Wailing and gnashing of teeth on the Brandon for Brandon swap.  Mostly, this is due to the (IMO - utterly preposterous) idea that Morrow has a shot at becoming a legitimate TOR starter some day.  This belief is built primarily on a PERCEPTION of overpowering stuff with gaudy 10/g K-rates.  This is further buffed by a visual perception of outstanding mechanics.

The perceptions of how good Morrow is - or might one day be - are built more on hope than of actual production and performance.  In short, the strong tendency with Morrow has been to heavily weight each good performance and blithely dismiss all the bad ones.  Hopefully, I can point out precisely why the perceptions of Morrow have been overly inflated AND explain why Captain Jack likely just dumped a guy who will AT BEST become a palatable set-up guy some day.

• His superb K numbers are primarily skewed toward relief.  Career MLB K rates are 8.1 as a starter and 10.1 as a reliever.  8K/g ain't bad, but it ain't Nolan Ryan.
• The combo of superb mechanics AND horrid walk rates are an indicator that the walk rate is unlikely to ever improve.  If his walks are not due to something fixable, they cannot be fixed.  Morrow's 4.7 BB/g jumped to 5.7 BB/g in 2009.  The Nolan Ryan experience indicates Ryan *NEVER* learned to harness his control -- he just actually began losing enough 'stuff' over time that he lost the "ability" to remain so wild.  Ryan's control didn't improve until his mid 30s.  Morrow is likely to follow the same path.  His control is likely going to remain sickly until his ability declines. 
• His walk rates aren't his real problem.  Morrow might be a poor man's Ryan, if he had Ryan's incredible HR suppression.  (Ryan had a 0.5 HR/9 for his career).  Morrow's 1.4 and 1.3 HR/9 rates were posted in one of the best HR-suppressing venues in baseball.  Once the league booked him, and the 7.1 BB/9 vanished, so did a liveable HR rate. 
• Morrow's career numbers show a MASSIVE 0.8 to 1.4 difference in HR allowance.  He's vastly superior at suppressing HRs as a reliever.  As a starter, he's gophered way too regularly.
• The starter/reliever split is likely pushed by the fact as a starter teams can load up with lefties.  His career LH/RH split is: .593 OPS vs. righties - while allowing an .810 OPS against lefties.  The 15 lefty HRs compared to 8 righty (in almost dead even chances), is scary bad.  Nobody talks about "righty" specialists in the pen.  But, if there is a role where Morrow could survive, that appears to be it.

But, the real death knell for Morrow as a stud pitcher has little to do with his physical limitations.  The problems are almost 100% mental.  He has repeatedly shown a complete inability to develop consistency.  His career path has been one of REGRESSION.  He gets called up, runs fantastic numbers in year one -- has a brief flurry of success in relief in year two - sputters as a starter, (1.47 ERA balloons to 5.79 as a starter).  Then, in year 3, puts up the worst numbers of his career in AAA, (6.5 K/9 with Tacoma).  In '08 and '09, in roughly even innings, he allowed the same 10 HRs, but added 10 walks while losing 8 Ks. 

His diabetes may or may not be a true physical issue.  But, it is undoubtedly an easy excuse to use -- and Morrow's MENTAL facilities appear to be clearly lacking in regards to potential growth.  Thus far, he's shown mostly only an ability to get progressively worse, despite having a HR-stingy park, and in '09, having the best defense in baseball behind him. 

There's no evidence I've seen that Morrow can develop consistency.  There's nothing to "fix" to allow this to happen.  IMO, the idea that Morrow will simply magically acquire consistency and stop walking 5 guys a game - or begin bringing his A-game more than once a month is about the same probabiliy of HoRam developing an out-pitch this year.  Loaiza did it - so it's possible.  But, it sure ain't likely.

In League, the club picks up a guy who HAS shown indications of the ability to learn and harness his inate stuff and improve.  Maybe 2009 was just a career year and Jack just got taken.  (Jack hasn't shown great talent when it comes to pitching acquisitions thus far).  But, I completely understand why Jack is wanting to trade the pheenom who has shown the ability to get worse in exchange for the pheenom who has shown the ability to improve.

But hey, Morrow might some day solve his gopher-itis and do a year a two impression of Hideo Nomo.  Stranger things have happened.  Me?  I'm liking the idea of a steadier version of Morrow in the pen, who has the resume to suggest he could work as an emergency starter, in a swing-man role at some point.