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May 19, 2014 The Week in QuotesMay 13-19JOSE FERNANDEZ GOES UNDER THE KNIFE “They said [the tear] was clean and his elbow looked very good aside from the torn ligament. Hopefully we can get that repaired and get him back on the road to recovery. This is a surgery so there's obviously risk, but with the technology and the success rate of the Tommy John procedure, we're hopeful he'll come back and be better than ever and comparable to the Jose we've seen perform the last year-plus.” “While pitching during the recent Dodgers game in Miami, he was struck by a ball on his rear thigh. This prompted a completely unanticipated change in delivery, which neither the staff nor his coaches could discern… Despite many exchanges on the subject in the days that followed he felt that with the Marlins regaining first place in the division he could not let his team down. Apparently the injury was worse than he believed.” “I don't think so. Jose has pretty big thighs. I don't think it affected him. He looked the same to me that game.” DANNY DUFFY CARRIES PERFECTO INTO SEVENTH INNING “My defense—my defense played a great game. A lot of hard-hit shots at the boys and they stayed right in there. Gordo [Alex Gordon] made a spectacular play in left and I just tried to execute and do my best to get outs, and it clicked tonight.” “Once you get to the fifth inning, you start thinking, ‘Hey, I’m going to put my body on the line to try to preserve this for Duffy, or whoever’s pitching. I guarantee all eight position players were thinking the same thing.’”—Royals outfielder Alex Gordon, who kept Duffy’s no-hit bid alive with a diving catch of Nick Markakis’s line drive in the seventh inning. (Andy McCullough, Kansas City Star) “He was throwing strike after strike. That’s Danny Duffy’s ceiling right there. He’s capable of doing that every time he goes out.” “He’s got the stuff of a No. 1. Now does he have the makeup and the mental fortitude do be a No. 1? Will he allow himself mentally to be a no. 1? That’s the question.” “He was some kind of special tonight,” “I don't care about all that. But I just don't want to see it done against my team." “I heard somebody say, ‘This is the type of feel for a perfect game.' And then right after that someone said, ‘Jonesy is about to rip one right here.' And you could just feel it.” “We lost. Doesn't matter how you lose, 50-1 or 1-0. A loss is a loss and they all [stink]. But give some credit to the other side. But we can take the lead in the series 3-1 [on Sunday], so no need to cry about it.” THE REST “It doesn't get any bigger than playing in the World Series against them. I think that was something that I think the whole city was pulling for, going to the playoffs that year. Then for us to get the opportunity to play that exciting series; we won that series, but a lot of those games could've gone either way… There's been a lot of history, starting from 1997 when Interleague play started, all the excitement about Yankees-Mets, and it doesn't get any bigger than the World Series.” ‘‘The kid’s been amazing for Chicago. He likes to work. I can see that before the game, during his drills in the outfield. Every time, he’s getting better. Every day. So far, so good. I think he’s a great catcher. When I came up my first [few] years, I got some good advice from some really good guys. So I’m just trying to give [Castillo] some advice, too. He deserves it. He can call a great game. Got a good arm, quick, good feet, can hit. He can hit 10 to 20 home runs someday. And he’s smart—real smart—and works hard.’’ “I didn't know until someone told me. You're just trying to plug away, throw strikes and get through the inning. I know A.J. [Burnett] and I have done it [this season], so we might have to push so Cliff [Lee] might be able to do it someday.” “He’s still sore. It’s one of those things where hopefully the cortisone shot works, but it’s got to be where he’s not really feeling anything for us to even get to the point where he’s swinging a bat. It looks like we’re four or five days away from that, so it makes no sense to keep playing short.. We’re hoping it’s not an issue; if it is an issue, it’s an issue we’ll just have to deal with and take care of,” Cashman said. “When he’s out there, we need him to be out there healthy so he can perform. The worst thing we want is that in-between stuff where he’s trying to get through something that’s not allowing it. That’s the no man’s land none of us want to be in.” “It doesn't really make my toes tingle. But sometimes you've just got to do something a little different. It's better than doing the same thing you were doing. At some point when we start rocking and rolling offensively, I think we'll go back to a more traditional [lineup]. It's just something we're trying.” “If a guy’s confidence is down, does he then begin to try a little harder? Does he try to hit for power more? Does his swing become a little bit longer? Those are all possibilities. Right now, Jackie might be pressing a little bit, and we’re seeing a little bit more length to the swing than we saw earlier in the season.” “Make contact. It’s one of those things where I’m going through something I’ve never really been used to. I really prided myself on at least putting the ball in play. I normally didn’t strike out as much as I have the past few go-rounds. I’m still a work in progress. I’m going to continue to work and I’m going to get better.” “No, I'm not happy about it. It's not like it just goes unnoticed. Obviously I want to win. Being a starting pitcher, you have a big say on how the game turns out. If my record isn't where I want it to be, obviously I have to do a better job.” “You know when someone’s walking behind you and you can feel it? I knew that wall was there and I just said, ‘Forget it. All or nothing.’ You usually have that point where you’re running after the ball and then a voice says, ‘Hold up,’ like a normal human being. And I guess in that moment, I said, ‘I’m a superhero.’ I didn’t feel like one afterward.” “Tell you what, he looks confident. He wants to be here and to show that he belongs here. Guys that can do what he does, they constantly put pressure on the opponents because when he gets on base he’s tough to stop. And he’s a tremendous outfielder; I think one day he could win a Gold Glove, he’s as good as anybody out there… He can do a lot of things. Now it’s just playing, get a little more experience. He’s still working the kinks out of his swing, and when he gets that there’s no telling how good he can be. We’re sure glad he’s here.” "I've always said good catchers get under the hitter, and so they're susceptible to backswings. The closer you are to the plate, you get strike calls. There's a grading system out there now that monitors catchers who get called strikes. He's at the top of the group." “We haven't officially called it a pulled hammy. Ronnie [head athletic trainer Ron Porterfield] just said it's really sore, and to lift it or attempt to run with it would be very difficult, so we'll play it very cautious, but if we need to use him we will. … It's not awful, but it is debilitating right now.” “I obviously don’t feel good. Nobody with the desire to play would feel good about this. With God’s favor, we’ll do whatever is best. If that’s taking some time off or whatever, we’ll do it if we need to. But the main thing is to get back in the field healthy.” —White Sox outfielder Jose Abreu, who was placed on the disabled list with an ankle injury. (Colleen Kane, Chicago Tribune) “I only hit one home run in high school. I had really perfected the bloop single over first base. I’m not much of a hitter and I never hit in college. Wainwright (hitting .381), makes it look easy, but we take batting practice every day. You can help yourself win games sometimes by getting bunts down and driving in people when you have the opportunity.” “You just have to strengthen all the muscles up again. Then once you can get over the mental block of that flinch or that take or something like that, that's the last step. Games are right after that… It's not lingering as much as I thought and I think that's why we're ahead of schedule and feeling good.” “Every year he’s getting better. He knows what he’s doing. He pitched a very strong eight innings.” “Wherever they play me, they play me. If they give me that big of a hole, it just makes sense [to bunt] sometimes.” “It's not what I want to do. It's not really a good example for kids and it makes me look like a [jerk]. But at the same time, you come here and you grind every day, you work and you're trying to stay in [at-bats] and help your team win a ballgame. Things like that can boil over real quick.” “That’s just the luck of the draw. Yesterday I didn’t have any luck. Today I threw a lot worse pitches than yesterday, and I get two outs out of it. That’s baseball.” “We're going to push Soriano's arm, we have for the four years that I've been here, and he made a good throw. We're going to push Gardner's arm, he made a good throw. Those, you hate to run into, but they're chances you want to take when you're not getting those big hits with runners in scoring position to try to push yourself across the plate or get yourself in scoring position.” “Going back down I realized I wasn’t doing much with my feet. When I came back I wanted to make sure that speed was a main element to work with. Even though my swing is coming around I still have to make sure that people know I can run, that I can do things with my feet. That’s what I’m here for.” “I learned the media controls a lot of things and the only question that you guys were writing in the off-season was what they were going to do behind the plate, when obviously the pitching was something that needed to be addressed. But I was the only question because I was the villain of the team… I think the media made me out to be a monster — I wasn’t. They changed a lot of things that I said or made up stories. So I thought that that was a big thing that went down. I learned how much media does control things.”
Nick Bacarella is an author of Baseball Prospectus. 0 comments have been left for this article.
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