AL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES: ANGELS v TWINS

October 11, 2002

Mike Scioscia

MIKE SCIOSCIA: Those are two big plays for us, obviously. Alex is a terrific defensive outfielder. Got a great read on it, ran a great route to the ball and made a superb catch. Garret, with two strikes, pinched a little bit, was able to get to that ball. Same thing with Garret, two big plays. Percy made some terrific pitches.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: It's all right.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: Troy's -- when he's swinging the bat well, he'll use the whole field. At least stay on the ball longer where he's not pulling off it. It actually started back in Minnesota in Game 2 where he drove the ball well to the right side. Not that it's going -- not that he has to hit the ball right side, but when he stays on the ball, he's got the potential to drive the ball that way. That's just an indication he's swinging the ball well.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: Troy finished the season really on a strong note, had a good September, drove in a lot of runs. I think it's a carryover. He went through a real tough stretch for a couple months in the middle of the summer. But he stayed with it, kept working with it, was still driving in some key runs for us. Then we put it together later. He was very, very productive. And he's really carried that over. He's gotten some huge hits for us last month of the season and now, obviously, in the playoffs.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: Well, guys aren't going to be able to do it every night. The first couple nights, obviously, Garret wasn't getting his hits to fall in, as some other guys in our club weren't. Those guys have a fine core of pitchers and they made some tough pitches early. Tonight, Milton pitched -- he just pitched a heck of a game. He didn't make many mistakes. But one of them was a fastball he didn't get where he wanted to with Garret and Garret didn't miss it. So, I think that's -- Garret, if he's going to get a chance to put a good swing off the ball and hit it hard, more times than not he does and tonight he did it off of Milton.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: I think we have, first of all, as far as who we wanted to pitch before Percy, I still -- we have a lot of confidence in what Web can do and what Brendan Donnelly can do and Schoeneweis if it's not the right matchup. Not automatically Frankie. He's pitching obviously as well as anyone would expect under the circumstances of a rookie coming up. We have a lot of confidence in him being able to continue that. Jarrod Washburn starting the eighth, we had talked about it, especially with Koskie leading off. Jarrod was starting to get his pitch count, had to work hard for his outs. I think after the long inning, bottom of the seventh, we had an extremely long inning where Garret ended out flying out to the wall in right. I just felt if we were going to start with somebody, it would be better to start with Frankie instead of bring him in if somebody was already on base.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: I think you look at both sides, I think both clubs are matched up very well on the mound with the bullpens. Our guys are doing a heck of a job of keeping us in games. If you look at the first, first game was a 2-1 loss. We held on for 6-3 win in Game 2, won here 2-1. You have to get that type of pitching if you're going to be successful. And for the first three games here, you can't ask much more from what we've done on the mound. That has to continue. We've got to keep giving ourselves the opportunity to play our style of game and to eventually put pressure on clubs and our way to do it is put some zeros up and see if we can stay in games. Our guys have been great at that.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: Not really. I think if you're going to look at every game, every game is big. I don't think there's any more or less pressure on the games that we're talking about. You have to win four games to win this series. We know it's going to be tough. I don't think that we were looking at it as a must-win at all because we have Jarrod going. They have arguably the best guy in their staff throwing even though he went through some stretches in the middle, but Milton is incredible for those guys. We knew it was going to be a great matchup. I don't look at it as a game that you had to have. If we had not come out on top tonight, we're still very much in this series as Minnesota is still very much in this series. I don't think it's swinging to that direction yet. I think when you get down to a must-win, I think it's facing elimination in this series.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: I think on the line drive that Eck hit off of Rivas' glove, Figgins is reacting to Ron. Ron made the right call at third base. It was going to be, I think with one out, it was going to be a situation where if the throw was decent, it's going to beat Figgy. Then you're relying on him to try to beat a tag. On the ball in the dirt, the ball deflected towards -- a little bit towards him at first where he didn't have depth. If the ball is going away for you or coming towards you, it's a tough read. Fig has good instincts there. If the angle was different, you would have seen him score on that ball. But it was -- there was no question of the instincts that Shaun Figgins has to run the bases. We have a lot of confidence in him.

MIKE SCIOSCIA: I could see him put his hand down. I knew it was close. But I think the tag got him just before he got his hand in. I haven't seen a replay yet, but I know it was close.