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AL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: ANGELS v YANKEES

October 22, 2009

Jeff Mathis

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Game Five

YANKEES Â– 6
ANGELS - 7

THE MODERATOR: Questions for Jeff Mathis and Torii Hunter.

Q. You've been in a lot of games, lot of thrillers. How many top this one?
TORII HUNTER: Oh, man, this is the top three, definitely. The other day the one we played, 11 innings or something like that, 12 innings, and that was number one. And this is number two. This was an exciting game, man. It's a good team over there. And we battle. Our backs against the wall, man. We're just kicking, punching, scratching, doing whatever we've got to do to get off that wall.
We know those guys are good. We know they're up. And we're just going out there playing every game, one game at a time.

Q. Can you just talk about the psychological attitude when you're behind? You have that 4-0 lead and then they explode six runs all with two outs? What do you say to yourself at that point? I know you don't give up, but it has to be a bit disconcerting?
TORII HUNTER: It's a little deflating. You know, these guys got six runs. You know, and it was 4-0, and, you know, we were trying to get more runs, but we said, hey, 4-nothing is pretty good in playoffs. And these guys, bam-bam, with the good offence that they have, they came back. When they got the sixth run, man, I was out there deflated, you know, and pissed off (laughing).
So I came in the dugout, threw my glove. But after all that I settled down, and everybody settled down, we went out there. We knew we had time left and a lot of innings left, lot of outs left. So that's what we did, we were just being patient.
JEFF MATHIS: It's the same way, it's deflating, but you can't quit. You still have a couple of innings to go. You go out there and do what we've been doing every time we were behind during the season and earlier in this series. You've just got to battle. And we pushed two across there, or three, I think, three.

Q. It appeared for the first six innings that John Lackey was about as good as it gets. Is that the case?
JEFF MATHIS: Yeah, he was throwing real well. Obviously, what you saw he had his breaking ball working and a good heater. He had a good stuff tonight.

Q. You guys have very quietly kind of dedicated your season to Nick Adenhart. I was just wondering if tonight with the season on the brink, if thoughts of that were either privately or whatever expressed by any of the guys in there?
JEFF MATHIS: Well, I mean, it's been a roller coaster, man. It's been a rough year for us, you know, especially with that tragedy earlier in the year.
You don't want the season to end, that's for sure. Especially with all that that's went on, and we're battling. We're still battling to get to the next day, and that's what we're going to do from here on out.

Q. When you're at the plate these days, does the baseball look like a baseball or a beach ball?
JEFF MATHIS: Just one of those things. When you get in the rhythm and you're getting pitches to hit, you know, luckily the ball is finding the hole. You can't really explain it, but I feel good at the plate right now, and luckily the hits are following.

Q. When was the last time you had six hits in a row?
JEFF MATHIS: That's a good question.

Q. Little league? High school?
JEFF MATHIS: I don't have my notepad (smiling).

Q. At this point you still have to go back to New York and win twice there. After tonight, does anything feel possible?
TORII HUNTER: Yeah, anything's possible, man. This is baseball. Baseball is a crazy game, man. You see some crazy things. Every time you come to the game you've probably been to 1,000 games and you see something different every year.
We're excited about it. I mean, we're going out there. We've got Pettitte on Saturday, we're going to take it one game at a time. That's all we can do. We can't think about Game 7 or CC, or anything like that of the we're just going to take it one game at a time and be ready to go. And that's what we did today.

Q. Do you feel like you have some kind of psychological edge? They're going home, to be frank about it, they're supposed to win. You're playing with house money?
TORII HUNTER: I mean, the pressure's not on us, definitely. Our back's are against the wall. They're up. And we're just going up and playing good baseball. We're going to try to play good baseball from here on out. We're going to their hometown. Their fans are tough. They really know the game of baseball. You know the Yankees are tough.
But we're still going to go out there and grind us a baseball game. We're going to have some fun and play the game we know how to play.

Q. It was very entertaining watching John Lackey as Scioscia was taking them out. Can you maybe replay what he was saying to Scioscia? We could read his lips, but maybe you could give us some insight?
JEFF MATHIS: Yeah, I'm not going to repeat it, but, you know, it's just how he is. Any time he's getting taken out of the game, he doesn't want to come out. That's just him. That's how he is. And, you know, he's a bulldog, man.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you.

End of FastScripts

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