NL WILD CARD SERIES: PHILLIES VS CARDINALS

October 7, 2022

Oliver Marmol

Busch Stadium

St. Louis Cardinals

Pregame Press Conference

Q. Could you just talk about why Q won your trust and what you learned about him as a competitor when you started managing? A lot of people say you don't truly know a guy until you're around him every day. What did you learn about his competitiveness?

OLIVER MARMOL: That was the big driver in this was his competitive nature. Every pitch is meaningful to him. If you just watch all of his starts, which you guys have, he doesn't take a pitch off. That was a big part of it. We can trust him. He's a pro about how he goes about his business. And he's doing a really nice job. So at the end of the day, we trust him with Game 1.

Q. There has not been a lineup officially posted yet. How much of it are you in a position to talk about at this moment?

OLIVER MARMOL: We haven't posted it, no.

Q. Could you describe your thoughts as you go through how you lead off? Do you have a pretty good idea of who your 3-4 hitters are, but how you have kind of looked at the last month in that lead off spot taking shape?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yeah. We've mixed and matched quite a bit throughout the course of the year in the lead off spot just to keep it super simple. We felt pretty good about the at-bats he's been taking. Hitting the ball hard. Taking his walks. It could easily be 1-0 after pitch number one. So I like it.

Q. Just like the arc of new season, how that's gone, four months ago?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yeah. To his credit, he had a really slow start and speaks a lot to just his character and his approach to the game. Slow start, went back, put his work in. Then that All Star break took it serious and took those days to work on stuff and then came back and started putting together a pretty good year, but his overall personality lends itself well to this game. You're going to struggle. You're going to have ups and downs, and he's a guy that keeps it light. To his credit, put together a really good second half. And we trust him in that one spot today.

Q. There was a point in the season where we asked you a lot about success against left-handed pitchers versus the lineup success against right. How has Noot, Donovan, how have those young guys balanced that out over the course of the season?

OLIVER MARMOL: That's a good question, exactly right. We were dumping on lefties quite a bit throughout the course of the year. Not so much the righties, but the additions of the Donovans, the Noots. They got really good at-bats right off, were able to balance that out regardless of anytime you saw a lefty come in in a three-game set. We got pretty excited about it because we knew what we were capable of doing against them, but the reality is once we added those guys, they started contributing. It really didn't matter left or right. We felt pretty good about our lineup.

Q. How do you all go into this game in preparation for Wheeler when he's kind of been building over the last month, kind of coming back off an injury. I know you expect him to be full go. What kind of challenges does that present?

OLIVER MARMOL: No different than any other. He's a good pitcher, knows what gives him success. We'll have a really good game tonight against each one of our guys. We'll prepare no different than any other game. Our guys feel pretty good about their individual game plans, and we'll take our best shot.

Q. Over the second half, we've seen you put Noot on, especially with Dylan against right-hand pitching. Those look better over the last couple weeks of the season. Did you see warrant maybe switching away and incorporating him regardless of handedness?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yes. We did quite a bit of it where he didn't see a right-hander for a while. Our goal down the stretch especially after clinching was to give him as much from that left side as possible, and he took some better swings. It looked better. And we're going to give him a shot. So, yeah.

Q. How much is that swayed by defense?

OLIVER MARMOL: It is swayed by defense. It's also no one else on the other side of it from a left-hand at-bat really living on fire. The lack of defense. So yeah, we'll stick with Dylan, and we feel good about it.

Q. How does your bullpen shake out in your 26-man roster?

OLIVER MARMOL: We feel good about our pen. Obviously we'll have the remaining starters in there as well that we can go to from the left side. We've discussed it. We went with Thompson, and Matz will be in there as well. So yeah, we feel good about the versatility of our pen.

Q. And the right side?

OLIVER MARMOL: Do you want me to name all of them?

Q. Well, other than the starters going in. Five or six?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yeah. The ones you would expect on the right side, yeah. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Q. But Jordan made it?

OLIVER MARMOL: Hicks?

Q. Yeah.

OLIVER MARMOL: And Hels is healthy. So both of those are on there.

Q. What is the difference for you as far as anxiety, nerves a year ago as bench coach one game back against the Dodgers compared to today?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yeah. I was just talking to someone in the office about it. I'm sure it'll switch over here in a little bit. It feels no different than a regular season game at the moment. Even last night as I was going to bed, I thought I'd be kind of racing through different situations. But the reality is our staff feels really prepped. And at the moment it feels no different. So I'm sure at some point that'll switch over, but not yet.

Q. Did it switch over last year before the Dodgers game?

OLIVER MARMOL: Um, no. I mean, a little bit at first pitch just because you're waiting to see like what's about to happen, you know, but not more than -- not a whole lot more than usual. And the reality is I feel like the last week or so just with everything going on here and the crowds, it's been playoff baseball as far as just the overall environment and the excitement. So to this point, it feels pretty normal. Yeah.

Q. You talked about the preparation for you managing your first playoff game. Is there anybody you've talked to to prepare for this moment?

OLIVER MARMOL: I did not, no. I like keeping everything the same, so I'm approaching this game no different than any other game. We feel good about our process and our preparation and just the way we go about it leading into it, which is the game and how we do it is you don't have to change anything when everyone feels like the environment or the stakes are higher. So I did not. I went about my process the way I usually do. We're going to take our best shot.

Q. What did you take out of what Tommy Edman did in that wild card game last year? You had a great game. Also what kind couple days of maybe rest do for him in a setting like this?

OLIVER MARMOL: The couple days of rest are big. He's a player that's going to -- he's even keel. The environment is not going to bother him one way or another regardless of how playoff baseball is. He's an even-keel dude. Those two days of rest were big for him. One, because he's gone hard all year for us. But being able to address everything with his lower half that he felt could help him with his swing, we saw a little bit of that that last game where he felt like he stayed through the ball a little better. So hopefully that carries out into today as well.

Q. How easy did Albert make it for you when he was struggling against righties, you played the percentages. You played the numbers. But then when he started hitting, he started hitting everybody. So then there was no decision. So how easy did he make it the two halves of the season?

OLIVER MARMOL: No, I loved it. It made life a lot easier when you're sitting there and you're pinch-hitting for a future Hall-of-Famer. One of the best hitters to every play this game with a rookie, it doesn't always feel right. We had to play the match up a lot early on. And then he started taking at-bats, taking good approaches against righties and lefties, which made life easier. He's one of the hottest hitters in the big league right now, so looking forward to it.

Q. Made your decision a little bit easier?

OLIVER MARMOL: Yes. Love him for that.

Q. With that playoff atmosphere you talked about over the last few days, how have you seen the veterans and youth of your team kind of mold together to get ready for today?

OLIVER MARMOL: I think that's one of the things that gives us an edge is the guys that are in that clubhouse have experienced this before at the highest stage and won before. When you get to draw from your young players, you get to draw from Albert and Yadi and Waino who have been here before, it's helpful, because it anchors you into the things that matter. You don't get distracted. And I think that's an edge going into this playoff run, for sure.