MLB WORLD SERIES: METS v YANKEES

October 24, 2000

Bobby Valentine

BOBBY VALENTINE: Boy, I'm trying to think about taking Rick out. Yeah, I thought he was pitching really well, too. But at the time, that seemed like the move to make. He'll be plenty rested in case we need him to pitch again this series.

BOBBY VALENTINE: I'd love to talk about Agbayani ,because we're here because of him. He's been one of many key players on our team. But he's been key, and yeah, I was a little baffled by people who followed our team all year thinking that maybe he shouldn't play today. I never considered him not playing. I never considered pinch-hitting for him, and I'm glad about that.

BOBBY VALENTINE: It's a difficult win, too, but we'll take it. We were a couple swings away from winning over there; we got the swings today. We made the pitches today. It seems like a light-year's difference between 3-0, 2-1, and it's 2-1.

BOBBY VALENTINE: Our fans were really good. Probably not as loud as they are during the regular season. But then again, with the price of tickets, it's probably not the same people sitting in the seats. But it's great to play here. But we played the same game basically, minus a couple of mistakes.

BOBBY VALENTINE: Just wanted to win the game. I thought that was the best way to win it. Keep them in. Sixth inning, we had a tie game. Bordick hit El Duque the best of anybody in our line-up the first two times up. He had a terrific at-bat the other time. The sixth inning, I'm not going to take out our best centerfielder, and I'm definitely not going to break any spirit that he has going right now in the sixth inning of this game. And, more important, as I told the guys on the bench, the sixth inning I'm not going to show any panic and try and take the entire team out of the game -- the team that got us there. And I said we're going to win this game either now or later, and we did.

BOBBY VALENTINE: Because I believed it in my heart.

BOBBY VALENTINE: I'm sorry, he does that conventionally with right-handers pitching, and left-handers, he was off the bag.

BOBBY VALENTINE: Well, again, this is the same idea. We're not winning this thing without Johnny having Armando at his side, and we needed him. Johnny did his job. And it was time for Armando to do his, and he did.

BOBBY VALENTINE: I think baseball fans, and I'm one of them, have been watching the World Series for the last few years, and it hasn't seemed like it's been real big competition. I thought we were in those first two games, but you could only go so long saying they were close games. If we didn't get a victory tonight... So we got a victory, we broke a little streak. Now we have to come out and do a job tomorrow.

BOBBY VALENTINE: You don't have team meetings, obviously, during a game. But they were saying all the right things. We tied that game up right there. We're playing our game. We're playing in our ballpark. We have our bullpen rested. Once we got 2-2, we felt we had a good chance of winning.

BOBBY VALENTINE: Actually, I thought incorrectly that I would have him bunt on the first one, get a fastball on the second pitch, and that he could drive because they might have thought the bunt was still on, and he threw a breaking ball and he still got a hit.