly as he gave up four earned runs on eight hits.  He kept the team in the ballgame, and that is all you can ask for by your starting pitcher.  Franquelis Osoria took the lose for the Pirates.

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