Brandon McCarthy

The MLB trade deadline brings excitement each summer as contenders try to improve their team while pretenders look to the future.

The saying in baseball is that you can't have too much pitching, so starting pitchers are always at high demand around the deadline.

An elite starting pitcher can be the difference in reaching the postseason or making a run at a World Series Championship.

Cliff Lee was traded at the deadline to the Texas Rangers a few years ago and led them all the way to the World Series.

Oakland's newcomers finally put it all together and the A's put together back-to-back wins, taking their first series of the season.

David DeJesus, Josh Willingham and Hideki Matsui were acquired to give the Athletics an offensive boost to support their stellar starting pitching, and also to lift the A's from their 81-81 finish last season, into contention in the American League West.

After weeks of speculation, the fifth starter competition is finally over and the A’s have their rotation set heading into the final week of spring training.

Injuries and ineffectiveness removed Rich Harden, Josh Outman and Bobby Cramer from the competition, leaving Brandon McCarthy and Tyson Ross to battle it out as the Cactus League came to a close.

Josh Outman has been optioned by the Oakland Athletics to Triple-A Sacramento following a frustrating spring where he was unable to find consistency from the mound.

Outman put together a very promising rookie season in 2009, going 4-1 with a 3.48 ERA and earning some All-Star consideration before his season was cut short by elbow troubles that led to Tommy John surgery in mid-June.

It feels like I'm having a flashback or experiencing déjà vu. Welcome back Rich Harden, to the disabled list that is.

Technically, Harden will not see the disabled list for his latest injury, at least not yet, but he did manage to strain his lat muscle during the first day of official spring training workouts for pitchers and catchers.

I'm concluding my look at the four AL West bullpens with Texas. Inside are analyses of 13 relievers (there's a lot of competition for relief slots):

Frank Francisco
Neftali Feliz
Darren O'Day
Darren Oliver
C.J. Wilson
Chris Ray
Ben Snyder
Dustin Nippert
Brandon McCarthy
Geoff Geary
Warner Madrigal
Willie Eyre
Clay Rapada

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My last article predicted the final records for the AL West teams. I came up with this:

LA 88-74
Seattle 87-75
Oakland 84-78
Texas 82-80

Obviously, I think it's going to be close.

The next thing I wanted to do was look at the starting rotations of each team, pitcher-by-pitcher, and grade them.

Without further ado, here's my look at Texas.

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Leading the AL West over the Angels by 1.5 games and still unbeaten against the Mariners this year, the Rangers went into last night's game looking to continue their winning ways.

Texas sent Brandon McCarthy to the mound as he looked to redeem himself after getting blown-up in his last start in Oakland.  Brandon also had a personal battle, he has yet to pitch seven complete innings in a Rangers uniform. 

Wednesday night against the Mariners he was able accomplish both goals.