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AL DIVISION SERIES: RED SOX v ANGELSOctober 6, 2009Terry FranconaLOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Workout Day ROB DOELGER: Questions for Terry Francona. Q. Do you have any kind of update on Rocco and how he's progressing? TERRY FRANCONA: Not anything formal or official. He's still pretty tender. I think we plan on taking the full allotment of time just to see if he's okay because of the threat he presents from the right side. I don't know if it will work or not. We're not going to put him on if he can't play, but if he can, we'd like to have him. Q. We saw Jed Lowrie here, can you update us on him, and the rest of your infield situation? TERRY FRANCONA: Gil (Velazquez) is here, and Gil is not active. Jed's going to be on our roster. But, again, because Woody's not here, Green's not available, if something were to happen, and Jed took a swing or something in the next couple of days. So Gil was getting ready for winter ball. He is here. He'll workout with us in the next couple of days. He will not be in uniform when the games are played. But he's been here before. He understands what's going on on. We didn't want to get caught short. Q. Now that the Yankees have made the decision, how does that change anything, if it does? Were you prepared for that? TERRY FRANCONA: Yeah, I think we thought we would do this all along. No, it doesn't really change anything. We had our meeting today, and we think we know how we feel about things. We'll go through our workout. We'll talk to our players. We'll check on some guys' health, and we'll put our roster together. Q. Dustin's had a solid year, not MVP numbers like he had last year. But just for him to follow up the kind of year that he's had, how impressed are you with what he's been able to do this year with everything that he had to deal with the family situation? TERRY FRANCONA: Well, he think we expected that. I think the organization feels like that is the type of player he is. I know there were times when I know he felt frustrated like he wanted to do more, and again, that is the type of player that he is. But barring injury, you're going to see those types of years for a long time. He wills himself to be on the winning side, which we respect that a lot. Q. You mentioned that Lowrie's on the roster. Aside from the Rocco thing, are there any other roster decisions that are still kind of hanging up there especially with maybe the last pitching spot or two? TERRY FRANCONA: Yeah, we have a couple of things we need to check. Manny was going out to throw. We'll just, again, there is not -- we don't have to have our roster set today, so it would be kind of silly to do that. We'll take inventory of where everybody is. I think we all know how we feel about everybody, or if this works or this doesn't work, what we'll do. We just want to let it fall at its own pace. Q. Your decision, obviously, to go with Jon in Game 1. Can you talk about his emergence into this real elite guy on this type of stage? TERRY FRANCONA: He's been a pretty good pitcher for a while now, and he started out the season, the first month of the season, kind of slow. Once he got on track, he hasn't -- he's been on track ever since. Just continues to get stronger. Cutter has become an enormous weapon against righties and lefties. Throwing the breaking ball changeup. He's a complete pitcher. Big, strong kid that seems to be able to endure a lot of innings and stay strong while he's doing it. Poise is real good. That's why we're comfortable letting him pitch. Q. When you finally saw David Ortiz turn the corner, what things did you notice either mechanically or approach-wise that kept him consistently driving the ball? TERRY FRANCONA: I think there were probably a few things. Balance at the plate. Which I think things kind of come hand-in-hand. As a hitter when you're in between you're swinging at a ball because you're not seeing the ball good. The change of speed is affecting you. Once he started earning fastballs because he wasn't swinging at breaking balls in the dirt, there's a lot of things that kind of came together. If we knew the exact reasons, it probably would have come together quicker. It's just he endured a really tough two months. There was no way to get around it. It was difficult. But he worked hard, and we stayed patient. Ended up his last at bat he could fire in there he'd have 100 RBIs. That's quite an accomplishment considering where he started. Q. I know you said Manny is going on out to throw, but how is he doing and are you set on the number of pitchers he'll be taking? TERRY FRANCONA: We haven't set our roster. We want to let these next couple of days play out. I think he feels pretty good. This is as good as he's felt. Again, he hasn't done much, and we'll see. This is hopefully a good first step for him. Where this goes, we really don't know yet. Q. A great deal has been made about the notion that the Angels are a different sort of lineup this year, especially with Abreu's patience. Do you think that is the case? And what are your impressions of Abreu? Obviously, you had the time with him in Philly. TERRY FRANCONA: Yeah, he's one of the more professional hitters in the game. I think that beyond Bobby, Morales has given them an unbelievable power dimension to their team that -- they go 1 through 9, and they have the ability to switch hit, run the bases, hit for average, and hit the ball out of the ballpark. There's a lot of ways. There's a reason they're good. We just spent about five hours going over it. But their depth is really, really good. End of FastScripts |
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