Dusty Baker Ball Quotations

I have learned from hamstrings that when a guy says he feels good, you give him a couple extra days. Invariably, you top a ball and have to beat it out. It happens every time.

Guys are throwing the ball well. We've just got to cut down on the walks. It seems like we walk somebody and they score.

He was going to third, but the runner had beaten him because the ball was high. He decided to throw to first, but it was too late.

His velocity appears to be up, his location was good. I'm sure he's not happy about not covering first base. He's been working on it, and we've been making him very conscious of it, but the way he falls off, I don't know, it just looks like he has a lapse or something. Other than that, he threw the ball good.

He's got the legs (to be a power hitter). We know he can hit the ball to right field, he's got a good eye for the strike zone and he can run and he's making fine progress for a young man who came out of Double-A.

He's been throwing the ball pretty good. He's been better in relief than starting. He enjoys the role and wants to go on every trip, which is rare. He wants to go in case he can get in a game.

He moves the ball around and works the ball on the outside part of the plate. He throws two or three different speeds off his fastball and keeps you off balance.

He looked happy. If he looks happy, there's a chance he threw the ball pretty good.

He expects the ball to be hit back to him and he gets in good position. He reminds me of a guy I used to play with, Fernando Valenzuela . They expect the ball to be hit back at them and they practice it. Perfect practice makes perfect results.

He doesn't fool around out there, does he? He gets the ball and throws it. This guy learned how to put different pressure points on the ball to make the ball move. This guy is the best I've ever seen.

I think the main problem was he couldn't feel the ball in his fingers. I guess it's cold, and the ball is a little slicker when it's cold, and he really couldn't feel it. Consequently, he starts trying to drop down, different things to try to command the strike zone, and he had trouble commanding the strike zone.

It could have been decided in the first inning. If we put the ball in play there, we could have scored a whole bunch of runs.

We couldn't get the ball down today. The ball was up and the location wasn't where he wanted it. Power hitters -- when you get the ball up and over the heart of the plate -- you're going to get hurt.

We executed that cutoff play perfectly. That was a very athletic play. That ball went into the gap, and it was obvious that they were going to send him. It was a perfect hop, a perfect throw and a perfect tag.

You've got to throw strikes. That's with most young guys. Throw strikes, throw quality strikes. Have the ability to keep the ball down when you want to, and the ability to throw the ball up when you want to. When you throw the ball outside, you don't want it to creep back inside. The main thing is just relax. Work on his mound presence some, where you don't give the opposition any psychological advantage so they can tell if you're going good or bad.

You would think over the course of a winter -- actually three winters, two winters -- that guys would come back strong and healthy, which hasn't been the case. Woody had a little setback with his knee, but his arm is doing well. He's throwing the ball great. Hopefully, Woody will be ready soon. How soon we don't know. We have Wade Miller coming on pretty strong. We just have to pull our belts a little tighter and do what we have to do.

(Zambrano) struggled early. He made a couple young mistakes. I guess that comes with young players. He started working his breaking ball and had them off-balance. In the sixth and seventh, he probably had his best stuff. Fortunately, we got a couple runs in the top of the seventh.

Sometimes he has great command of the strike zone, and the next time ... It's a matter of being more consistent. He is throwing the ball good.

This is the best ball we've played the whole year.

I like his approach. Anybody who can hit the ball up the middle and to the opposite field is going to hit. He'll learn how to hit with power. If he can hit balls to right field, he has power.

If you can catch a ball in Minnesota, you can catch it anywhere.

The ball is flying out of this ballpark, and ordinarily it doesn't. It's strange for here.

The ball kept coming over the heart of the plate. It was supposed to be outside and it caught too much of the plate. He threw a lot of pitches (105) in a short period of time.

That first inning has cost him a lot of pitches. He's been throwing so many pitches the last three starts, that's why we took him out. After the first inning, he started throwing the ball better. He had a lot of deep counts, a lot of 3-2 counts. Those pitches mount up.

He's strong. He's going to love Wrigley Field. He has tremendous sock to left field and to left-center. He doesn't hit the ball up in the air. He keeps it relatively low. The ball jumps off his bat. So far I like his swing. He can hit that fastball, which is where it starts.

He's throwing the ball great. We just can't go to him when it means something yet. I have to talk to (general manager Jim Hendry ) and we have to figure this thing out, because we're not out of it yet.

He throws strikes, he's not afraid. He doesn't pitch away from the bat. He knows how to pitch. He has three good pitches. He's still trying to get a feel of his breaking ball some. He's been impressive. It's the first time I've seen him and I like what I see.

He said he could go one more. But you could see he was laboring out there, throwing the ball high,

He's lost some valuable time and he's lost some valuable experience in there. We don't know if he's quite back to where he was before, even though he's throwing the ball very good.

He threw the ball pretty good. He was better the second inning than the first. The important thing was, he was on the mound. I thought he did pretty good.

The bullpen hasn't gone the way we scripted. Guys were going two innings and you can't use them the next day. They told me Aardsma was throwing the heck out of the ball in Triple-A.

The field's a lot faster than ours. That ball got to him a lot quicker than he expected. We'll try to get him some more time at second base, especially with the split squad coming up here.

For a while it didn't look too good because we were hitting the ball hard and on the nose, but right at people. We scored when we had to and the bullpen did a good job.

It's one of the best trades you don't make. Walker made some fine defensive plays tonight. He's hitting the ball outstanding.

They are both throwing the ball good. It's just a matter of location most of the time. I'm confident it will come. They've pitched well in the past, so why wouldn't they pitch well in the present and future? I'm not too worried. You want them to be in great form right now, but we do have some time. They have a couple of starts left.

They're playing hard. Corey circled the ball and missed and, like I said, we just played bad defense today.

He puts pressure on the opposition. He brings a different dimension to our lineup so we can play small ball and set up the guys behind him to play long ball as well.

If he keeps throwing the ball like that, there'll be no problem.