West Michigan Whitecaps<\/a> outfielder Nolan McCarthy vividly recalls the minutes he spent in the parking lot of a Wawa gas station in Florida. He had just been a part of several pro days where he worked out in front of Major League Baseball scouts, but no one was interested in signing him.<\/p>\nJust 30 minutes into the 20-hour drive back home, he heard from his agent.<\/p>\n
“He called me. He’s like, ‘Don’t leave yet. I might have something.’ So I sat in a gas station parking lot for 20 minutes, and then I got the call from the Tigers, and it was the best thing ever. You know, not only did I not have to drive 20 hours home, but I had a new team and a new organization, so it was amazing. It was the one of the best days ever,” he said.<\/p>\n
McCarthy was born in the Detroit area before he moved to the Kalamazoo area, where he spent most of his childhood. He remembers being a Tigers fan growing up.<\/p>\n
“Going to those games when Verlander was pitching, or Cabrera was hitting a Homer, you know, [Victor Martinez] all them, Austin Jackson. It’s just really cool because, you know, growing up watching those guys, you have dreams of eventually playing in Comerica,” he said.<\/p>\n
McCarthy played ball for Portage Northern High School before going on to play at the University of Kentucky and the University of Georgia, where he got to face off against some guys who are now big leaguers.<\/p>\n
“It was the best time of my life, and you face great pitchers. Like I remember going down to LSU and facing Paul Skenes in a super regional and that atmosphere, it doesn’t get much better than that,” he said.<\/p>\n
McCarthy has also played for the Kalamazoo Growlers, so he knows what it’s like to be back in Michigan playing. He’s happy that playing for the Whitecaps will not only give him the chance to be back home, but also playing in front of Tigers fans.<\/p>\n
“It’s really cool. I got here Friday afternoon and played in Lansing. You see Tigers gear everywhere, and it’s just really cool being in Michigan, being a part of this organization, just knowing that if people are rooting for a professional baseball team here, it’s usually the Tigers,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It’s cool that the people that come to these games might follow everyone’s career on this team, and it’s just awesome getting to play in front of people who care, and great atmospheres.”<\/p>\n
McCarthy, like fellow Michigan native Jalen Evans, is also appreciative of the opportunity to get to play in front of his family.<\/p>\n
“It’s really cool. My parents have always been like, my biggest supporters, so having them come to the games is really cool,” he said.<\/p>\n
McCarthy got his first home start on Wednesday<\/a> afternoon when the Whitecaps beat the Lake County Captains 7-1. McCarthy went 1-for-3 from the plate with a walk, a run, and an RBI.<\/p>\n“I really pride myself in being a complete player, you know, playing good defense, hitting the ball well, and just doing really well on the base paths. I kind of like the old school baseball, you know, stealing bases and making plays in the outfield and putting the ball in play,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Definitely want to work on my power a little bit, you know, get the ball out of the yard, getting the ball in the air. But, yeah, I just want to kind of do what I can, hit the ball around the yard, use all parts of the field, and then steal some bags and make some plays.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nolan McCarthy graduated from Portage Northern High School and he recently played his first home game with the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":626383,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-626382","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=626382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626382\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/626383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=626382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=626382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=626382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}