Dusty Baker Game Quotations

One of the hardest things in this game is a fallen star. When a guy accepts the position that he's in in his career, it makes it easier on a manager and coaches and very beneficial to the guys on the team.

I didn't have any choice because I had a short bullpen. If we tied the game up, and I'm out of pitchers, where I have to hit for them -- I only have five guys. That's why I double-switched, to get the most innings out of the guys pitching without running out of pitchers and running out of position players.

He didn't want to come out of the game. He said he was OK, but they all say they're OK. I don't know how he is, we'll talk to the doctors and go from there.

He's just keeping up with (Curt) Schilling. They're both 3-0. His main thing is strike one. When you get strike one, then you can do a lot of things - inside, outside, up and down. The name of the game is control. He was great.

I was watching a game the other night, and in between the innings, a goat ran across the screen. I thought that was the craziest thing I've ever seen in my life. Or vote 1-800-Which Curse is Stronger, the Goat or the Curse of the Babe. It's crazy.

I talked to him the other day because he was pressing a little bit already. I told him to just relax. It's the same game he played in Venezuela. We have to eliminate the pressures of the amount of people and TV and radio, simplify things and say, 'Hey, man, it's baseball.

It hurts us not to play Friday night games. We got home late Thursday from Puerto Rico and had to play a day game the next day on the 12th. We can get home at 1 o'clock not fall asleep until two and have to be back up at eight while the other team has been here. They are in bed before we even get home.

That was huge tonight, to get back to 2-2. We definitely wanted and needed the game tonight to start the Series all over again. We certainly didn't want to go down 3-1 then have to win three in a row.

We were told he would pitch sometime in that first game -- possibly.

I've seen some greats leave the game. You never want to see them leave and you'd rather see them leave on their terms and leave on top. It's not over with yet. You don't know if somebody is going to offer Sammy a job here soon or what is going to happen. But Sammy has been one of the great players of the game for a long time and a guy who meant a lot to Chicago and a lot to the game. ... I just hope he gets a job somewhere.

It was a perfect scenario, too -- day game after night game.

You get a good setup man and sooner or later someone is going to want him as a closer. You got a good middle guy and you or somebody is going want him to be a setup man. You see bullpen guys move in this game more than any other players.

They're still going to follow us here. We just kind of messed that game up tonight.

There are going to be some times when all of them will have to come off the bench. To me, that will keep all of them ready to come in the game at any minute.

I've got a game plan. Some of it depends on how healthy Todd feels, how his legs feel. He's still recuperating from last year at the end of the year. With the hard ground down here, it puts pressure on your legs.

He started out not very sharp and he had 37 pitches in the first inning. That's almost three innings worth and we were debating whether or not to send him out in the seventh or not but he wanted to pitch and he ended the game strong.

It's the same with pitching. You talk to Greg Maddux and I'm sure he has a game plan, but he also sometimes can feel when a guy is looking inside or if a guy is looking for something else or it depends on which pitch he takes and how he takes it. Some guys get it early, some guys get it late, some guys never get it.

It's not over with yet. You don't know if somebody is going to offer Sammy a job here soon or what is going to happen. But Sammy has been one of the great players of the game for a long time and a guy who meant a lot to Chicago and a lot to the game. . . . I just hope he gets a job somewhere.

It's a big game. It's a very important game for us.