Jim Tracy Chance Quotations

Obviously, that's the hot topic these days. I've done everything I possibly can to keep Freddy involved, and he has responded big-time. You have to get Freddy at-bats, but you also have to give those other guys a chance to jump-start themselves.

He's done a great job and he's really shown me he has a chance to be a very special player. He's a tremendous talent.

(Playing the Dodgers) is kind of special. It was five years that I spent there. In my opinion they were five very special years. There were a lot of very special things we accomplished there. There were things that some people thought we were never going to have a chance to do, but we did.

I think you bring the best out of your players when you sit and study and look very closely at what their capabilities are and then try to find situations where their talents have the best chance to come out,

I think he has a chance be a terrific offensive player. But part of becoming a great offensive player is having a full understanding of the strike zone and understand what pitchers try to do to him in certain situations. The only way you get to that point is you keep carrying the bat to the plate.

It has a chance to look like that.

We're not quitting, that's for sure. We've been in every single game and we've had a chance to win every single game.

Did the starting pitcher give you a chance every fifth day to go out there and win? -- that's the biggest element I look at. (Santos) was pretty good at that last year.

You better believe he's having a terrific spring. He has a chance to be a real player at the major-league level.

We had something going on in the fifth, it looked like we had a chance to get back in the game, but they cut the inning off. We took some good at-bats off him, we created some opportunity for ourselves ... but from watching him, he's got a crisp fastball and his breaking ball also is very sharp.

Back in May, when the Padres went something like 22-6, they had a chance to slam the door, throw the lock around the handle and close it off for everybody else. And it didn't happen. So it's not a matter of anybody putting on any type of serious charge thus far, it's a matter of teams just winning some games here and there.

I like challenges. I like it when people say, 'You don't have a chance to succeed there.'

I'm not saying things would have necessarily been different if Sean was in the lineup but I think it would have helped to have a hitter who combined to strike out less 100 times over the last two seasons up in the situation. You need to make contact with a man on second and none out, and I think Sean would have given us a great chance of doing that.

Challenges are something that I like very, very much, ... I like hearing people say or maybe think that this is a situation you don't have a chance to succeed in, I'm very challenged by that.

The challenge is something I like very much, ... I take a lot of pride in people saying this is a situation where you don't have a chance to succeed. I'm really challenged by that.

You don't want to get too overly involved in velocity at this point. You want to give him a chance to stretch his arm out.