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NCAA MEN'S COLLEGE WORLD SERIESJune 21, 2011Derek CampbellDavid EsquerMatt FlemerKyle PorterTony RendaOMAHA, NEBRASKA California – 7 THE MODERATOR: Dave, give us an overview, please. COACH ESQUER: Well, I say it over and over, I'm proud of our guys the way they came out, but we beat one heck of a team today and one heck of a pitcher. If that guy isn't going to be at the top of the draft list next year, I'm missing something. But he's a heck of a pitcher. So that is a heck of a win for us. That is a quality win and at the World Series. I'm happy our guys kind of grinded it out, because that's kind of how we do it. We don't do it easy. We had to catch ourselves in the middle of the ballgame there. I thought we were a little too excited trying to make something happen that really wasn't there and didn't let the game come to us. But eventually we moved the runners along and came up with that big hit we've been looking for the last couple of days, and it came from a lot of different places. Derek Campbell came up with some big hits for us, and Darrel Matthews. Just over and over it just pieced together. That kind of falls in line to how we have to do it as a team. It's not one guy and a three-run homer leading the charge. It's piece by piece with every player playing a role. When we were in the Regional, I remember mentioning to our guys that some teams look for one hero to take them the distance, and we don't need that. We need 27 heros. We need guys on the bench. We need guys on the field. We need everybody playing their role and piecing it together, because that's who we are. Q. Coach, can you talk about how gratifying it is to be named NCAA "Coach of the Year" and pull off a Cal win for the first time in over 30 years today? COACH ESQUER: Well, the whole day's been amazing. You can't be a good coach without good players. If our players can come out here and perform like they did today under he elimination circumstances. Thankfully for us one of our rallying clauses is to try to be as loose as possible, and that serves us well in big moments. But like you said, it's been a really, really gratifying and humbling day to have both in one day. Q. Matt, so was it the stirrups, the jerseys or was it the playoff beard? MATT FLEMER: I don't know, all three. I've never worn my socks high, so this is something new. But, no, I think we just wanted to try something different. I don't think we were pleased with the way we played the other day. The hitters did a good job. Porter did excellent on the mound for us. Like Coach said, Derek and Darrel got big hits for us and kind of got the train moving, but we just wanted to do something new so we could kind of get rolling here. Q. Is that about the most pitches you've thrown in a game? MATT FLEMER: This year, maybe. I'm not sure. I felt good though. I mean, I started out last summer in summer league, so it wasn't too bad. Q. Coach, can you kind of assess Kyle's performance? He looked good out there and set the tone early. COACH ESQUER: Yeah, I appreciate it. Because I think I talked about the whole game and didn't talk about Kyle Porter, and that was kind of the story line of the game was handing him the ball and letting him run with it. We have tremendous confidence with Kyle every time we use him the whole year is when the game mattered most, whether it was out of the pen or starting games. We got in a position where we used him against Baylor to win an elimination ballgame for us. We just have great confidence in him. That was the key for us is him coming out there and giving us six innings of good baseball. He probably could have gotten out of that one inning unscathed, but to his credit he got us out of that inning as well and set the table for Matt to come in and pitch those final innings. Just an outstanding performance. Like I said, it's in a big spot, and many people may be surprised he came through that way, but I don't think anyone on the coaching staff is surprised he was capable of doing that. Q. Coach, I think it was after the home run they hit and your players came back in that you gathered them together. It looked like you were either pissed off at them or just trying to inspire them. What was it that you said to them at that point that kind of turned the game around? COACH ESQUER: Well, it was both. It was both. I was both a little angry because I thought we were just trying too hard. I thought too many guys weren't staying with the plan of what got us here. Again, I thought with two strikes we were a little reckless with two strikes. I told them just basically I'll take bad contact to the middle of the diamond, then you trying to make something good happen up against the fence. Let's act like we belong here against this guy. The way we're going to be able to do is to chip away at him and keep the line moving. I don't need a home run. Q. David, yesterday you said you might like to have Tony Renda move back to second base if he were okay so that you could play one of your left-handed bats in the lineup at DH, and you wound up keeping Tony at DH and letting Derek play, and you got two big hits. What was the thinking? Was Tony not able to go at second base, and what did you think about having Derek in the