NL DIVISION SERIES: BRAVES v ASTROS

October 12, 2001

Larry Dierker

LARRY DIERKER: I don't feel that way. I think that I felt some sense of urgency to win one out of the first two games at home. When we didn't do that, I knew we were in trouble. I thought we could win a couple games on the road because we've done that during the course of the year. But we didn't. I can't really think of anything I would call turning point. Obviously that lead we didn't protect was a failure in Game 1. Then in Game 2 we had every chance to come here 1-1, but we couldn't score a single run. We held them to one run. I thought we played a pretty good game defensively. We pitched well. But we couldn't score. Today, I don't know. I felt like we should have been able to hit Burkett, but I wasn't standing in there in the batter's box seeing where those pitches where. He's got very good control, similar to Shane. Two pitchers that pitch about the same way. Burkett made the good pitches when he had to, and pitched the kind of game that he has pitched a lot this year. And Shane didn't. Shane wasn't horrible, but he certainly wasn't his best. Probably the first indication of that was when Bako was hitting with first base open. We elected as we almost always do to try to get the eighth hitter out so we can start the next inning with the pitcher. I realize sometimes when you do that the guy's gonna get a hit and drive in that run. There has been a few times when I managed here where the guy has gotten a hit and driven in that run. I think this was the first time in five years where the guy's hit a home run. With all the experience Shane has and the kind of control he's got, I'm just dumbfounded that he made a pitch the guy could hit out of the park in that situation, particularly with two strikes in the count. If I were to say a turning point in this game, I would say that was it. We don't allow those two runs, we're right in it tight all the way. I don't even know if Dotel's pitching to Chipper Jones at that point. I mean, everything changes. That was certainly, in my mind, a breakdown for us. If he had thrown the ball down around the ankles or up around the shoulders and managed to get a hit off it, then you just tip your hat to it. Get a pitch you hit out of the ballpark, tip your hat to that too. He hit it out of the ballpark. But it's very unusual to see Shane make that kind of mistake.

LARRY DIERKER: I'm not sure how else everyone feels. I don't always have the same emotions and same feelings as players do. Everyone's different. I think that I felt when we got here it was uphill to try to beat them three times in a row. At the end I thought it was clearly possible. But when we didn't, I mean if we had won today, we still would have to win tomorrow with Maddux and the next day with Glavine. So getting so close and not doing it in the first game was the point at which I was really the most upset. Being able to at least win a game here, it's still sort of embarrassing but it doesn't really enrage me in any way. It didn't really get to me as much because I knew that even if we had won, we'd still have two games to go. That first game in Houston I think was big. If we could have won that, it would have changed all the emotions and all the feelings about the series. To lose that game, then come back and not score a run the next day, I felt like we really put ourselves in a very difficult position in the first two games. So this game, it was a game where I was disappointed in that one situation, but it wasn't a game that's got me really mad. You just accept it. The season's over, we won 93 games. I talked to the guys after the game and I told them that I was really proud of them. To be able to win 93 games with the injuries we had and some of the young players we played, I couldn't be happier about the way we played in the regular season. Honestly, in the post-season, I felt like we had a better team than the Braves. We may not have had better pitchers, but they were without the guy they started at first base, without the guy they started at second base, without their catcher, without their shortstop. Even though the guys they brought in to fill in did a good job for them, I think they're a much more dynamic team when they've got Lopez behind the plate and Furcal playing shortstop. I felt we caught them at a good time but the guys are pros and they're used to winning. They didn't really give us anything. So they played the tough baseball the Braves are noted for. I mentioned before the season even started I felt like they were the best all-around team in the league. I also said going into the playoffs that I felt like they were a better team than their record shows and that they probably feel that way, too. I'm sure they feel that way now.

LARRY DIERKER: I felt like the absence of those players was more of a factor during the season than in the post-season. The only guy that pitched in place of one of those guys was Mlicki, and he held them to one run. So I don't know that Astacio, Hernandez or Oswalt could have done better in Game 2 than to allow one run. I don't know anybody that could have done better in Game 1 than Miller did. So had the series continued or really probably more so had we won this series, gotten into the second series where you have to use four pitchers, then we probably would have felt the absence of those pitchers. But the absence of those pitchers was more difficult for us during the season when they went down than it was during the playoffs.

LARRY DIERKER: Well, I think we're going to have a very good team next year. I think Bagwell and Biggio still have a lot of baseball left in them. We've got some young pitchers that are very talented and will get better with experience. I feel some of the things we need to address about the team in terms of getting a little more speed here and there, just tweaking the team a little bit to try to get better. I don't think we have to make any major changes, I think we're going to be an excellent team next year. Of course in the last couple days everybody's been asking me whether I'm going to still be here to where it matters anywhere, to me. As soon as I know I'm going to be around, we start planning for next year, I'm going to get excited because I think we're going to be good.

