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AL DIVISION SERIES: ANGELS v RED SOX

October 7, 2007

Mike Scioscia

ANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA: Game Three

THE MODERATOR: Questions for Mike Scioscia.

Q. Mike, just wondered if you have an update on Vladimir?
MIKE SCIOSCIA: Yeah, Vladimir he had treatment yesterday, some tests done yesterday. He feels fine. He's a little stiff but it will loosen up once he gets out there and takes some batting practice. And he's good to go in right field. He'll be out in right field today.

Q. When you look at the injury situation, just going through the whole list, Figgins and Gary Matthews and Garret Anderson, does it feel like you're snake bit? Is there a little bit of why this and why now?
MIKE SCIOSCIA: No, I don't think there's any team in baseball, any organization in baseball that doesn't have to deal with injuries and have to deal with depth issues on their roster for the whole season, starts at spring training, guys get nicked up. I think it's something every organization has gone through. I think the ones that have the depth have the opportunity to still play at a high enough level to get to this point.
We're no exception. You have to deal with it every day during the season. Not only guys, maybe they're not out of the lineup, but if they're not 100 percent it might affect some of their performance.
There's no sense looking at what if. You have to deal with what you have in front of you, and we have a good ball club, even with some of our guys banged up, we're a good ball club and we should be playing a little better.

Q. Can you talk about facing Schilling and what will be the game plan against Schilling?
MIKE SCIOSCIA: Without giving away too many secrets what we're trying to do against him, Curt's a veteran pitcher, not throwing as hard as he did a couple of years ago, but he still has the ability to command the baseball as well as anybody in the game today. Can change speeds, good split, we'll mix in the sliders, breaking ball. But he's all about fastball command. That's what he was about when he was throwing 95 miles an hour. It's what he's about as he's throwing the ball now.
He's going to be on those corners, he's going to be moving the ball around and he has the ability to turn the fastball into three and four different looks. And that's how he's successful. So nothing like batter's box experience for us. Some of our guys have faced him. Some of our guys have not faced him. But when you get in there, obviously you're going to know what Curt is going to try to do and he's still very, very good at it.

Q. Two parter, who is going to be your DH today?
MIKE SCIOSCIA: Today Juan Rivera is going to DH.

Q. What time did you get here to the ballpark here today? Were you able to get much sleep last night knowing what you guys have on your plate today and was your mind just cranking all the scenarios and permutations?
MIKE SCIOSCIA: Your mind's cranking and some decisions are made easy for you when you get to the ballpark. Today Casey Kotchman is out of the lineup. He has a non-baseball-related medical condition so he's not available today.
And so therefore made decisions a little easier as far as what your lineup is going to be and who was going to play. And so we'll have Morales at first base and Juan Rivera as the DH.

Q. Considering how well you played at home this year, how will you respond to people who say you should have played for the home field advantage rather than rest your players?
MIKE SCIOSCIA: We did play for the home field advantage. We tried to win every game we were on the field this year. We tried to win 162 ball games this year.
We were banged up a lot of times during the season, at the end of the season might have been the most banged up we were at any part of the season.
And we had guys that were -- not only probably couldn't go out there perform the way they needed to or at a very high risk of being injured and being done for the season.
So I don't think it was as much resting guys as it was trying to get guys to play at a level and most of our guys did play the last weekend because they had rebounded a little bit. We tried to win 162 games this year. I wish we had home field. It didn't work out.

Q. Can you give us your lineup today and if there's a Game 4, who is starting?
MIKE SCIOSCIA: Our lineup today will be Figgins at center field. Cabrera shortstop. Vladimir in right field. Anderson, left field. Morales at first base. Izturis at third base. Kendrick second base, Rivera as the DH and Napoli catching. And we'll talk about our Game 4 starter after hopefully we win today.
THE MODERATOR: Mike, thank you very much.

End of FastScripts

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