NL DIVISION SERIES: CARDINALS v DIAMONDBACKS

October 10, 2001

Bob Brenly

BOB BRENLY: That's the main reason, yes. He's 5 for 10 this season and .430 in his lifetime and with some home runs. Also, I thought Jay Bell swung the bat well the last week of the season. He struggled in the last half, but came on strong in the end. And he was swinging well in Milwaukee, so Jay gets the nod today.

BOB BRENLY: Yes. You know, Randy is just death on a left-handed hitter. There is no easier way to put it than that. There has been a few guys that have hit from the left side that have had moderate success against him. But most managers choose to go with right-handers, and right-handers you wouldn't expect. I don't know the numbers off the top of my head, but there are a few guys you would least expect that have good success against Randy. And, generally, they're going to be in the lineup when he pitches.

BOB BRENLY: I look ahead only because you ask me to. Miguel has been great for us all year long. I think what we're seeing is a man who was blessed with a tremendous throwing arm, and just recently learned how to use it, learned how to be a pitcher, and he has really blossomed this season, his confidence has blossomed. I mean, I don't know what to compare him to, but he'll pitch in the rotation, he'll pitch long relief, he'll pitch short relief, he'll pitch set-up, he'll pitch relief between starts. He wants the to be out there on the mound, no matter what role we put him in. And it makes it easy to continue to use him because of the way he has pitched. But we feel he's been effective as a starting pitcher, so we're looking for a good outing from him tomorrow.

BOB BRENLY: We were hoping for that. I was with the Giants on the bench in the '89 World Series, when he and Will Clark put on a show like I don't know whether we've ever seen before by two guys. Certain guys just seem to rise to the occasion and Curt Schilling proved he was one of those guys last night. And Mark Grace has proved throughout his career, he is another guy that can come through when you need him the most. Mark Grace's struggles in September, I think part of that reason was because we rode him hard during the regular zone. He was one of our constants all year long, and when he stumbled a little bit in September, fortunately, Erubiel Durazo and Greg Colbrunn got hot and allowed us the opportunity to are rest Gracey a little bit, so hopefully he was coming into this series as fresh as he's going to be.

BOB BRENLY: Absolutely. I mean, fans are entitled to do whatever they choose to do after they come into a ballpark, but it stung me personally because Matty has been such a big part of this team and a big part of our offense, and we in the clubhouse know what he's gone through this season and how he has persevered and battled through the whole thing and it did hurt.

BOB BRENLY: Well, we hope so, you're never quite sure what's going to happen, a month or two months or six months down the road, but our game plan all season long was to limit pitch counts for all of our pitchers whenever we could. The way our bullpen pitched the majority of the season gave me the freedom to do that to take Randy and Curt out of the ball games when we had comfortable leads and their pitch counts were up there. The reason we did that all season long was to have these guys on top of their games right now.