MLB WINTER MEETINGS

December 4, 2023

Dave Martinez

Washington Nationals

Press Conference

Q. At the end of year you were talking about potential for some changes in your coaching staff and we saw what you did. Can you talk through what the decision-making process was there.

DAVE MARTINEZ: Yeah, obviously it was a tough decision. Very close to all those guys. I'm going to miss 'em. But I thought it was an opportunity being where we're headed to bring some fresh guys in and some guys that are very well capable of coaching and coach young players. So I decided to make that change.

Miguel Cairo is going to be the bench coach. Known him for years. He was a bench coach with Tony. So he learned a lot over there with them. I can't say enough about him. He's a baseball rat. Knows the game very well. He knows all aspects of the game. He's done a lot in his career.

As you know, we all know Parra. It's just a matter of whether Parra was going to want to do it, and he committed to being a full-time coach. But he'll bring a lot to our outfielders and our base running that we want to get better at.

Ricky, who was with us last year, who did a great job with CJ Abrams, Cande, Cande loved him, so he gets the opportunity to coach third base.

So the other two guys, two main guys in Hickey and DC who I wanted to keep, I love those guys. Those guys work really hard, players really bought into what they want to do. They have gotten better, so they will be back.

Q. How do you want the familiarity that the players have with some of these new coach -- how do you think that can benefit the team?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I think, one, Parra was around quite a bit. So he knows these guys. Ricky's known these guys as well. The new guys, Miguel, and I talked to Miguel the other day, via Zoom, because he's managing in Venezuela, he's going to start reaching out. He wants to get to know the guys a little bit before he comes to Spring Training. So he's going to start reaching out to guys and introduce himself.

But I think these guys are well capable of doing the job. As you know, I don't micromanage these guys. These guys are going to coach. They're an extension of my voice, but they're going to be allowed to do what they do. I've known these guys for years. I've known them as players, and I know them as a person as well. And they're all in. They're eager to get going. And we've been Zooming already about different things, and they're ready to go.

Q. You also have Chris Johnson too. What's your familiarity with him and what's he bring to your staff?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I've known his dad, but he's so far in his young career, he's brought a lot. I heard nothing but great things about him. I interviewed him, talked to him. He knows a lot about hitting. I think he's going to complement our team really well and help our kids out a lot.

Q. You mentioned offensively wanting to see more power from this team. Do you think that's something that's going to come from what you already have, or do you feel like that's something you're going to address this winter from outside?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I think it's going to be both. I really do. As you can see, some of our young players started getting it towards the end there. I think there's still a lot more out of CJ, out of Keibert and some of our younger guys.

We do have some young players that are coming that I think will supply some power as well. I think this winter we're going to look elsewhere too to see if we can maybe fill some gaps that we need to fill. We're in a tough situation because we want to bring -- we want to get our young guys up here and we don't want to take too many spots away from those guys when they're ready, but yet we got to compete at the Big League level.

So we'll look at all avenues and all aspects and see what we can do.

Q. At these early stages of the off-season, who do you envision, the vacancy at first base?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Right now we got Joey that can play first base. It's kind of early, so we're going to look at all different avenues and see. We also got an opening at third base. Kieboom has done well so far in winter ball. So we're going to keep an eye on that.

But there's always room for improvement, as we all know. So I can tell you something, and you guys know this as well, Riz does not like losing. I do not like losing. So we're going to do the best we can to fill a competitive team.

Q. Joey last year you had at DH but also said I want to play first base. Do you want to still have him at DH or see him play first base more?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I want to see him do a little bit of both, I really do. I want to see him play some more first base. We are pretty good about masking his -- he had a knee issue so we wanted to keep him healthy. The biggest thing was to keep him on field, keep him hitting.

So hopefully this year he comes ready to go. I know he's doing a lot of agility stuff, he looks good so far. So I told him, I said -- and he even mentioned to me about playing some outfield too as well. He loves playing left field. So we'll see what kind of shape he comes into Spring Training, and then we'll go from there.

Q. There's been a lot of speculation this winter, as you're aware, about Juan Soto possibly getting traded. What was your?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Are we going to get him? (Smiling) I'll take him back.

Q. What was your experience managing him for five years?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I love him. I said this since I've known the kid. I love him. He's a competitor. He's one of the purest hitters in the game. He's a game changer. I've always wished him the best. Whoever does get him, if San Diego decides to keep him, they know they got a good one. But wherever he ends up, they're going to get a good player.

Q. What was it like going through that pre-trade and then it going down?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Looking at it now? I think we did all right. Yeah. But building up to that, you just don't know. We just knew what we had at hand. I look at CJ, what he's done, I look at James Wood who is coming up, all these young players that we got for him, we're doing okay.

Q. Do you have any doubt that he can handle a place like New York?

DAVE MARTINEZ: No.

Q. Why?

DAVE MARTINEZ: He loves to play the game of baseball. I tell you a story, first time I ever met him, I just asked him, I said, hey, what motivates you, what drives you to be? And the first thing he says is, I love baseball. That's all I want to do.

