AL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: RED SOX v YANKEES

October 16, 2003

Joe Torre

JOE TORRE: Well, no. He's the best starter in the game. Grady went out and asked him and obviously he wanted to stay in. It would be tough for any manager to say, no, you're not staying in this game, when it's Pedro Martinez. You know, he fights you, he battles you and we do the same. Today it was very satisfying because it was a tough mountain to climb, four runs against him, especially a game that's so important. Posada's hit, Jorge, you look at the stats against Pedro they were awful up to about the middle of this year and then all of the sudden, I don't know what he did differently but he certainly -- I know he's hit one home run, maybe a couple off him, gotten some base hits, maybe a different approach. Jorge, this kid has grown up over the years that he's been here and I've been here, and this is, by far, his best year as far as catching, handling pitchers, going out there and telling Roger what to do and stuff like that. It's a credit to this young man and how hard he's worked.

JOE TORRE: I put my defense in for the home run.

JOE TORRE: I didn't do it. They did it. The guy who stopped the bleeding. The guy who put a tourniquet on the whole thing was Mike Mussina, first and third nobody out, gets out of a jam, a double play ball from Damon which is not easy to do, and striking out Varitek. That was the turning point for me. You felt like you were getting your brains beat out and you look up, it's 4-1 you say, okay, now we are at arm's length here. Took a little wind out of our sail when Ortiz hit a home run off Boomer but these guys just kept going at it.

JOE TORRE: I always try to look at that half-full glass and I was saying, well, this is a perfect way for Roger to get 20 wins this year, to win this game. When I saw him come out, I said the only way that is going to happen is if we continue to go on. He battled. He didn't have good stuff. He looked like he tried to muscle a little bit. Emotionally he was fine, I thought he was in pretty good control of himself but he got in some pitch count problems, especially to Trot Nixon, got behind and threw him a fastball and Nixon could hit a fastball on Christmas Day. That whole ballclub, when you think of how many games we've played and how evenly we're matched, I hate playing them. I didn't look forward to playing them. But now that it's over with, I couldn't be more satisfied.

JOE TORRE: Later on his emotions -- we're trying to win a ballgame. You know, the leash is very short when it comes to Game 7 or post-season, period. When you know everybody is in that bullpen, and we had Heredia up, too, just in case Moose wasn't ready but Moose got ready quickly. When he came out of the game, he pitches three great innings, and came back in after he changed shirts and sat in the rest of game and said, "remind me, I want to be a starter." This was a team effort, total team effort, guys running hard, playing hard. I didn't like the signs, things were happening when Soriano hit that ball and it hit the mound and then Walker, makes two sensational plays; that one and that one on Bernie. I said, "Oh, I don't like the way this thing is unraveling here." But Boony, he's been struggling since he's been here offensively. What a huge base hit for him, a home run for him.

JOE TORRE: I think we beat them. I don't think they beat themselves. I know the Red Sox fans are going to be very proud of this ballclub this year, they were the toughest team in the eight years I've been managing this team, and Grady Little should be congratulated. I know he probably doesn't want to hear it right now, but this ballclub believed in themselves, they never thought they would ever go away. I mean, the series against Oakland -- the Red Sox fans, I know they are going to be proud. There are the handful of people up there that will be the wah, wah, wah; stuff like that. But most of those people are pretty damned proud of their ballclub.

JOE TORRE: This means, this is the best, and taking nothing away from the Paul O'Neill teams or Tino's teams or Brosius, Knoblauch or Girardi, David Cone, Jimmy Key, John Wetteland my first year, taking nothing away from those teams, but we only played one Game 7 and that was the one in Arizona that we lost in the last inning. To come here and play against the Red Sox, and play them 26 times and beat our rival like we did, it couldn't be more satisfying. This has to be the sweetest taste of all for me. They never quit. To me, I tell my players every spring, I judge you on your effort. You're not always going to succeed. You know, I take -- people are going to say things on the radio or in the newspaper, but understand that you do the best that you can and that's all you can do. It's not always going to be nice or pretty on a day-to-day basis, but just understand that I appreciate it and this ballclub, they started -- they came together. They showed me what they were all about and I think they proved it to themselves that last trip up to Boston during the season. Saturday game against Pedro, he had a 4-0 lead on us and we just kept battling back, battling back and won the next game and then that Sunday against them the following weekend. You know, at times it's tough to believe in yourself when you're struggling, but Jason Giambi today, what a nice, huge day for him. And this guy over here, Boony, my defensive replacement. He hit a home run, I love it. For three innings, I was waiting for Manny to turn his back and see a ball go into the stands. It finally happened.