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AL DIVISION SERIES: YANKEES VS INDIANSOctober 6, 2017Cody AllenAndrew MillerAustin JacksonCleveland, Ohio - pregame 2, Canada Q. Andrew, how did it feel being out there last night? It looked like it was either walk, strikeout for you pretty much the whole way. ANDREW MILLER: I felt good. I thought chase had a really good at bat. They put together professional at bats. I wish I'd thrown a couple more competitive pitches to Gardner. Sometimes you're going to lose the battle, and I felt like that was about to -- he won that one. That was a heck of an at bat. It happens and you move on to the next guy. Glad Cody came in and cleaned up my mess. But all in all, I felt pretty good. Q. For all three of you, how do you feel about taking Game 1 and still having your best pitcher available for two of the last four? ANDREW MILLER: We always want Kluber pitching, but we love the rest of our guys, too. I think Trevor, it's not like we went out there without confidence in him last night. I don't know whether you plan on him basically throwing no hit ball through five innings or whatever, but he's been great. We've seen the work he's put in. We had a lot of confidence in him last night, but we always like our chances with Kluber on the mound. CODY ALLEN: I think Andrew hit the nail on the head. Whenever you have Kluber going and you have a win under your belt, it's a good feeling. Each game's important. You don't know how it's going to shake out. I think we've all seen some playoff games here already that have kind of gone awry. So you just show up, prepare as best you can, and just go compete. Q. Bauer got attention last night. Everybody talked about Kluber. Carrasco's going Sunday. How much do you think maybe he's flown under the radar, and what kind of growth have you seen in him? How much better is he maybe than he gets credit for nationally? CODY ALLEN: You're talking about Carrasco? Q. Yeah. CODY ALLEN: Obviously, our staff as a whole has been very, very good this year. Even the likes of Mike Clevinger and Josh Tomlin, and Danny Salazar's given us really good starts, Ryan Merritt has given us some really good starts. Carrasco has been a guy who's been very, very consistent. Early in the year, when maybe some guys weren't pitching necessarily that well, he was very, very solid for us. But, yeah, whenever you have a front-runner like Kluber on your staff, you know, he's probably going to take a lot of the attention. I mean, Carrasco's had a heck of a year for us, and he's been very important. ANDREW MILLER: I think he threw 200 innings, and he's gotten better. Cody can speak to it more, but his career, he's really taken off the last few years. His stuff is second to none. Just like Trevor last night, we love having him on the mound. I think there's 24 guys that have confidence in that game when he takes the ball. So we're pretty lucky to have the staff we do. Q. Austin, Tito was saying the other day that you really saved their butt this year with all the injuries to the outfield, and I know you had your own knee issue to come through. How personally rewarding has this season been for you? AUSTIN JACKSON: I mean, honestly, it's been great to really get back out on the field in general. When you're sitting at home watching the postseason and rehabbing and trying to get yourself back healthy to show that you can still play, you know, it's definitely rewarding when you're able to make a team and contribute and step in when guys are hurt and just fill in that role. It's been some ups and downs this year with injuries and not playing as well as we would like, but we got through it, and it seems like each and every time Tito puts a guy in there, they've been able to step in and fill that void. I try to do the same and just contribute any way I can. Q. For Cody or Andrew, of course you're going to face the same team two or three times during a series, but is it any different in the playoffs when you know you might go out there again in the ninth tonight or on Sunday? CODY ALLEN: I mean, every team, regardless of how many times you face a team, they've done their homework. I mean, we've faced these guys in the past. It just comes down to making good pitches. I mean, just which team can execute the best. So I don't think facing certain hitters so many times throughout a series gives the hitter or a pitcher an advantage. It just comes down to just executing and making good pitches. ANDREW MILLER: I think it's fun to face the same guys over and over. That's a chess match, I think. Whether it's the same series. As a reliever, you see that. The starter's equivalent is just going through the lineup a couple times. It's fun. It's a challenge. Do you try to get them out the same way you did last time? If they get a hit off you, do you do something different or go back to that spot? That's kind of the secondary part of the game. It's fun working with the catcher and try to come up with a way to make an adjustment or stay the course or whatever it might be. Q. I have two. Andrew, just first of all, people see 30 pitches and two walks, but how much of that Headley at bat really skewed that outing last night and just how tough was that battle? And Austin, when he's done, what did you think of Kipnis' catch last night and the work he's put in in center? ANDREW MILLER: Like I said, I felt sharp. These games, a four-run lead feels like a one-run lead. It doesn't take much for the game to sway. I played with Chase, respect him as a player. He's a guy that I was friends with over there, still friends with. I'm happy to see him all the time. That was just a good at bat. You're not going to win every battle. I don't know how many pitches it was or whatnot, but I had two walks, but I probably threw 70 percent strikes last night. It is what it