So he'll handle it very well.

Q. Back to Joey, he has said and you said in the past that he feels more engaged when he plays in the field. Do you feel like that's a reason to play him at first or in the outfield even moving forward?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Look, he did really well. I know he wanted to play more of a position. I had to explain to him that DH is a position, and it's a big position because we needed him to hit.

But I will look at the options, and we'll get him out there to play some first base more this year just to keep him engaged a little bit.

But I thought he did a heck of a job. I know he didn't like it at first, but towards the end he actually accepted it a lot better. I didn't hear any griping towards the end about not playing first base or outfield. But, man, he can hit though. We need him to hit.

Q. The conversation is so much about maximizing every pitch, getting a path to 27 outs. But now some of the things we're seeing, innings still means a lot. As a manager, what does innings mean to you and do you value that any differently, do you look at it differently than you did in recent years?

DAVE MARTINEZ: No. Hey, look, I could go back to 2019 and the pitching staff that we had. Those guys eight innings and we won because of our pitching staff. They kept us in ball games. I always say the same thing to our young guys: If you can give us 18 to 20 outs as a starter, we're going to do big things.

I still believe that. I know the game's changed a little bit, but our starting pitchers need to give us some innings.

Q. Along those lines, Corbin, obviously ERA was not where you wanted it to be, but he gave you 180 innings. How much do you value him and sort of what he lets you do with everyone else, like that idea of an old-school innings eater?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Hey, look, I seen a lot of upside last year with Corbin. The record doesn't indicate, I know his ERA didn't indicate it. But this guy takes the ball every five days, doesn't complain, and he gives us the innings we need. We were able to develop our younger players because he could do the things that he did and he gives our bullpen a breather.

So when I look back at some of the past year, it typically is one inning where he kind of loses things. If we can get him to get rid of that one winning, he's going to do big things for us, he really is.

I know that he's working hard already. He's down in Florida, so hopefully he comes back and he has a year that we know he's capable of having, the year that he gave us in 2019.

Q. Upgrading starting pitching, you go out with the rotations you have from last year and stick with that, what's the balance of letting your young guys learn and grow versus bringing in some veterans? How do you see that?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Like I said before, Riz, he's a competitor and he wants to win games. We could add another starting pitcher in that mix. But it will definitely help us develop our younger players, younger pitchers as well.

But I want to see our young pitchers pitch. Some of these guys got a year under their belts, some of them have three quarters of a year under their belt. I want to see what they can do coming out of Spring Training.

As you know, we did some different things as far as limiting their innings, we went it to a six-man rotation to keep them fresh, knowing that, hey, we're trying to take care of them for the future.

So I want to see them grow, though. I want to see them compete. So this to me is going to be an interesting Spring Training to see how they bounce back from last year, because a lot of them did pitch a lot. We had some guys that were injured before, and they made it through last year. So this year will be critical. But, yeah, I'll take a good quality starter anytime.

Q. Do you envision Trevor Williams in your rotation, or would there be a chance you would look to maybe get more from him?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Right now, Trevor's -- he's our fourth, fifth start. We'll see what transpires over the winter.

Q. From the results you saw from the six-man rotation, how much are you considering implementing that again?

DAVE MARTINEZ: We already talked about it. I looked at the schedule, fortunately we got a lot of days off in the beginning. We do have a couple of stretches where we play 17 in a row, 15 in a row. So we might incorporate a six-man rotation during that time.

Q. What's a favorite story you have of a time you played a hunch, maybe went against the book with a move and it paid off?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Did you watch the World Series in 2019? (Laughing). Yeah, I mean, I can't just go back and name one. There was a lot of hunches.

I'll tell you what was crazy, you guys probably thought I was crazy, but when we walked Muncy and we kind of walked the winning run. But I was not going to let that guy beat us again. So it worked out.

Q. You mentioned Carter playing this winter. Has Victor been able to play winter ball?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Victor has not played yet. I think his plans are to play. He's feeling a lot better. I know he's taking some swings. But I think he definitely wants to play some games before he gets to Spring Training.

Q. Do you, as things stand now, see him as a center fielder, or is that up in the air?

DAVE MARTINEZ: It's all going to depend on his health. I'm glad that he'll be back. We definitely could use him.

Q. You have a lot of right-handed outfielders now?

DAVE MARTINEZ: You must have read my mind. We need a left-handed bat.

Q. When you look at left-handed bats, would you prefer that to be in the outfield or see it somewhere else, like DH or first base?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I would like to get a left-handed hitting outfielder. I'll take anyone, but to have outfielder would be great.

Q. What do you hope the identity of this team is next season?

DAVE MARTINEZ: You know what, I just want them to compete. We saw a lot of growth last year, especially in our younger players. I want them to be hungry and be ready.

We're close. We really are. These guys, they feel like they can do some special things. Our core young guys have -- towards the end of the year, they started getting it. So I want 'em to build off of that and be ready to go in Spring Training.

