|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC POOL TWO: MIAMIMarch 14, 2009Davey JohnsonJake PeavyBob WatsonMIAMI, FLORIDA THE MODERATOR: Bob, do you want to talk about the roster move first and then go into the game. BOB WATSON: Prior to the game we made a roster move: Dustin Pedroia pulled a left oblique muscle, and the doctor DL'd him, and we've added Brian Roberts from the Baltimore Orioles. He will be here tomorrow, and he's going to be our second baseman. Q. My question is for Davey Johnson: Davey, you saw a Puerto Rican team tonight, very tough. They were good with the bats. What are you expecting for the next game? DAVEY JOHNSON: Well, I mean, it's a double elimination last time I checked. It was a tough night out for Jake. Jake didn't feel up to par, and that happens at this time of year. It's just one game. You tip your hat to Vazquez and the rest of the guys on the Puerto Rican club. We have another game tomorrow, and we'll go from there. It's just part of the game. Q. Davey, in the second inning I know you wanted Jake to finish the inning, but did you think about taking him out a few pitches earlier so he could come back again in the tournament because he just went over 50 to 52 pitches? DAVEY JOHNSON: Yeah, we had a lot of one-inning pitchers out there. Just basically let him get a little more work. Unfortunately it wasn't really great work, but he still needed the work. Like I said, it's a double elimination. It wasn't a thing where it was -- hook him in the second inning. Just let him get his work in. Q. I just wanted to clarify, I thought the understanding was you were not going to be here tonight. Was there some change in plans? DAVEY JOHNSON: The wedding got over a little early and I had a plane standing by, and I wanted to be here. Maybe I should have stayed longer. Q. Jake, how would you assess tonight? What wasn't working? What was going on? JAKE PEAVY: Nothing was working. Just a tough night. I just couldn't make pitches, just couldn't make adjustments. It was just a rough night. Up in Canada I felt like I was a tad off, and that's normal to be -- third time on the mound tonight, it was my fourth time with live hitters, and just quite a bit off from where I'm used to being. The basic thing is making adjustments. Most of the time the more time you spend on the mound you can make adjustments, just tonight there was no making adjustments for myself, and I take full responsibility. I threw a good bullpen in Toronto. I wasn't able to get two side sessions in like we had hoped simply because I was under the weather a bit. I take full responsibility for the boys' loss tonight. I just didn't do what I expected to do, what I should have done. Tip your hat to Puerto Rico. They have a good team, but I certainly didn't make pitches, and they certainly have guys in their lineup that you can get out but you have to make pitches, and I didn't do a whole lot of that tonight, and I'll be better the next time out. Q. Davey, when you look at what Vazquez was able to do to your guys, how much of that was just him being that good, and how much of it was some of the at-bats your guys took? DAVEY JOHNSON: I thought he was pretty good and he was making some pitches, keeping the ball down in the zone, and you had an umpire that was calling pitches down in the zone. You tip your hat to the pitcher this time of year. He made good pitches. We've had a number of off-days, but that's just this time of year. But you've got to tip your hat to him, he made good pitches when he had to, and their whole club did. Q. I don't know how to delicately put this, but point blank, is falling victim to the slaughter rule embarrassing? DAVEY JOHNSON: You know, it's always embarrassing to lose, but I could have gone in the bullpen and brought somebody else in to pitch to avoid that. But you know, it's early in this tournament. It's double elimination. Thornton has been awfully good for us. He wasn't as good tonight, but it was a situation where we were just going to let him get his work in. At that point we were eight runs down. I don't usually make pitching changes just to avoid the ten-run rule. Q. Did clubs put some kind of limitation on how to use your relievers, like limiting them to just one inning or so? DAVEY JOHNSON: No, I mean, we have a lot of pitchers I could have used more of. We also have a game tomorrow, and hopefully we've got three more games to play. You know, it's this time of year where a lot of the guys are closer types, pitch one inning. A lot of guys aren't used to coming in in the third or fourth inning. You know, the format is a little tough on them. I thought the bullpen did fine. It was a game where we were getting guys to work that we thought might be helpful to us down the road. I mean, the format is fine. Q. Can you talk a little bit about the urgency? Obviously you're facing elimination now and just the resolve of your team in trying to get back on track. DAVEY JOHNSON: I'm used to managing USA Baseball; the Olympics, one game can knock you out of a medal round. If we want to go to a medal round, we'd better not lose any more while we're here, or at least win the next two. It's not a bad thing sometimes, especially this time of year with this crew. It's a great crew I've got, fine players and great character. I look forward to us having a good game tomorrow, and I feel sorry for who we play the next day because I think these guys are going to be up for it. Q. Jake, a follow-up: You said you were feeling a little under the weather. Do you have a cold, or when did that come on? And how did it affect your preparation? JAKE PEAVY: I'm not going to use that as any kind of excuse. I certainly got sent home early the last day in Toronto. A lot of the boys have been under the weather. With the time off that we had, I had a week in between starts. That's normally not what you do. So the plan was to try to throw two good bullpens just to build up the endurance and get more comfortable on the mound. That just wasn't able to happen because of the scheduling and the way I was feeling. But absolutely no excuse for the way I performed tonight. Like I said, I take responsibility for what I did on the field, and I'm going to learn from it, going to get back up on the horse tomorrow and get better. Like I said, this is a double-elimination tournament, and I hope the boys pick me up and get me out there one more time to see what we've got. Just a rough night, but like I said, we play tomorrow, and I think the boys will be up for the challenge. Q. Davey, there was one point in the fifth there, y'all got a run in, had two guys in scoring position, and it looked like you had a chance to make it interesting. How big a turning point specifically was a strike out there but more generally was them getting out of that inning? DAVEY JOHNSON: That was big. I thought if we scored a couple runs there, we would have got right back in it. Their pitcher got probably our hottest hitter out in McCann. But that's just part of baseball. It didn't happen, and we'll come back tomorrow. I know a lot of guys weren't real happy in the clubhouse tonight, so I'm looking for a good game tomorrow. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, guys. End of FastScripts |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|