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NL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: NATIONALS VS CARDINALS

October 11, 2019

Mike Shildt

St. Louis, Missouri - postgame 1

Nationals - 2, Cardinals - 0

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Just your thoughts on how Miles pitched tonight?
MIKE SHILDT: Miles was great. I thought he threw the ball very, very well. The one decision with Gomes, because he made such good pitches to Zimmerman and then to Taylor and then looked to make quality pitches to Gomes, made him pay for a ball up. We could have done something about it, taken it out of his hands. Of course it turns the lineup over a little bit. But outside of that he was tremendous. Scattered a few hits but that's what he did is scattered hits.

But in command of his pitches, ball was going where he wanted to, pitched six innings gave up one run against a good offensive club, gave us more than a chance. I thought he was terrific.

Q. To follow-up on your comment about Gomes, can you describe in that situation why you do pitch to him and then later in the game you do decide to issue the intentional walk?
MIKE SHILDT: Yeah, so obviously we thought about doing the intentional walk in the 2nd, but like I said he was crisp against Zimmerman, really good pitches with Taylor. And then we felt good about him being able to execute. And he got behind in the count, which he did he got down 1-0, maybe doing something with Gomes at that point. Then having Sánchez lead off the next inning, which kind of keeps potentially Rendon and Soto out of the mix, he just didn't, wasn't able to make a pitch. Later in the game once Gomes got a couple hits it's pretty clear that that matchup's not favorable for Miles and we put him on.

Q. Right now obviously there's a lot of frustration with the offense but does the recent roller coaster offensively for your team, both goods and bads, give some hope that this is still a series involving your offense?
MIKE SHILDT: Oh, yeah, I mean there's complete hope. We had a really good offensive club. Sánchez was really good tonight. Not a lot out there that we saw, that I saw that was in the middle, really changed speeds, did a terrific job. It's interesting, it's baseball, it's one of the reasons we love it. We scored 13 in an elimination game and came right back and the guy threw a great game. But there's no, nothing but optimism about all our players and our offense for sure. We'll be ready to go tomorrow.

Q. There's been so much talk about the big three that the Nationals can put out there and their rotation but does what Aníbal did tonight just remind us, hey, they have got more than just the big three?
MIKE SHILDT: Yeah, yeah, this guy's an accomplished pitcher in this league and has done a nice job for their club. Did a nice job against the Dodgers. That's why before the game when we had our little gathering here people were talking about the big three and I said hey, we're going to respect them, we're familiar with them but we got a guy tonight that we got to contend with, and not overlook him. And we didn't. He was just really good, made a lot of quality pitches and didn't give us a lot we could put good swings on.

Q. Kendrick is so good against left-handed pitching but also really good against right-handed pitching. What led to taking Miller out and bringing in Brebbia?
MIKE SHILDT: Just in that spot, Miller was great, he got his guy in Soto. It's not a that we can't go with Miller against righties, we just felt at that moment with the runners on base and the way the game was going that our, like you said, he's really good against lefties, he's a good hitter, so that's the thing about it. You look at matchups we took our absolute best matchup we felt was on the table to be able to hold it at a one-run game. Nothing against Andrew, he threw the ball great, got his guy in Soto, we just went to Brebbia to clear the table.

Q. Miles pitched out of that jam with Soto, big pitch to get him to ground out to end the inning. Looked like they had a little maybe exchange on the way off the field. Did you happen to see that at all?
MIKE SHILDT: I didn't notice that.

Q. When you get to this point in the season is there a lot you can do adjustment-wise with the offense or are you just sort of looking at the team that you have and trying to put them in the best position to win at this point?
MIKE SHILDT: I'm always going to put our team in the best position to win.

Q. I just mean in terms of is there a lot you can do adjustment-wise at this point in the season with the offense or do you know what you have and this is sort of game plan you're sort of steering through at this point?
MIKE SHILDT: I think I understand the question. Are you saying should we did a lineup change.

Q. How much can you do directly to sort of --
MIKE SHILDT: I can do anything within reason with our roster to put our lineup out. I just, I find the question -- I understand the question, but I find it interesting when essentially the same lineup just scored 13 runs. Essentially the same lineup because I got these questions, which again I don't mind answering the question, but I'm going to give a good reason for it, because I got a similar question before an elimination game at the end of the season against Chicago and we scored nine runs. I'm not going to be knee-jerk with one game when we just got through winning a series. And we have gotten to this point with the group that we have, with guys that have taken good at-bats. So don't know how else to further answer that one.

Q. The way your team has been resilient all year long, even if like Tommy gets a base hit there, great play by Zimmerman, but do you feel like you're just kind of a hit --
MIKE SHILDT: I had full confidence that we were going to be all right and come back and figure out a way to win that game, I really did. Guys made good pitches, we took our at-bats. And Tommy, it was a great play by Zimmerman, just weren't able to scratch through.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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