Deep League Pitching: Brandon McCarthy

[Axis of Honor 25]

So I was looking through the waiver wire list for the last couple days in search for a pitcher that could give all around good numbers to replace the highly inconsistent Colby Lewis in one of my leagues. In fact, as of right now Colby Lewis has given up 3ER to the Indians and has struck out only 3 in 7.1 innings and continues to follow his FIP (4.87) and xFIP (4.14) line, not to mention his terrible tERA of 4.84. His WHIP has also climbed considerably since the All-Star break and his K/9 has fallen as well. Anyway to the point. I happened to stumble upon Brandon McCarthy, who i figured was probably getting lucky somewhat due to his ballpark and his recent career. Then I saw his numbers: ERA: 3.31, tERA: 3.27, FIP: 2.69, and xFIP: 3.27. His WHIP stands at a pretty solid 1.17. So I found myself asking the question what changed? Well apparently sometime between his last season with the Rangers in 2009, and this season with the A's, he added a cutter to his repertoire, a highly effective one I might add. His wCT 4.8 and is his best pitch. Since the implementation of his cutter, it has boosted the value and effective of his other pitches with his fastball coming in as his second best pitch this season (wFB: 4.1), which has been his problem pitch in the past. His curveball comes in as his third best with a 3.9 value. I'm not even going to count his change-up and slider because he hardly uses them as it is. The main thing to notice here is that the addition of his cutter has opponents swinging more at pitches out of the zone: O-swing%: 31.1%, a new career high. While his SwStr% has defintely declined over the years that may be due to him not attacking the zone as aggressively as before. Did I also mention that he barely walks anyone? 1.33 BB/9. He's not even getting unlucky from a high BABIP and a low LOB%. So here you have a pitcher that has good all around numbers, that is not getting lucky due to his ballpark but still benefits from it, and has a relatively decent offensive that hits for him. Not mention his sexy GB% of 46.7 percent , especially in Oakland. What's not to like here? He's only 12% owned in Yahoo! leagues, however I'm not surprised given his career and the underrated team. But those in need of some solid pitching to help eat up some of those innings before they hit their max, Brandon's your guy.

http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?pl ... position=P

[J35J]

Yup, he's been a solid back end of the rotation guy. I had him earlier in the year and he had a couple shaky outings and figured I'd drop him before he completely blew up. I noticed the other day he's still rolling right along. Definately worth a look to fill out the back end of the rotation.

Felipe Paulino is another guy to look at as someone you can spot start at the back end of your rotation(only 2% owned). I got a thread going on him today as well.

[markj11]

He didn't even use Vaseline on me:

L 3.1 IP 8 H 7 R 5 ER 0K