At a time when the Los Angeles Dodgers had a starting rotation led by Clayton Kershaw, Zack Greinke and Hyun-Jin Ryu, the group was rounded out during the 2014 offseason with the signings of Brandon McCarthy and Brett Anderson.
The newcomers, both of whom had a long injury history, received drastically different deals in free agency, however. Anderson inked a one-year contract, while McCarthy signed a four-year, $48 million contract.
His tenure with the club came to an end before seeing the lifetime of the contract play out when the Dodgers included McCarthy in a salary-motivated trade with the Atlanta Braves this past offseason.
In the midst of a rocky first season with the Braves, McCarthy announced he will retire at the end of the 2018 campaign, per Mark Bowman of MLB.com
“I’m done after this,” said McCarthy, who is 6-3 with a 4.92 ERA in 15 starts this season. “This is it. The offseason is the rest of my life. If I was going to keep playing, a month and a half ago I would have had the surgery that cleans the [knee] and I’d be back next year just a little bit after Spring [Training].”
McCarthy’s first season with the Dodgers came to a halt after just four starts because of Tommy John surgery that then delayed his start to the 2016 campaign until July. Hip and mechanical issues then dogged McCarthy during stretches of 2017.
He went 11-7 with a 4.51 ERA and 1.28 WHIP in 33 games (29 starts) for the Dodgers over parts of three seasons. Despite some of the ups and downs, McCarthy remembered his time with the organization in a positive light.
