Brandon McCarthy jokes about Dodgers left-handed pitching ‘bias’
If you’re a right-handed pitcher, there’s no room for you in the Los Angeles Dodgers rotation. After reaching a three-year, $48 million agreement with veteran left-hander Scott Kazmir on Wednesday, the Dodgers top five starting options heading into the new year all are left-handed.
Of course, three-time Cy Young award winner Clayton Kershaw leads the rotation. He would be followed by Kazmir, Alex Wood, Brett Anderson and a hopefully healthy Hyun-Jin Ryu.
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Five left-handers. That’s blasphemy. The set up reeks of left-handed bias, and currently injured right-hander Brandon McCarthy isn’t going to stand for it!
He’s joking, obviously, because that’s what Brandon McCarthy does best. But he wasn’t the only Dodger to catch on to the possibility that left-handers will likely rule the rotation come opening day.
That would actually be pretty cool if that happened. If not during the regular season, they should at least do that during a week at spring training.
All left-handed rotations have only happened a handful of times in MLB history, so it’s certainly newsworthy and perhaps worth a joke or two when it actually happens. Unfortunately for the Dodgers, the offseason in general hasn’t been a laughing matter so far, and that’s somewhat reflected in the Kazmir signing.
Five left-handed starters is far from an ideal set up. Teams typically prefer a balanced rotation to keep opposing teams from getting too comfortable during a given series. However, after some big misses in free agency this winter, the Dodgers can’t afford to be too picky in terms of rotation additions. They simply need pitchers who can contribute and hopefully help offset the loss of Zack Greinke.
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One guy who could help further that case would be McCarthy, whom Los Angeles signed to a four-year, $48 million contract last winter. Unfortunately, he won’t be available to enter the rotation until mid-season at the earliest after undergoing Tommy John surgery in April. So barring another signing or a trade, Los Angeles will be “Southpaw City” for most of 2016.
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Mark Townsend is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Townie813