is. The Gardner bat, I need to be better there. I threw him a pretty good 1-1 breaking ball, I think it was, and he laid off of it. That happens. But the Headley bat, that's a credit to him. I don't think it's something -- it wasn't me being erratic. I threw some really good pitches, and he either laid off of them or wasted them. So that happens. AUSTIN JACKSON: That catch was awesome. I think it gives him a lot of confidence to be able to make a play like that on the big stage. Like I said, I think it gives him a lot of confidence, and we were all pumped up for him, to kind of see his reaction. You make a diving play like that, and like I said, on the big stage, you usually have confidence. He needs that. He hasn't had a lot of balls hit his way, but to be able to make a play like that in this situation is key. Q. For Andrew and Cody, the postseason games have evolved so much over the last few years with your team leading the way in terms of heavy bullpen usage. Is there almost a level of surprise last night when your starter makes it into the seventh inning? And how much easier is that for you guys just to have a lighter workload? ANDREW MILLER: I don't know that -- I think that we were watching the game, Trevor was pretty locked in. You want him to keep going. I think that for someone like him, he's got to earn pitching deeper into these games. It's just the reality of the situation. He did that last night. His leash ought to be longer next time. I would imagine Tito would say the same thing because of that. When there's zero hits on the board, I think you know he's going to stay in the game. But at the same time, we had a fresh bullpen and a lot of options. So you know that it's a possibility. But when he's pitching like that, I think you take your chances with him. CODY ALLEN: Yeah, I think, obviously, last year, the way things shook out, it was just kind of out of necessity, not having Carrasco, not having Salazar, with the way that everything shook out. But around baseball, I think you're seeing it, not as a knock against starting pitchers, but there's some really, really good bullpen arms out there, and teams have put together nice stables of arms that you want to use in high leverage spots. So you're going to go to your best guys in big spots. Q. Cody, can you take us through that at bat with Judge in the eighth a little bit last night. I think he fouled off a breaking ball straight back that could have done some damage. What did you think about that whole sequence of that at bat? CODY ALLEN: I thought I made some pretty good pitches. We had a pretty good plan. Berto is extremely prepared for all of those situations for every different guy. That pitch right there, it was a mistake. I was kind of lucky to get that one back. But you're just going pitch to pitch, just trying to make one good pitch after the next. Hopefully, he either hits it at somebody or an out comes. But in that same scenario, you throw a couple of good pitches, and he can still do some damage on a pitcher's pitch. You're just trying to slow the game down as much as possible and just take it one pitch at a time. Q. Andrew, this team from the outside seems to have a different confidence, a higher confidence and a different aura about it than last year. Does it feel that way inside? ANDREW MILLER: Last year the expectation wasn't -- I guess the team knew they had it in it, and that was the goal. But the fact of what we went through and that experience we had last year certainly helps build confidence. There's a lot of familiar faces. Most guys on the team were there last year. We added Austin. We added Edwin. And those guys have -- those are veteran guys that are going to contribute and have that experience, as well. But for the most part, we shouldn't have more confidence this year because of what we went through last year. We proved ourselves what we could do and how close we came. I think, for the most part, it's a young team. Everybody should be getting better. We ought to like our chances. Q. What has Jay Bruce's arrival meant to this team, just across the board? ANDREW MILLER: He's played great. He's hit the ball out of the park. He's put together good at bats. He's played great defense. You always want those guys. You can never have too many of them. He's fit in really well. The front office has done so well whenever we have guys, whether it's Joe Smith or Austin in the off-season or Boone in the off-season, whatever it may be. They make sure they do their homework. Whether they bring in the right guys or Tito makes sure it works, I don't know, but everybody seems to fit in the clubhouse seamlessly and contribute. Q. Austin, obviously, you've played in a lot of big games in the postseason in Detroit and a couple of years ago with the Cubs. Was there any point last year or during the off-season where you wondered if you would get back to this point? AUSTIN JACKSON: Yeah, absolutely. Like I said earlier, when you're at home rehabbing, you start to question whether you'll ever step foot back out on a baseball field and if you'll be able to run the same, if it you'll be able to hit the same. Basically, use my legs. That's part of my game. So it was tough, but I think watching the postseason last year, it definitely inspired me a lot to get -- you know, I started training harder because I wanted to be back in this position. It's kind of a no-brainer to come here with them showing interest in me two years in a row. It was a no-brainer for me, and I wanted to be part of this winning atmosphere. I could just tell the fight that this team had, just watching that postseason, and I wanted so bad to get back out on the field and try to get back to this position. It's worked out so far. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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