NL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: DIAMONDBACKS VS PHILLIES

October 23, 2023

Torey Lovullo

Citizens Bank Park

Arizona Diamondbacks

Pregame 6 Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: We're going to get started with Torey Lovullo.

Q. As you look at the running game and getting going, you referenced yesterday maybe having a different approach at the plate that would allow the base stealing to happen a little more easily. Can you elaborate on what that looks like?

TOREY LOVULLO: Yeah, I centered that comment around obviously being patient at the plate, but being ready to jump on mistakes. If the pitchers are concerned in hearing the black noise over their shoulder, then we have to be ready at home plate to take advantage of some mistakes out over the plate.

Deliveries change. When you speed something up, the arm drags, takes a little bit longer to get to home plate or get lined up, get the ball to home plate accurately. So we have to be ready for those moments at the plate.

But situationally, if we are on the move, we have some plans in place that it's baseball 101. If somebody gets a big jump, take a strike, get them to second base. It's part of our DNA. We have to get our running game going. I know it energizes us.

We haven't necessarily played D-back baseball over the course of these first five games. It's one hit, one moment, one stolen base, one aggressive behavior that could lead us down the right road, so that's what we're waiting to do. That's what we've been waiting to do. We've been talking about it. We can't force it. We can't run into outs. You have to be smart about it.

The offensive part of it goes hand in hand with what you're going to do on the bases. You have to get on base, number one. Once you're there, you have to be patient as a hitter, number two. Then number three, that pitcher is going to change his delivery to get the ball to home plate. You have to be ready to jump on mistakes.

Q. In terms of Alek Thomas and what he has done, not just in this series, but what does it mean to the Diamondbacks and about their outfield to have him in place for here and also moving forward? Gives Corbin a chance to go on a corner. How does it change kind of the way you think about what you have in the outfield going forward as well?

TOREY LOVULLO: We think a lot of him and other very talented young outfielders, right? He is 23 years old. We have more coming. We have an injured one in Jake McCarthy right now. Because of that, it allowed us to move somebody like Daulton Varsho, who is an excellent player, and get us Gabi Moreno and Lourdes Gurriel. That speaks volumes about what we think of him as well as many others.

Alek has a great heartbeat. Nothing really rattles him, and he's made some quality adjustments. He will continue to make adjustments to be the best version of himself, but he's a young upstart player that is just gaining momentum, and three or four home runs later in the postseason at 23 years old, it's something that he's worked hard to do.

So it doesn't surprise us. We know what he is capable of doing, but I want him to continue to get even better.

Q. Just a quick follow-up on that, the defensive metrics love him. I think he was the highest rated of your outfielders this year. Does it really come down to his offense developing for him to claim that role for you, do you think?

TOREY LOVULLO: I think at one point in time I would be able to validate that thought, but for right now he's our guy in center field, and he is proving that. His at-bats have been very consistent. As we're moving forward, I think it's his spot, but this is a crazy game. He has to continue to grow and learn.

But the defensive metrics, yes, I will agree with you. Early on at some points in time in his career when he wasn't necessarily consistent offensively, we knew what he offered us defensively. He was playing every day because of what he offered defensively and offensively, and I think they're catching up to one another, and we need that to continue.

Q. It seemed like the last three or four innings of Game 4, something was clicking for you guys offensively getting a lot of guys on base. Did you see anything different in your at-bats, in your approach in those couple of innings compared to the rest of the series?

TOREY LOVULLO: Yeah, I think we were checking off the secondary stuff that was out of the zone. They're clearly working that top bar against us, and we just have to see the ball down and get it in the box. When we do that, we're a very capable team.

We've got to find a way to crack the code, right? They've got Wheeler and Nola, and they've muscled their way through us. So we're very respectful of their ability, but that's a puzzle that we have to figure out today. We're going to figure it out. We're going to do our absolute best to check off certain pitches, certain counts, wait for the ones that we want, maybe get things to turn around a little bit and put a little bit more pressure on him so that we're going to hit some mistakes that we're waiting for.

They haven't made a lot of them, but we're determined to find every mistake that's made and take advantage of it.

Q. Quick follow-up on Corbin specifically. I think he referenced making some adjustments out of the last game, and he had some solid contact, even if the results weren't necessarily there. Did you see him having better at-bats in Game 5 than maybe in the first four games of this series?

TOREY LOVULLO: Yeah, I did. It seems like they're just one step ahead of him. They pitch him in, and he's looking away. He's looking away, they pitch him in. And that's just the game of cat-and-mouse. That's what's so exhausting by the end of the day that makes you either love or hate this game, right? I think it's a challenge to figure out that part of the puzzle.

So I think the Phillies have just been pitching him very tough and have been unpredictable and they're landing their pitches.

I just want Corbin to get the mistake and hammer it. I think that ball into right center field the other day was that pure swing, barrelled it up. Unfortunately, it was the biggest part of our ballpark. It wasn't out. But I think Corbin is a feel guy. Once he gets that feeling, he can be very, very -- it can be a great run for him. So we'll see.

Q. Kyle Schwarber is a great power hitter, but he is not impossible to pitch to as evidenced by a .197 regular season batting average. What's making him virtually impossible to pitch to this postseason and especially in the series?

