Brandon McCarthy struggles to pick New York Yankees jersey number

Earlier this week, the New York Yankees, looking for some starting pitching help rang up the Arizona Diamondbacks and asked about Brandon McCarthy’s availability. Obviously there wasn’t much attachment on the part of the Diamondbacks as they traded the sarcastic and humorous pitcher to the Big Apple.

More from MLB

• Braves get dose of bad news on Max Fried as ace nears return
• Shohei Ohtani trade rumors live tracker: Every update so far
• MLB Rumors: Yankees mistake, Cardinals trade package, Cubs choice
• Inside the Clubhouse: What I’m hearing ahead of the MLB Trade Deadline
• After frantic trade day, Kiké Hernandez grateful for second chance with Dodgers

It was probably a welcome move for Brandon McCarthy considering he’s leaving the struggling Diamondbacks behind and will now find himself in the thick of a postseason race with the Bronx Bombers, though, things have apparently gotten off to a rocky start and it has nothing to do with his performance on the mound.

McCarthy was apparently getting himself ready to become a member of the New York Yankees today and one of the first things he needed to do was select a jersey number. Sounds easy enough, right? Well, not when the New York Yankees have 18 retired numbers. Now, granted the No. 8 is retired twice as is No. 42 (Jackie Robinson, not Mariano Rivera…yet) but still – it’s not exactly easy to pick a number when you have to select between the available digits not retired and those not on the back of another player/coach.

For what it’s worth, McCarthy has worn four numbers during his big league career – 41, 55, 20 and 32.

Of those, only #32 is retired so hopefully the pitcher won’t have too many more struggles finding a digit to call his own.

Then again, judging by McCarthy’s humor, he’d probably put a letter or a symbol (the MLB’s version of Prince?) on his back if he could.