LARRY DIERKER: Well, I think we have several players that are ready to play in the Major Leagues. There may be another player in front of them that's already here, which makes that difficult. That's what I'm talking about when I say tweak the team a little bit. There are places where you're three deep at one position and you don't even have a single guy at another position. So I don't know how all that's going to come out. I know our Minor Leagues played about .630 baseball all the way from top to bottom, our whole organization. We won championships all over the place and have a lot of prospects. That's why I'm excited about the future. Honestly, whether I'm here or not, I'm a lifer when it comes to the Astros, and I see good times ahead. It's really tough to play this long and then go out in three games. I feel, as many baseball people feel, that the first round should be seven games just like the second game and just like the World Series. But even that said, if it was a seven-game series and we start out 0 to 3, we're probably not going to win that anyway. In a highly contested 2-1, 2-2 type deal facing the final game of the third win, it doesn't seem quite fair that you don't have to use your whole roster of pitchers and all of your players in the playoffs, the same way that you do during the season. Of course you need them to get in the playoffs. But after you get there, you don't need 25 players anymore. That's why I think a longer series is a more fair test.

LARRY DIERKER: I feel pretty calm. I think that the record of our club since I've been manager has been good. I think we deserve another chance to-- not only just me but the staff as well. The only thing I really feel sensitive to is the coaches, because if they want to make a change, whoever they bring is probably going to bring in their own people. Then all our guys are going to have to scramble around and see what they can get. I've got another year, and I'm not in as vulnerable a position as some of the other guys. I'm also very well satisfied with the performance of the club in the last five years. So even though we haven't made it past the first round of the playoffs, I think that we have, as an organization, both with our Major League play and our Minor League system, risen to a position where we are thought of as one of the top organizations of baseball. I certainly don't take credit for that, because I didn't sign the guys or develop them. But I think that once we've signed them and developed them and got them here, we've done a pretty good job with them when they got here as well. So I'm -- I really want to come back and give this another shot. But if it doesn't work out, then I think I can be -- have some peace of mind about my stewardship and the way things went.

LARRY DIERKER: Well, first of all, I'm not worried about it. But I understand the dynamics of Major League sports, our sport and any other. We're in the entertainment field, and our players have risen in salary to the elevation that some of the top musical performers or motion picture stars make. So there's a mentality of who's hot and who's not. It doesn't make sense based on other businesses, but in baseball, these things happen. Yeah, I think it's absurd. But on the other hand, it's reality. I've known that since I started this.

LARRY DIERKER: Yeah, I do. That's why I said I'd like to come back.

LARRY DIERKER: The big picture of the sport or the team?

LARRY DIERKER: I don't know where it's going. I don't really like where it's been as an industry in the last, oh, gosh, maybe 15 years or so. But I think that the ownership position, the management position, is very weak right now with regard to any negotiations. It's hard to give back or take back something you've already given. So even though I'm concerned that we're not as efficient as we should be and that too many teams are in a perilous position in terms of finances, I also realize that we set attendance ratings and the ratings are good. So it's kind of hard to say the industry's in bad shape when it's as popular as it is. But I think we have negotiated ourselves into some vulnerable positions that it's going to be hard to get out of.

LARRY DIERKER: Yeah, we're in the same position today as we were on this day last year as we were trying to plan for the future. We wanted to try to improve our overall team speed, diversify our offense where we had some left-handed hitters, right-handed hitters, some speed and some power, and just the kind of offensive club that can generate a few runs against a tough pitcher and can occasionally score a lot of runs when the opportunity is there. We ended up scoring probably the second-most runs in the league this year, and yet I think our pitching is in really probably as good a shape or in better shape than we are at the position player. It's not that the guys aren't talented or don't -- haven't performed well and run hard and everything else, it's just the mix of the talents we have is not ideal for all situations. I shouldn't complain. A lot of the guys would like to be sitting here saying we just lost out in the playoffs, because most teams didn't get in the playoffs. But even when you get this far, you still want to get better. Honestly, I think one of the things that the Braves have done so well over these many years is they've won, they've won and they've won but they haven't tried to stay with the pat hand. Even when they win the World Series or go to the World Series, they're still active in the off-season trying to improve their team. I think every team should do that every year. I don't think you can say, "Okay, we got the ideal team now. Let's stay with it and see how far we can go." I think you have to tweak your team all the time.