Q. When you say you guys are close, what still needs to be checked off?

DAVE MARTINEZ: We still got some pieces that we need to add. When I say that, we still got a lot of young kids that are coming up that could possibly help us, the Brady Houses, the Wood, even Hassell, Lipscomb, which I saw playing in the fall league. Those guys are coming. The future's bright here, it really is. I'm excited about it.

Q. Do you think all those kids will be at Big League Camp, and what can they get from that experience?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I hope they're all in Big League Camp because I want to see 'em play. They will definitely get a lot. The biggest thing is really getting to know them and work with them and kind of give 'em an idea of what we're looking for and how we want to attack the game. That's going to be the biggest thing.

The other thing is too this year we got this prospect game that I'm really excited about. I think it will be fun for myself the coaching staff, even the fans to catch some of our young prospects. We got a lot of 'em, so I think that's going to be a lot of fun.

Q. As you look to shape your bullpen, are you still envisioning the closer role being a Finnegan/Harvey combination?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Finnegan, Harvey, maybe somebody else. Yeah. But, yeah, I mean they have done a great job. They really have. So, yeah I'm proud of the way those guys -- especially Finnegan. He takes the ball, as you know, all the time. He's really, really, really improved.

Q. (Indiscernible) pitching lab. What do you feel is the balance of your guys going there and what the team (indiscernible)? How do you feel about the outside voices having a different perspective?

DAVE MARTINEZ: We're totally engaged in what they're trying to do. They're all trying to get better, and they're trying to figure out how to utilize their body the best way they can, whether it's to throw hard or spin the ball better. But we're always in contact, we're always trying to work with them.

The only thing that I always tell them is let's be smart about it. We don't want anybody coming to Spring Training and trying to throw a curve ball slurve or whatever and end up getting hurt. So we're going to be really cautious and really smart about what we do.

Q. What are your overall thoughts about the state of diversity within the coaching and managing positions and baseball's -- the Angels have quite a diverse staff now. Just wondering what you think.

DAVE MARTINEZ: You can say we got a diverse staff. Hey, look, hey, I always say it's about merit, right. I think coaching and managing is about merit. I think we put together a really great coaching staff. These guys I've known them for many years, they truly love baseball. I got two guys that are on my coaching staff managing in Venezuela, another my bullpen coach is a pitching coach in Venezuela. So these guys are always involved. They love the game. So I'm looking forward to working with them.

Q. Your overall thoughts about how that applies to the league as a whole?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Yeah, like I said, I think it's great for the league. I think these coaches all are hired because of merit and what they do.

Q. What did you learn from last year and the rule changes how you can use speed? Do you think you can lean into that more this year?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Yeah, we're definitely going to try to push the envelope a little bit more than we did last year again, but it's part of our identity. We got some really good young athletes. We get Vic back and we got Young and we got CJ and Lane. Lane started getting it a little bit.

So we're definitely going to push the envelope when it comes to stealing bases, running a little bit more. But I also think some of our young players, like CJ, they will start driving the ball a little bit more, Keibert, Lane. So you'll start seeing them develop becoming better hitters.

The biggest thing for me that we talked a lot about this winter so far is our chase rate. We got to get better at swinging at strikes.

Q. What did you put on Luis Garcia's off-season to-do list?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Have you seen his body? He's looking good. Hey, I told him he's got to get agile. He's another guy, we got to get him more to swing less. I don't want to take his aggressiveness away, but he's got to learn how to hit the ball in the strike zone.

Q. Is that message that you guys sent to him about getting himself more agile and more in shape?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Yeah, look, my message to him was is no guarantees in Spring Training. You got to come and fight for a job. I think I sent the message to him when we sent him down. And it hurt me because I love the kid. But he's got to get better. He's going on his fourth year now with us, and I know what the upside is with Luis, but we got to get it out of him. He's got to be consistent.

Q. Do you see Jake Alu kind of pushing him for that second base spot in Spring Training?

DAVE MARTINEZ: I see Jake, yeah, definitely see Jake pushing him a little bit there. He's definitely -- I love Jake because he can do multiple things. Also like Jake at third and I like him at left field. But having Jake would be definitely a plus, and he's another -- he's a guy that can hit left-handed as well.

Q. Would you consider bringing a veteran second baseman?

DAVE MARTINEZ: Like I said, we're going to look at how we can get better as a whole. Whether it's at second base. Look, like I said, I believe after what happened last year with Luis that he's going to come back in Spring Training ready. But only time will tell. We got other holes that we need to fill. So but we're definitely going to be looking.

Q. I think this perception that managers don't really have the same power they did years ago, don't make the same number of calls they used to. What is a decision or two that you have to make every day?

DAVE MARTINEZ: The biggest thing is managing the bullpen. Talking to you guys every day. (Laughing). But managing the bullpen. Keeping that bullpen fresh is always sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and have to force myself not to pitch somebody because he's pitched three days in a row.