AL WILD CARD SERIES: RAYS VS GUARDIANS

October 8, 2022

Cal Quantrill

Progressive Field

Cleveland Guardians

Pregame Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: First question for Cal.

Q. Cal, is it weird to be in a position where you got to be ready to pitch tomorrow, but you don't want to pitch tomorrow?

CAL QUANTRILL: No. I'm regular rest, ready to go. I would love to take two more days.

Q. You expected this place to be jumping yesterday. Did it live up to your expectations?

CAL QUANTRILL: It did. It was awesome. 12 o'clock game on a Friday, people have work, and we still filled it up, so I thought that was awesome, proud of the Cleveland fans, and I expect today to be even better.

Q. After José's home run could you even hear anything? It seemed incredibly loud.

CAL QUANTRILL: Nope. I think they're going to have to build a statue of this guy one day. It's pretty special. That was a storybook. It couldn't have happen to a better guy too. It was pretty cool.

Q. Kevin Cash said it might be impossible to put together a pitching plan of attack for José. How would you attack him?

CAL QUANTRILL: Walk him, face the next guy (smiling).

Q. As you look at the Tampa Bay lineup are there certain points in there that you see certain challenges or how do you kind of interpret what they present?

CAL QUANTRILL: I think it's a really good lineup. It's a pretty deep lineup too. They can be difficult to plan for because, well, they're good, but they're pretty young and there's not as obvious like approach to each hitter. I think they have the ability to do different things.

I've played with a couple of 'em. Obviously Harold has the ability to hit just about anything. I played with Margot in San Diego. They've got a lot of speed in their lineup. It's a well-balanced team. A lot of guys, it feels like they can play a lot of different positions. I feel like we're kind of trying to attack baseball in a similar fashion.

Q. What do you think of baseball at noon?

CAL QUANTRILL: I mean, it's not maybe what you dream of in the Wild Card series, but we are here, we're ready to rumble. No excuses. I think it just gives us more time to celebrate if we can get 'er done.

Q. You guys, obviously youngest team in baseball. You haven't played like it, I mean, you're winning so often. But through this stretch, especially recently at the end of the season, are there things that still remind you you're such a young team, in the clubhouse especially, and what are they?

CAL QUANTRILL: Yeah, I think guys joking around, looking for Bryan Shaw, trying to figure out, like, what are we supposed to do if we win or if we lose? Like, no one's ever done it before.

I would just say the energy. Like it's hard for me to imagine another team with this kind of energy this late in the season, showing up, show up time. They keep telling us when the training room opens and guys keep showing up here before they're allowed to.

So it's impressive. It's a really fun team to be on. My coffee intake just continues to rise as the season goes.

Q. Follow-up on the time, you said they keep telling you what time the training room opens and guys show up before they're supposed to. What about yesterday and today, what time is that for these noon starts?

CAL QUANTRILL: I think we opened up at 8:30. But it wouldn't have surprised me if there was five or six guys rolling in here before 8. I just think that everyone's excited. They have done this all year long. I'll walk in and have a table of cards or dominos or whatever's getting played going. Basketball net in the corner. I think we have future NBA stars on this team. So it's been impressive.

Q. One thing that's sort of uncommon with young teams though is how much, how often you guys play mistake-free baseball too. Run the bases well, play defense well, do all the right things every day. Do you sense that too and how just how uncommon that is for such a young group that you guys are able to successfully do that on a regular basis?

CAL QUANTRILL: I'm not surprised, I think this is what we preached in spring training. I think it's, you know, I didn't come up through this system, but talking to the guys, this is what they preach at every level. This is what's expected. Tito made it very clear early on that if you wanted to stay in this lineup there were certain things that had to happen. You were going to run hard, you were going to play good D and you were going to show up every day with the same energy. I think guys took it to heart. We have a lot of good players. People want to continue to be in that lineup.

So it's been really fun to watch. And it's been fun to pitch ahead of. Knowing that contact you feel, you feel confident. I feel confident that every one of our guys deserves to be up there and will make any play they're supposed to make.

Q. Do you kind enjoy that chaos on the base paths kind of theme?

CAL QUANTRILL: As a pitcher, honestly, it gives me anxiety because it's no fun when they're doing it to you. But I can say, it's just, it poses challenges for another team. When every single guy on your team is willing to run, willing to take an extra base, willing to put pressure on it just forces you to have to make a lot of very quick decisions. It's just an added challenge in baseball.

Q. What's the vibe in the dugout? Is it different in October? Is the tension palpable?

CAL QUANTRILL: You know what, it's exciting baseball. But I think that we've made a really conscious effort of playing these games -- we want to, win or lose, we want to go out the way we've played all year long. We want to play the game the same way. If you're a guy that's top step screaming, we want you continuing to do that. If you're reserved, then we're not -- I feel like the message was just be who we are. Don't change that. We're going to win the way we win or otherwise.

So I think that it's exciting. And when José hit that home run yesterday there's certainly a little extra juice. But for the most part I think we're making an effort just to say let's just win these ball games the way that we know how.