Dodgers Close To Four-Year Agreement With Brandon McCarthy

The new is coming in fast and furious now. Almost too fast for me to keep up. I’m loving it too, like a McDonald’s cheeseburger. Little to no Dodgers news for weeks, and now a whole month’s worth of news within a few hours this evening.

Ken Rosenthal is reporting that the Dodgers are close to signing right handed starter Brandon McCarthy. Terms are not disclosed as of yet, but reports indicate the contract is for four years.

If you remember Adrian recommended signing McCarthy a few weeks back, and it looks like the Dodgers had the same thing in mind. The 31-year old right hander is a California native hailing from Glendale. McCarthy was originally drafted by the White Sox, making his MLB debut in 2005. He has pitched for five Major League teams which include stints in Chicago, Texas, Oakland, Arizona, and the Yankees most recently.

McCarthy was the guy hit in the head by a line drive back in 2012 when he was with the A’s. He had to have surgery to relieve pressure on his brain after he had a hemorrhage. He recovered quickly and ended up signing with the Dbacks, before being eventually dealt to the Yankees at the end of last season.

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McCarthy is the guy who limits walks, and gets ground balls. He uses an effective cutter, and sinker, mixing in fastballs to efficiently pitch. McCarthy was 7-5 with a 2.89 ERA in 90 innings for the Yankees last season. He whiffed 82, and walked just 13 while allowing 1.3 walks per nine, and striking out 8.2 per nine. All total McCarthy was 10-15 with a 4.05 ERA in 32 starts. The right hander is 52-65 with a career 4.09 ERA, and an FIP of 4.00.

It’s important to remember that McCarthy does have a history of shoulder injuries, and is not in his prime. He made 10.2 million dollars last season.

McCarthy should slot in right behind Zack Greinke and give the Dodgers quality innings. McCarthy is generally a workhorse, he threw 200 innings in 2014.

So we now know who will probably be the number four starter in the rotation. This seems like a pretty solid move from the Dodger think tank. Although we’ll have to wait until the financial terms are released for us to make a more definitive judgment.

Of course nothing is finalized, and the Dodgers have not made an announcement yet. So we’ll have more on this later.

I can’t wait to see what the brain trust does next.