McCarthy and Co. emphasizing new approach

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- For Brandon McCarthy, it's not a matter of eliminating pitches, but just making sure that he's not getting beat with anything but his best stuff.

There's a new emphasis this year in D-backs camp for pitchers to know which of their pitches are working for them on a given day and then making sure they stick with those.

While that sounds like common sense, a lot of times in the heat of the game a pitcher and catcher will try to stick with the original game plan, even when it may not be working.

"If something works, then I'll stay with it. And if it's not working, we'll move away from it," said McCarthy, who will start Wednesday's Cactus League opener. "I think it's more just making the adjustment hitter to hitter, game to game -- not just trying to force feed things in there."

If he was guilty of that last year, it seemed to mainly come with his cut fastball.

"It probably wasn't an excess of cutters, it was cutters in the wrong situations, without it being as good as it should be," McCarthy said. "There were just too many times where we just kind of threw pitches just to throw them and you would find yourself getting punished. We kind of overcomplicated things. And I think we did it, almost as a staff. We didn't just go out and accentuate our strengths."