NL WILD CARD SERIES: PADRES VS METS

October 8, 2022

Joe Musgrove

Citi Field

San Diego Padres

Pregame Press Conference

Q. Joe, it's been a while since you've been in postseason play. How much are you looking forward to making your first postseason start?

JOE MUSGROVE: I'm really excited. My last postseason experience, obviously I was out of the bullpen. I was a rookie at the time too, so a lot of nerves, a lot of unknowns, a little bit of fear of being the guy that didn't get the job done.

I've grown a lot since then. I've experienced a lot since then. I'm in a different role now. So I'm extremely excited.

I feel really prepared. I like where I'm at physically, delivery-wise. Done a lot of homework over the past week and a half on these guys, so I know what I want to do. It just ultimately comes down to execution. Excited to get out there and see what I can do.

Q. If you are starting tomorrow, it will be a deciding game, a lot of adrenaline comes with it. How do you plan on controlling it or do you embrace it? How do you handle that?

JOE MUSGROVE: You can't avoid it. It's going to be there. The nerves are there regardless of the start. Could be Opening Day. Could be mid-June. Could be a postseason game. I always feel the nerves and the anxiety and the anxiousness getting ready for a start.

A lot of it is just the preparation leading up to the first pitch. There's all kinds of unknown and a little fear of what could go wrong and things don't feel right on a certain day.

You kind of rely on the compounding effect of the hard work and the trust, and you go out there, and you just compete with everything you've got, and you kind of let the chips fall where they may.

Q. Whether you get to do it or it gets done tonight, what would it mean to you to bring postseason baseball back to the city of San Diego?

JOE MUSGROVE: It would mean a lot. Obviously we want to get a little further than the Wild Card, but you've got to take what's in front of you for what it is, and you've got to go one game at a time.

For me, being the guy that would be pitching that third game should it get there, I almost have to prepare like, if we lose tonight, we'll be going tomorrow. If we don't, we'll cross that bridge when we get there when it comes to the Dodgers, but my focus is solely on the Mets right now and getting through this series.

Q. Along those lines, Joe, right now it's absolutely as if you're pitching tomorrow, but how do you envision it would go throughout the night?

JOE MUSGROVE: Tonight?

Q. Yeah.

JOE MUSGROVE: I don't know, man. Two really good arms going up against each other tonight. Blake's been just as good as anybody down this stretch of the season, and his tendency throughout the course of his career is to get stronger as the year goes on and really finish strong and be a presence in the postseason.

I know he's ready for this game. We've been talking about it since day one of Spring Training. So I expect him to go out there and give it everything he has.

Obviously our offense with the momentum we got going last night off another really good arm, I think they feel a little more confident going into tonight.

So we'll see, but I can't sit here and have the expectations of we're going to go out there and win tonight and I'm not going to have to go worry about tomorrow and start focusing on the Dodgers. I have to focus on what's right in front of me, and that's the Mets right now.

Q. Do you think the gap between postseasons for you has made you appreciate this a little bit more?

JOE MUSGROVE: Absolutely. Being in Houston, some of the guys I played with on that team and, like I said, my rookie year, there was so much experience and knowledge of the game. My catcher at the time was Brian McCann, who had been one of the best in the game at the time and caught some of the best, so I got to learn a lot from him.

Some of the things that he told me and talked to me about during that postseason, I wasn't able to grasp or understand until a few years later in Pittsburgh, and I started realizing some of these things that he was telling me about finding your identity as a pitcher and really understanding yourself and how much more the game opens up and how much freer you feel when you know what kind of pitcher you are and what you like to do.

So I've really held onto that, that one tip he gave me, and it's really helped my career take off. So keeping those things in the back of my mind and having that long layoff and being able to get back in there now and putting some of those things to use and see what I can do, I'm really excited about it.

Q. You said you've been doing your homework on the Mets the last week and a half. You didn't know you would be playing these guys. How did that process go in terms of studying different teams? This was the most likely matchup, but did you study these guys -- how did that all go?

JOE MUSGROVE: Not these guys more so than anybody else. We'd just seen the Cardinals recently. It was mainly Mets and Braves I was looking at. I was trying to finish out my season strong. I'd seen the Giants a ton. So the preparation for that game was a little bit easier.

