AL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: RED SOX v YANKEES

October 16, 1999

Jimy Williams

JIMY WILLIAMS: He snared some line drives the other day too and hit a home run. I give a lot of credit certainly to the young man, but our training -- Jimmy Rowe, they have two different bandages for him for his wrist; one when he is hitting and then a different one when he takes the field. That is why he is a little bit later than the rest of those guys going out on the field because he has to have a different tape job. But he is just -- he loves to play. I think you all know that. He is a fine, fine player.

JIMY WILLIAMS: I am not trying to be proved right. Location, change of speed, movement then velocity. But I mean he pitched a strong, strong game. I don't have to tell you folks that. I think we said in that game the other day that maybe his velocity wasn't what it has been prior to the time that he hurt his back, but his location and his breaking ball, which is change of speed and movement, you know, certainly came into play and I think it did again tonight. I don't know what gun readings were going on out there tonight, I don't know how hard he threw. He got in front of hitters, located, used different pitches to start hitters off with and maybe to finish him off with. He used his whole repertoire so to speak.

JIMY WILLIAMS: He had some very impressive numbers for playing eight games or whatever in these Playoffs, but certainly that helped tremendously we are going against Roger Clemens, the pitch he hit I think was probably a ball. It was a high fastball, but caught it just right, you know, and he hit it real hard and certainly when you can get a couple of runs up, and we are down two games, that helps us a lot, it really does. Then tacked on where we got contributions certainly from that entire lineup later on. We made some very good defensive plays too behind Pedro.

JIMY WILLIAMS: Well, you really don't know what the other club is going to do certainly. But you think about what your club is doing offensively and certainly what Pedro is doing, you look at the number of pitches, you see his background where he has been here the last week or ten days, you think about his back. I think his pitch count was right over 100; correct me if I am wrong, a little bit over 100, so with that in mind, seven innings, we have the lead. We need to get six out. We thought that was the right time from our standpoint of both number of pitches, score, you know, not hurt the kid.

JIMY WILLIAMS: I don't really -- I don't say the other club is not going to score. I don't say fifth inning if he pitches two more because I don't know what is going to happen. That is why you play. Because they have such an outstanding team over there. When you get through six and you look at the pitch count and you see the score, then you say, well, we get three out here and you know, if we can get three out here with this club and they don't score or whatever, then certainly we might consider it. And we tacked on some runs again in the bottom half, but we had already made that decision after he pitched the top of the 7th. To try and get those last six out, we put a couple of other guys in there to pitch.

JIMY WILLIAMS: We had a winning record during the course of the season on the road; correct me if I am wrong-- and at home, so, I think to get to this level, you have to have the capabilities and qualities to win on the road as well as at home. As far as our fans, we have tremendous fans here, you know, they were -- they were very vocal again tonight. You know, I think they really like this team because they can associate with the kinds of players that we have here with themselves. I mean, that is what I think. The association -- they are in their uniforms so to speak even though they are not playing, that is what I sense from this community.

JIMY WILLIAMS: Just a managerial decision, just flip flop those two guys, but certainly he responded very well. His numbers are indicative of that. But the young man had a tremendous year with our club. Here is a guy that came out of nowhere and the numbers he put up, he has been instrumental in a lot of games for us this year, but he helped us in that Cleveland series too, didn't get a lot of hits but got some big hits that last game and certainly got a couple of big ones tonight.

JIMY WILLIAMS: You never let up against the Yankees. That is kind of the way I answered the other question about the pitching. You play the game nine innings. The other two were -- I try and prepare the same way that is regular season with these games the best I can. So, tense, I don't know. Trying to do right, you know, put them out there, let them play. I don't know about tense, a lot more important things in life, you know? Really, there really are. This is a game. We are trying to win certainly. Trying to do our damndest to win these games, but I don't know about tense. Relaxing, yet I don't relax. But I don't know if I am tense either. I enjoy watching these kids play these games I really do.

JIMY WILLIAMS: The score tomorrow when we start is nothing to nothing. So we start all over. It is a great game, isn't it? Isn't it great, we get to this do this all again. It is nice. I am serious. It really is. We are very happy to be playing we really are. I mean it.