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AL DIVISION SERIES: TIGERS v ATHLETICSOctober 8, 2012Bob MelvinOAKLAND, CALIFORNIA: Workout Day Q. Would you talk about the difficulty for opposing teams to play here when it's full and loud and what's the advantage of the Oakland A's? BOB MELVIN: Well, it is full and it's loud. And we saw that last weekend of the season, I think it really, really helped us. They were involved. And even earlier in the season when I've often said if there's 10 or 15 in here, it sounds like it's 30. And when this place is packed it's about as loud as it gets. So it has an effect on us. We appreciate it. Q. What do you expect to see from Brett tomorrow, considering the time he's been off? BOB MELVIN: You know what, not too many limitations. We'll see how it goes. We'll play it by ear. I don't think we're going to do anything too strict as far as his pitch counts go. We're just going to see every inning how he feels and monitor that. Adrenaline kicks in and sometimes you have more in the tank than you normally would after a little bit of time off. Q. Bob, you played that very tough road trip at the end of the season before coming home, and you had games similar to the ones you just played in Detroit. How much does that experience and considering what you did after that, how much does that do for you now? BOB MELVIN: Yeah, I think that was the way it was for us basically the last month or so. We played some very dramatic games that we lost and were able to come back and win the next day. Our mantra has been let's play for the day, let's not worry about tomorrow. If we have a nice win we'll ride the momentum of that. If we have a loss, we'll separate and put it aside and go out and play. And this group has been about as good a group of doing that as I've ever been around. Q. Obviously the strikeout total was high during the regular season. Did you like your club's approach during the first two games or are there things maybe you want to see tomorrow? BOB MELVIN: You know, we tend to strikeout a little. And we did the first couple of games. It didn't stand out to me. You have a guy like Justin Verlander you're going to strikeout some. And Fister was good, too. He had that run back sinker off the left handers inside. So it's been something that we've, again, we've had a few of them. So we'll continue to swing the bats like we have. We're one swing away from driving in a couple runs here in this ballpark. It's worked well for us. It's not like the last day you're going to say today let's work on cutting our swing down and choke up two inches on two strikes. We're going to play what got us here. Q. I probably asked you each of the last couple of days about Jonny Gomes. But looking at the splits, are you considering him starting? BOB MELVIN: I don't know. It's a tough one. Where? He and Smitty have been the platoon there. Smitty is 6 for 13 with two home runs off of them tomorrow. It's always difficult not to get Jonny in. It's difficult not to get Chris Carter in. But, you know, we're planning it a certain way, and there's a good chance that we're going to continue to do that. Q. Jim Leyland just came in here and pretty much made it clear that he's sure that Alburquerque was not intending to offend. BOB MELVIN: Right. Q. The Detroit Tigers aren't about that. Do you take that to heart? BOB MELVIN: You know what, I respect Jim Leyland about as much as I respect anyone. I think there are varying degrees to all that stuff, showmanship, whatever. We were accused of something in New York that was going on in our dugout. I think everybody has different takes on that. I don't think there's one right or wrong way. Emotionally after a game when something like that happens you're always going to hear something from somebody. But you move on. It's not a big deal for me. Q. You saw plenty of Sanchez in the National League? BOB MELVIN: Yeah. Q. At least enough to know who he is. Pitching very well again now after a little stumble early. Do you see anything from him lately that you have not seen in the past? BOB MELVIN: I think with most guys that have a track record like him it's confidence. You get a couple of games going in the right direction and then you feed off of that. I don't see anything different in his repertoire to an extent. He has some pitches you have to deal with to begin with. It's not like he's a two‑pitch guy. I think it's probably more confidence than anything. I haven't been around him. We did face him, I think it was the last game of the series. So we do have some recent history with him. We're trying to put everything aside and just go out and do what we do best tomorrow. Q. You talked about the strikeouts and the way it's been all year. What does it say about this team's personality, sort of the way you guys approach hitting? BOB MELVIN: I think it probably fits in with not the way we approach hitting, but just kind of the style that we play. But I think every team, there's no perfect teams. Every team is going to have deficiencies in a certain area. That's one that's probably not our most prideful stat, yet we work around it. Q. They've done a pretty good job containing your middle of the lineup guys so far. How important do you see that those guys get rolling for you, and how confident are you they can get it going? BOB MELVIN: It's two games. Things can change very quickly in one game. I think when you look at how guys were handled or whatever, a two‑game lack of production, I think that's a pretty small sample size. We're going to be just as confident no matter what happened those last couple of games. Q. Each of the guys who are sort of your end of the bullpen gave up runs, albeit not entirely their own fault. It's like the first time I think maybe that that's happened in one game. Is there ‑‑ is it just an odd coincidence or do you know, do you think that it has to do with the amount of work that they've done? BOB MELVIN: No, they had, what, three days off before that game. So they were all rested and ready to go. It just happened. I didn't even know that, that that was the first time, if that's the case, that they were ‑‑ Q. I haven't looked it up. BOB MELVIN: No one is going to be perfect. You're not going to run the table and be perfect over the course of the whole season. And they got us. You've got to give them credit for getting us. But that's not going to affect those guys tomorrow, not at all. And I think the fact that they did get rest benefited them and all the velocities were there, all of them made good pitches at times. Certainly Doolittle made a good pitch on Cabrera, if that ball is caught it's a different story, and you never know how it's going to play out after that. Q. The play in which Coco was run out at the plate. How did you feel about how that transpired? BOB MELVIN: To me that was an easy send. Coco is always prepared to go on any ball hit to the outfield. He gets good jumps, made a good slide. It was a perfect throw and a great tag, and it was as close as it can be. Whenever it's that close, you never fault something like that. And we are aggressive. Coco is very aggressive. I think it was the right call all around, they just made a great play. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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