MLB WORLD SERIES: PADRES v YANKEES

October 21, 1998

Dave Stewart

DAVE STEWART: No, maybe a little transfusion, but, I don't want to do it myself. The best thing about my job is, one, when you can see the successes of the pitchers and the things you've tried to put in them mentally and physically, and watch those things work, but at the same time when you've worked with these guys through the year, their failures hurt just as bad. But believe me, when these guys are out there pitching, I'm pitching, too.

DAVE STEWART: All I can think about is my personal experiences with bad performances. And the bottom line is you want to forget them anyway. So when you talk to your pitchers you basically want them to always remember that even if there were some positive things that took place out there, and try to focus on those things, but expand it next time out for 6 or 7 innings.

DAVE STEWART: Yeah, at this time coming to the World Series. No, I'm just playing with you. You know, at some point you have to look at the baseball club that you're playing against, and you honestly evaluate their performance. And the Yankees have been, to this point, worthy of being three games up on us. They played very well. Everything that we've done they found a way to do better. I know it's been questioned, did we leave Ash in too long, did we take Brownie out too soon, should we have pitched Trevor last night, should we have pitched him in the 8th inning. There are going to be so many questions about the things that you do, but we're sitting down and watching how the game is going, and we're thinking about all the things that have taken place, not just in this series, but through the season, whether the guys down in the bullpen are rested enough, do they have enough to get through this, we can only go by what our gut tells us to do, and unless you're sitting there, you just don't know what you would do. And fortunately for us, we're in the opportunity to make those moves, and I can't think of one, to date, that I would take back, not one.

DAVE STEWART: I think there could possibly be. I know that Trevor's velocity was down quite a bit last night. I don't know, maybe we need to see Lee Majors or something. But we're struggling a little bit. And how we get to that next step, I'm assuming that we're going to have a pretty good shot at today's ballgame, but we still have tomorrow, and we're going to need our bullpen. I don't know that there are anymore words that can be said to get two or three more performances out of the guys down there, but obviously we definitely need it, and this is really not the time for your tanks to run low. But I really don't have an explanation for why we're not being successful, other than the fact that probably there is some fatigue there, but as professionals we've still got more work to do.

DAVE STEWART: Would we use him in the 8th?

DAVE STEWART: I don't know, let's wait and see. I really don't know. Like I said, it's playing it by gut. I think in talking with Bochy earlier today, if we get that late, I mean Joey Hamilton is still available, and probably the freshest arm down there. Trevor through a ton of pitches last night. So I assume we're going to try to keep him to one, one and a third, and not two full innings. We're going to take what Brownie gives us, and probably try to fill the gaps, in a winning situation probably with Joey Hamilton.

DAVE STEWART: I always, not even during the year, I tried to never give into tired, mentally tired was not an option for me. My responsibility was to go out and pitch, and be a No. 1 starter or, in my case, it was a No. 1 starter. And there comes a lot of responsibility with that. The responsibility of a No. 1 starter is to make sure that you do what it takes for your club to win on that given day. So there's no time for tired, there's no time for fatigue. The only thing that matters is giving your team a chance to get an opportunity to play the next day. That's how I went about my best. Tired was never an option to me. I never thought about tired. I always felt once you gave into it you became that. So I never thought about being tired, I only thought about what I could do to make my club a winner.

DAVE STEWART: That will be determined by how many calls I get from my services past here, and what the calls are about. I think I made it real clear that there are only three jobs that I would leave this situation for, which are farm director or the assistant GM, or GM position, if nobody has called about those positions, I'm very happy with the San Diego Padres, I have a good working relationship as well as a personal relationship with Kevin Towers. My home is here, and I'm a slave to my home. I have no reason to leave here unless there is a better opportunity some place else, and so I guess in answer to your question, I don't know that anybody's called yet. And if nobody has called, then I I'll figure out -- the only other thing I'll figure out is if I want to coach again. I'll figure that out once this is done.

DAVE STEWART: I think we're definitely in a situation now that we have not been in through the course of the year. And I think for a lot of them there is disbelief, and it should be. We haven't experienced this. But at the same time I think in my mind being totally on the outside looking in, we're right now in as big a media attention as we've ever had. New York is an experience for anybody that has never been there and we haven't been in a World Series since 1984. So with the disappointment of not pitching the way that we're capable, and probably having problems harnessing the emotions when we're out trying to perform our jobs, we become overall disappointed and probably depressed about the situation that we're in. And we're digging a bigger hole. And a lot of that is my fault, because from the get the responsibility of our ballclub on our pitching staff, and I think a lot of our guys have taken it personally, and feel disappointed that we haven't been able to stand up to this point.

DAVE STEWART: Who knows? We can never tell. Like I said, with no disrespect to the Yankees, we were a pretty good ballclub at home, so it may have made a difference. But respect to the Yankees, it may not have.

End of FastScripts….