Brandon McCarthy Scouting Report Revisited

We had a Brandon McCarthy report up on the site a couple months ago. But this guy has gone down to the minors and done some serious work so it’s time to take another look:

In 2004 McCarthy racked up 202 Ks in 172 minor-league innings. That’s a mind-numbing K rate for a major-leaguer, but nothing to go all frothy at the mouth over in a blue-chip prospect. When he came up at the beginning of the ’05 season we all expected Brandon to start blowing guys away. That didn’t happen. In fact, he looked pretty average giving up a hit/inning and striking out about 4-5 batters/game. That’s all right because he’s not a power pitcher. And since so few people have access to minor league telecasts there’s no way to tell whether those scouting reports you read on Farmer Joe’s Birmingham Report are right.

Brandon got sent back to AAA where he evidently decided to work on his stuff, finding good movement on a 2-seam fastball. He posted an average ERA for a blue-chip prospect in AAA (3.85), but his WHIP held at a steady 1.13. He racked up 130 K in 119 IP and now he’s back in the bigs and coming off seven scoreless innings against the Red Sox, a game in which he also notched 7 Ks.

McCarthy will never be a K/inning guy in the majors, and he’s not going to blow the ball past hitters. He works in the low 90s and gets his punch-outs by commanding his off-speed pitches in the zone and on the corners.

He’s not flashy with a huge Felix Hernandez arm, but he is a true pitcher. Command is, to some extent, a much more rare commodity than the “stuff” pitchers we all read about. So many “stuff” pitchers frustrate owners with high ERAs and WHIPs because they just can’t put the ball where they want it. Brandon can, and will, paint the corners.

McCarthy is going to be a 15 game winner soon. He’s going to keep the ERA in the mid-high 3s and his WHIP should be somewhere around 1.25. His fastball found some decent movement and he kind of reminds me of what Scot Shields might look like if he pitched in the starting rotation. But 140-155 Ks is probably his ceiling.

Brandon McCarthy Profile and Statistics