AL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: RED SOX v YANKEES

October 17, 2004

Joe Torre

JOE TORRE: Well, you have to. You know, there's no formula for it, other than every game has a life of it's own and bad things -- good clubs come back from bad things happening. We certainly had opportunities to score in the extra innings. And having a one-run lead in the ninth inning, it certainly is disappointing. We're so used to Mo going out there and getting people out, which he did tonight. It's just that the walk and the stolen base was the difference in that ninth inning. But you have to come back. As I say. Everybody is going to have trouble sleeping probably except maybe from exhaustion, but that's our job.

JOE TORRE: No, I didn't. I thought it was an opportunity, especially the way the eighth inning, we were facing their three, four, five guys. That's like a safe situation going through the heart of the lineup and he only threw 30 pitches. He was the only one available, he had not pitched in three days before that.

JOE TORRE: I thought El Duque was good. You know, I think he got, again, when you get a close game like this, especially in this ballpark, you tend to be a little careful and I thought he tried to make maybe sometimes too good of pitches where it cost him because the walks, all night long when you think about it, Mo in the ninth inning and Duque with the walks, that's what cost the runs for us. So I thought he was fine. He threw close to 100 pitches. His velocity was good. It looked like when he made his pitches he had good bite on the stuff, so I was pleased with his outing.

JOE TORRE: Well, I'm a firm believer in momentum in a short series. But again, we have to certainly look at the big picture and see where we are. You know, take on this ballclub later on and just be what we are supposed to be and, you know it comes down to who is going to pitch the best, but for sure, I've always felt since I started doing this thing about nine years ago, that momentum is easily changed in a short series, and there's not much you can do about it. You just have to make sure that when we go out there for the next game that, you know, we can't carry this baggage with us.