AL DIVISION SERIES: TIGERS VS GUARDIANS

October 9, 2024

Stephen Vogt

Comerica Park

Cleveland Guardians

Postgame 3 Press Conference

Detroit - 3, Cleveland - 0

Q. Stephen, can you take us through I guess what the plan was with the lineup and then pinch-hitting as early as you did? Did you know going in that that might be the case?

STEPHEN VOGT: Yeah. We kind of knew in the back of our minds that they could have done that and given the situations that we were in, they were high leverage. So we thought that was the opportunity to take our shot, both with Noel and Fry coming up on the back end. Those were high-leverage situations, chance for us to get the matchup, and we just didn't come through.

Q. Stephen, those decisions, just how much are you guys talking about them pregame, maybe even in the days leading up to them and ensure it's something you guys really map out aggressively?

STEPHEN VOGT: Oh, we meet constantly before, during, constantly talking about when will we go, what's the situation if we're going to do it versus if we're going to hold. We prepare very, very much for these situations. Nothing that happened today caught us off guard. We were prepared for all of it. We took our shots when we had the opportunity to put some runs up, placed some bets and then just didn't come through.

Q. Did you feel a little handcuffed with your bench later in the game just given how everything had played out and making those early substitutions?

STEPHEN VOGT: Yeah. When you're playing from behind, the other team has the opportunity to get you handcuffed. Outside of maybe a couple at-bats, I felt like we had the advantage in almost every situation today. We had traffic going. I thought we did a great job setting the table. We just weren't able to come up with a big hit.

Q. What did you think of Alex Cobb and the way he came out and his entire performance?

STEPHEN VOGT: Yeah. I thought Alex threw the ball well. They got the single up the middle in the first inning to score the run, and after that he threw the ball really well.

I thought, again, the score dictated that we needed to move away from him. I felt if we could have put some runs up and fought back early, we could have let him go a little longer. But with where we were in the game, I felt like it was time to go get Erik.

Q. Speaking of Fry making substitutions, you had a really good at-bat. Does that feel one of those days you're like that's not your day?

STEPHEN VOGT: Yeah, I mean, you can go down that road all you want. At the end of the day, all you can control is hitting the ball hard, and David did that. Credit Vierling for making a great play, being in the right spot. And, again, I felt like we had pretty good at-bats at times and at other times we didn't.

But overall we gave ourselves an opportunity to score a lot of runs today. Just weren't able to come with a big hit with runners in scoring position.

Q. In general, not necessarily just Fry's at-bat but maybe early in the game against Montero in the first inning, are you pleased with your approaches? Are there certain guys that you want to go up and try to attack early in the count or maybe other pitchers you want to work deeper?

STEPHEN VOGT: We've faced Montero a number of times. We know he's aggressive in the zone early. I'll never question what our guys do. It's their at-bat. We don't tell people how to work an at-bat. They're individuals. They're Big Leaguers. They're really good hitters.

He made good pitches in the first, and we weren't able to get anything going. Then they pulled him after six pitches, which was their plan. And like I said, we kind of knew that was what they were going to do, but we had to combat for Montero going.