TOREY LOVULLO: We've had a lot of conversation about that. He's not a .197 hitter. I know that. I don't know what happened to him this year. I only saw a handful of at-bats. He has an unbelievable eye and knows the strike zone. I think he just sold out to maybe slugging and trying to hit home runs.

At a certain point during the year where you can't recover your average, you're just going to stick with what is getting you through the year. And I don't know, how many home run did he hit? 40-plus? So I think he probably sold out to the long ball, but I know he is very capable of being a good hitter.

For me it's limited movement, sees the baseball. And it is unbelievable that every mistake that we make, it's not a single or a roll-over or a weakly hit ball. It's going out of the ballpark. We just can't make mistakes to him right now. That's what happens when a Major League hitter gets locked in.

I don't know how to stop him. We just can't make mistakes. We know there's holes in there. Every hitter has a hole or two. We just can't get it to the right spot at the right time, but we're going to try like hell today to do that.

Q. It seems like that third time through the order has been a bit of a struggle for you guys. You've had some starters that you left in that struggled in that spot, some relievers that have come in who have also struggled there. Just curious how your thinking on how to handle that has evolved over the course of the series?

TOREY LOVULLO: Yeah, I see that stuff too, right? Those are conversations that we have. It would be nice to be out to a 7-0 lead, and you don't have to worry about that, right, until there's some damage out there and runners on base. But it just seems like every game that we've played through the month of September and beyond to this day, I have had to be very careful about that third time through the order. It is throwing people off considerably.

What's great is I leave somebody in, and he gets hit, and they're, like, why are you leaving him in? I take somebody out before he gets hit, and they say, you're crazy for taking him out. So this is the balance that I am trying to strike perfectly by staying ahead of it and having a good instinct for when, why, and how I'm doing something.

So it's a challenge. Right now at this point in time, it's the part of the job that's giving me the most anxiety, paying attention to what's happening inside of the game for the third at-bat. Hitters are good at this level. Teams are good at this level, and now you add in a little bit more that they're the best teams with the best hitters. They get even better.

I'll be mindful of it, and I will pay attention to every swing that every player takes leading up to those third and fourth at-bats.

Q. One other one real quick. You've talked a lot about how you didn't really need to deliver a message to your players in some of the big moments. Does that change at all today with your first real do-or-die game that you have played this postseason?

TOREY LOVULLO: No. I think this team is just internally motivated. I talked about an external motivation the other day. It seemed to catch a little wind. I didn't mean for it to get that way, but our team is extremely focused and centered on coming here and playing our best baseball game. We can't look past Game 7. As I've said, anything can happen in Game 7. It's wide open. It's a crap shoot.

Getting there is really important, so we have that all-in mentality. We didn't come cross-country to get our asses kicked. We came here to play our best baseball game, and our guys will be ready to go.

Q. Just from a baseball standpoint, can you articulate the flexibility and athleticism required when you think about Nola? He has this curveball too and also the swing-and-miss changeup. How difficult is it to game plan against someone like that?

TOREY LOVULLO: Yeah, he kind of mirrors Merrill Kelly. I feel like they're very similar with their stuff, shape, and the ability to get swing and miss with three or four different types of secondary pitches.

Yeah, like Schwarber is locked in at the plate right now, I think Nola and Wheeler are locked in on the mound. It's the hard work that they're putting in behind the scenes. I'm watching as best as I can as he is throwing a bullpen three days ago down in the right field corner. And I'm standing in our dugout looking down there, and I'm watching him work on things in a dry, no ball situation, and I'm thinking, this is how locked in this guy is. He is paying attention to certain things, working on certain things to duplicate his delivery and make sure he is in the right spot with his body to make those type of pitches.

It's a challenge to be a pitcher at this level right now because everything that you throw, do -- you know, he went and got his cup of coffee this morning. It's, like, you get game planned, and he is one click ahead of it, and it doesn't surprise me because I watch what he did in the bullpen from across the field the other day.

Q. Can you go over the lineup change you guys made with swapping Pavin for Pham?

TOREY LOVULLO: Tommy Pham is Tommy Pham, right? He's a professional hitter. Even though he's been grinding for the past four or five games, I still feel like he's very capable of just taking one swing and getting on that run.

We're talking about with Corbin, right? I want him to step out of the lineup, catch his breath, watch through a different lens. Maybe match him up in a great situation in Game 5, which never happened. I also wanted to give Pavin a chance, who was swinging a very hot bat. I was rolling the dice. It didn't work out.

Tommy is back in there. I want to stay true to my word that I was going to give him a little bit of a blow and see what he could do the next time around. We have to be versatile and make adjustments, and this is just how it landed. I got a lot of information that says that Tommy should have a good day today.

Q. On the third time through the order stuff, I know Merrill like everyone else has a little dropoff there, but less so than some other guys.

TOREY LOVULLO: Yeah.

Q. Is that something that you think is attributable to how many pitches he has, and does that kind of change how you operate with him the third time through the order compared to some other guys?

TOREY LOVULLO: Yeah. Those are some of the finer points that I'm looking at. He can go fastball, cutter, changeup first time around. He can add in a slider the second time around. All of a sudden he pulls a curveball out, and he just starts adding more ingredients into his outing through the course of the outing.

Now, I don't want to give away the game plan. I have a really good idea of what is going to happen, but I think he's very versatile. You might not get a look at a pitch or two until your third time, and I think that's -- that helps him be creative in navigating that third time through the lineup for sure.