I was very interested to read the story out yesterday about Brandon McCarthy showing up at the Ballpark to pitch for Andy Hawkins, Jim Colburn, and Nolan Ryan. He wanted for them to look at his mechanics. He reportedly walked away feeling as good about his mechanics as he had in two years. We all will remember that he had some serious mechanical problems last year when he was healthy. His results thus far in his rehab has been up and down. Like Chris Young before him, because of his height he will struggle at times with repeating his delivery.

What was most interesting to me, though, was the inclusion of Nolan in this session. Dick Bosman famously pushed Nolan away from helping anyone on the staff when he was pitching coach. We never heard of Nolan working with any of the pitchers when Mark Connor was still around. Now, Connor is gone and we see this happening. Now, I know that many on LSB are wary of Ryan's influence in some areas of the organization but I see this as being a huge plus. The guy obviously knows pitching and he has a track record, though not as a full-time pitching coach, as successfully helping certain pitchers through the years. The best example of this is Randy Johnson. Johnson was just piddling along early in his career until he spent some time with Nolan. After that, he turned dominant and the rest is history.

I just wondered what LSB's opinion of Nolan is as far as working with our pitching staff. If he can help get a guy like McCarthy on track, that would be huge because this guy has great potential.