As soon as that game ended, I've been going over these two lineups for quite some time now.

Q. Joe, if you throw tomorrow in an elimination game, how do you mentally prepare for that? You've obviously pitched in big games, but being the starter in an elimination game, how do you get set for that?

JOE MUSGROVE: I think, like I said, the game planning and the studying, knowing what you want to do out there, the preparation work is what I think ultimately frees you up out there.

When it comes down to it, we're all in the same boat. Everyone is going out there competing. No one knows what's going to show up, what kind of person is going to be there or the results they're going to get. You fall back on the hard work and the training and the preparation and the video work. You rely on all those things, and you go out there, and you let your instincts kick in.

The professional athlete in you is going to come out and the competitor in you is going to come out. So you get as prepared as you can, and you go out there and just give it everything you've got.

Q. I was wondering what this is like for you. You're obviously very excited to pitch tomorrow, but on the other hand, you hope you don't. Have you ever gone through something like that before, and how do you handle that? How do you sort of handle those two differing emotions?

JOE MUSGROVE: Yeah, like I said, I'm not even thinking about the next series. We've got to get by these guys first. My sole focus is on the Mets.

I've never been in a situation where I might throw tomorrow, I might throw against a completely different team in two, three days. I haven't been through that before.

I've seen the Dodgers enough this year to have an idea of how I want to attack them. If we get past this series and get on to them, the work should be minimal. I'm not overly concerned about not having enough time to prepare for those guys. I've seen them enough to know how to go at them.

Q. Joe, you've talked ad nauseam about being a fan, watching the Padres for a while. Being in the postseason now, have you been able to slip back into that I'm watching my Padres in the playoff game right now and kind of be a fan a little bit?

JOE MUSGROVE: It's fun, but I don't really see it that way. It's exciting, and I relate to the fans a little bit when it comes down to these big games of being a fan in the stands or being upset and being let down and the team not making it as far as we have this year.

I realize all those things, but when it comes down to it, you can't play with the emotions and all that stuff in the back of your mind. I've got a job to do, and I'm going to do what I need to do to go out there and get it done.

Q. You talked last week about switching up your warmup routine. How did you arrive at that, and how different is it from anything you've done in the past?

JOE MUSGROVE: I don't know. A lot of what I do is kind of trial and error. Throughout the course of the season, I guess that was my last opportunity to give something a shot before we get into the postseason. You don't really have the luxury of trying and failing in the postseason.

So it's something I talked about with Ruben as far as like warming up and the way that I'm warming up, the amount of throws I'm taking and how we're going about getting to the actual first pitch of the game.

A lot of the routine's the same as far as preparation and getting ready, but when it comes to the actual throwing before the game, we switched things up a little bit, and I felt good with it. I've continued to carry that routine throughout this week and make sure those feelings are maintained in there and I'm not missing out on something that needs to be ready for the game.

Ultimately when it comes down to it and you get on the mound, I think everybody is able to tap into that competitive spirit, I guess, and go out there and just compete. Your stuff always sharpens up a little bit when you get out in the game. So I never put too much importance on execution or location in the bullpen. It's mainly just a time for me to get my body warmed up and mentally start preparing and go through the first couple hitters of the game.

I know in this atmosphere the first inning is the biggest inning. You get those nerves out of the way and get those first three guys out and move on, and you can start getting into the groove a little bit. A lot of importance on the first inning tomorrow.

Q. Would you have gone ahead and still done that if you needed to face the Giants?

JOE MUSGROVE: Yeah, probably, mainly because I didn't feel very consistent with the start of the games with the routine I had. So I wanted to try something new, and I just kind of went for it, and it worked out.

Q. You played with Josh Bell for a long time, and you talked about how hard he works. What was that moment like last night when he hit that homer?

JOE MUSGROVE: Thrilled for the team, but extremely excited for him. We talked a lot about the days in Pittsburgh about what it would be like to play together in a postseason and the level of excitement. I know there was probably some tough decisions for Bob to make yesterday with setting the lineup and who he wanted to go out of the gate starting and who he wanted to have off the bench.

I'm extremely happy for Josh. I think he's a guy that's prepared for this moment for a long time. He gets the opportunity and shows up right away, and that first at-bat was pretty cool.