lineup? COACH ESQUER: Well, sometimes your best moves you stumble into them. But we felt it best that Tony spend one more day DH'ing. To his credit, I asked him quite honestly if he felt he could give us what we needed for nine innings at second base. He felt like he could, but consulting with the trainers they felt like let's just give him a little more time rather than risk having to pull him sometime during the game. And we were completely comfortable with Derek out at second base, and the defense he can play and he can chip in and help our offense. So we felt like let's go with that lineup and let's make it work. Q. Tony, is that the best strained quad you've ever had now that you gave Derek the chance to do that? TONY RENDA: Yeah, I have a lot of confidence in Derek. He's a good ballplayer. For a freshman he handles himself very well. You know, it was a huge stage here, and he's handling it very well. I'm really happy for him. I'm going to try to get back out there. Every day it feels better, so I just take it day by day and see where it goes. Q. Derek, you haven't started that many games in the field this year. Now you've been the man in the College World Series as a freshman, as a guy who a few months ago didn't have a program to go to next year, what was it like when you knocked in those runs? DEREK CAMPBELL: I don't like to think too much, because when I think too much that doesn't work well with me. So I kind of play it simple like he said. Having the game come to you and having each pitch come to me, and having each groundball come to me. I'm not going to go do more than I'm capable of. But in that process success comes. As you can see, I'll get a base hit and move to second on an error. Anyway I can get the team the W. Q. Tony, can you speak to the significance of today and this win and how you guys fought back and maybe how that symbolizes the journey you guys have been on for the last nine or ten months? TONY RENDA: Yeah, we've been down all year. We've had to fight back, whether it's getting our program back, our alumni fought for us and we fought on the field every single game. Got off to a great start and won a lot of ballgames. We were down as a program. We were down in this tournament as well. We lose our first game. You've got to come back and win ballgames against very good teams or else you're going home. We know the tasks and what we need to do. We know it's going to be difficult, but we're going to take it day by day and throw our best guys out there and keep turning over the lineup and try to get some wins and get to that championship series to make it even. Q. Kyle, the Texas A&M guys were in here saying after you gave up the home run, it didn't seem to faze you at all. Can you take us back to that moment and reflect on the day at all? KYLE PORTER: It didn't affect me at all. The guy put a good swing and hammered the ball out of the park. I know with the offense that i had behind me that one run wasn't going to win the game, so I didn't think it affected the performance at all. Q. Derek, if you don't want to think too much coach can answer instead, but on that tag up at third, I assume you were just looking to your coach since you weren't a think on that. And Coach, did you have the scouting report on Naquin and try to challenge him in any way just to be aggressive? DEREK CAMPBELL: I mean, Tony comes up and hits the ball kind of not too deep, so I'm tagging up, kind of looking. He's trying to block me. I'm like, am I going to go, am I going to go? And I hear the base coach going you're going, you're going. So in the back of my head I'll be honest with you, I remember in pregame saying, this guy's got a gun, this guy's got a gun. So I'm just running as fast as I can, and I don't think twice about it. I trusted my coach. So luckily it was a little high. I didn't really see the outcome of it, but got Tony that sac fly, so, yeah. COACH ESQUER: I think as a staff and the coaches, we knew that we were going to have to try to take the game to them a little bit. We weren't going to be able to play passive and beat a good team like Texas A&M. We were going to have to maybe take some chances, put some guys in motion and get a big hit when necessary. I think Tony just kind of sensed the moment. I trust him. I don't second guess him because he'll do a better job than I would. When he sent him, I felt like this is the moment we need to put some pressure on them and make them make some play, even though that's probably the best arm in the outfield. Q. Kyle, 2-0 in elimination games. Do you understand the magnitude of the games you're pitching in and what was your mentality coming in? KYLE PORTER: My mentality coming in was I just wanted to go out there and give the team the best chance to win. I was just going to go throw strikes, limit the damage, and hopefully the offense will put up enough runs to get it done. As far as the elimination games, I don't treat it any differently than any other game. I want to go out there and win just like everyone else does. I try not to be caught up in the moment. I try just to not think out there, just go ahead and throw. It usually doesn't hit me until after. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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