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MLB WORLD SERIES: PHILLIES v YANKEES

October 29, 2009

Mark Teixeira

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: Game Two

Philadelphia Phillies 1
New York Yankees 3

Q. Pedro is sailing along there, what did you notice that he was doing? And what kind of pitch did you hit in that situation?
MARK TEIXEIRA: I think it was just a high change-up, and I wanted to be aggressive off him. I mean, if you get down in the count against Pedro with the way that his off-speed pitches were being thrown tonight, he was going to put you away. It was a 1-0 count and I saw a pitch up in the zone and I let it fly.

Q. Tell us how important it is for you at this point in your career to hit your first World Series home run. I mean, what emotions are you going through given that you had at that time against the Angels? Tell us a little bit about how you're feeling about that right now.
MARK TEIXEIRA: It was pretty special. My first post-season home run was a walk-off in the Division Series. That was just a special moment in my career, and this one, just because we won the game -- if you hit a home run your first career home run in a game that you lose, it doesn't have any meaning. It's not very special. But tonight was a good home run for me and for the team.

Q. Alex did a lot of carrying of the team for the first two rounds. Do you get a feeling at all that it might have to be the opposite in this series, guys like you carrying Alex?
MARK TEIXEIRA: The great thing is all season we've had guys pick each other up. I had a terrible April, a couple other guys maybe started the season slow, but other people picked it up.
The first couple series, Alex carried the entire offense, really, and he hasn't gotten any hits, but I'm going to bet that Alex is going to be fine the rest of the series. And if not, then hopefully me or a couple other guys are going to step it up and do what we've done all season.

Q. You guys have talked a lot this year about over coming some adversity during different parts of the season, but there's nothing like staring at a potential 0-2 hole in the World Series. What was that like for you guys last night before this game heading into this?
MARK TEIXEIRA: It's a terrible clichÃ©, but it was a must-win. You don't want to go 0-2 into Philadelphia. With my time at the Braves I know how tough they are at home, especially in the World Series. Their fans are going to be all over us. It's going to be a great couple of games out there.
But if we went in there 0-2, it would have been a tough road for us.

Q. Now that you're a World Series veteran, do you have any -- can you discern any difference between, quote, the post-season and the World Series as far as pressure, crowds, the level of the game, the level of the intensity?
MARK TEIXEIRA: You know, I think it's obviously the end. You know that there's nowhere else you have to go. I think when you play the Division Series and the LCS, there's always more. There's always more. You're always kind of thinking ahead, this is it, and I think everyone is going to step up their game, especially the pitchers. You're not saving any pitchers for the next round. You're going to see the best out of the pitching staffs, and I think that's the difference.

Q. Talk about the defense a little bit. Molina picking Werth off of first, the double play in the eighth. Those seemed just as important as anything that happened tonight.
MARK TEIXEIRA: I think all season our defense has been so underrated. People can talk about our big name pitchers and Mariano and the home runs we hit, but I don't think we're in this position without our defense. We don't win the division without our defense. We played great defense in the playoffs so far, and hopefully we continue that.

Q. You guys were down one run when you hit your home run. How important was that to bring the crowd into it to get some momentum behind you guys?
MARK TEIXEIRA: Well, we hadn't done much offensively all series, and Pedro was pitching great. We tip our hats to him. But I think the home run got the crowd back in it, it evened the game. Hopefully it gave A.J. some confidence that we were actually going to score for him. And it kind of put a little bit of a crack in their armor. They had pitched so well the first two games, and for us to get a run, and then Matsui's home run was just huge for our confidence.

Q. Did you learn anything on the first at-bat that you took into the next at-bat when you had the success?
MARK TEIXEIRA: Not really. It's been so long since I've faced Pedro, years and years, when he was at Boston. So I didn't really know what to expect. I was just trying to look for a strike and swing hard in case I hit it.

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