As seen on FS Wisconsin:
Did he expect Randy Wolf to settle into today's game?
Well, we were certainly hoping he would. There's been a lot of outings this year where he's scuffled in the first inning, then turned it around and really got us into six, seven innings. So that's what we were hoping to do.
Why has Wolf struggled vs the Diamondbacks?
Yeah, I don't think it has anything to do with the D-Backs. I think when Wolfie gets in trouble his location isn't there, and you saw that in the first inning his location was all over and getting behind in the count. Like I said, sometimes he gets a little off in the first inning and then he'll straighten it out and end up throwing a real nice ball game.
Why didn't Wolf throw more fastballs?
Well, I think just looking at what we need to do with some of these guys he thought the off speed was what he needed to do. I think curveballs were all down in the zone early and he couldn't throw them for strikes but I think Wolfie, when he throws well, he needs to establish the curveball, he needs to establish the changeup, and he had trouble doing that and that'ss what was getting him behind in the count but this is a good hitting team, we can't just go at them with fastballs. You've to be able to mix up your pitches and get ahead in the count.
Surprised how badly they lost in Arizona?
Yeah, these two games are certainly not typical of what we've done all year, I think Yo coming back and pitching Friday should be good for us, but I think sometimes you get in situations where you come out early, you try to make pitches and like I said, you try to establish some off speed stuff and you get behind in the counts, you've gotta come in with some fastballs and you get hurt on them.
Were these games decided by the team that pitched better?
Well, they have. Our two lefties didn't throw well today. The other guys threw the ball ok but this is a good team and when you open up holes for them they're gonna take advantage. And we didn't pitch well and they hit very well.
How do you stay loose in the face of this?
Well they still know we're coming back home, we're confident in what we do at home. We've got Yo pitching, which everybody's comfortable with, and I really liked the way we swung the bat today. I think we've been swinging the bat well except for yesterday, but three out of the four games I really liked the way we swung the bat. Today we had a chance to score a lot more runs, a couple of big hits when we have bases loaded and we score a lot more runs today. So really it was the two lefties today that had trouble.
Bad luck today?
Yeah, breaks are what you need. A lot of times when you're playing well you get the breaks but they're earning it. They're playing really well and they're earning some good at bats, putting the ball right through the hole. Cowgill today pinch hits, and that was a big at bat, and he hits a ground ball and it's perfectly placed between third and short and they come home with two runs there. So that was a big at bat. On our end, Corey Hart just misses a ball, when it left the bat we thought it's got a chance, but that's...sometimes just because you're playing so well you get them.
Did he see enough from Wolf in the second to let him pitch the third?
Well, that's it and also trying to get through the game. When you get behind that many runs early you've got to pinch hit in the spots they come up. If you go to the bullpen guy right away, that at bat's going to come up and then you've got to decide, "ok, we're five runs down, or whatever you are, are we going to send up our pitcher to hit?" And I don't know if that's a good way to go about it. So that's what gets tough is, in the third inning, trying to decide to leave Wolf in there or not, we know he's coming up third in the lineup and we know we need to hit, we need to score runs to catch up: We can't just keep throwing zeroes up there and catch up.
Can this team draw something from adversity?
Boy I definitely think so. We've been through losing streaks and come back and played real well. We've had a lot of series there at the end where we didn't play so well and bounce right back and have a great series. So this team is resilent. They're gonna come out and we're gonna play hard and I expect us to have a real good game on Friday.
What's he seeing from Rickie Weeks in this series?
Well, Rickie's seeing the ball well, when he's getting his pitch he's putting a good swing on it and just missing them. I keep thinking he's gonna get one of these balls and he's just missing it. But he feels good swinging, and I do like a lot of his swings, but he's just not squaring them up like he is when he's going well.