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NL DIVISION SERIES: GIANTS v REDS


October 7, 2012


Dusty Baker


SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA: Game Two

Cincinnati – 9
San Francisco – 0


Q.  You gave several reasons for why you picked Bronson for this night, but maybe you didn't see this coming, huh?
DUSTY BAKER:  No, but, you know, Bronson has been‑‑ well, you know, we have four‑‑ four or five guys that were throwing well down the stretch and Bronson, he flirted with a no‑hitter a couple of starts ago.  He's been throwing the ball well, and I just thought him and this ballpark and this for giving ballpark, you know, would be right for him, even though he hadn't‑‑ I don't think he had won a game here.
He was great.  He had his breaking ball working, his fastball, he located it well.  Him and Hanigan worked well together, and just seemed like they were on the same page.  Once we got those early runs, he seemed to get tougher.

Q.  You're up significantly in this series, you guys are comfortable, but I would imagine Game 3 is critical for you guys, you feel like that's a very important game, talk about how important it is to close.
DUSTY BAKER:  You're not comfortable at all until it's over.  We've been there before.  It's hard to take the last breath out of anything, and that is their last breath and they're trying to get a hole, win Game 3, then Game 4, and it's back to even so we're trying to stop it from getting back to even, you know, any kind of momentum.
It's very important and it's important that we try to end it, if we can, especially with our situation with Johnny Cueto, that would buy us some more time.  It's always important to try to get it over with as soon as you can.

Q.  Could you talk about the offense coming to life out here after a long‑‑ about a month of not having much offense?
DUSTY BAKER:  Yeah, our pitching carried us the last month of the season, and sometimes you go through periods of streaks where you're not scoring runs or you're not finding holes, not having very good at‑bats.
Just seems like once somebody starts hitting then it's contagious throughout your lineup.  That's what happened.  Brandon started hitting in this series, Ryan Ludwick hadn't had much success off the tough left‑hander tonight.  Joey Votto, once everybody starts hitting feels like everybody is going to hit.
There are some times when you can't buy runs and there are other times that you can score runs at will.  If I knew why and the secret of that, then I‑‑ I might really make a lot of money.

Q.  Some of your players on the 2010 team said that experience is making a big difference between what's happening now and back then they were more just happy to be there.  Can you address the experience factor?
DUSTY BAKER:  Yes, I think it's big.  Once you've been there and then you can‑‑ you know what it's like.  You can say, when I get there I'm going to be like this or that, but you really don't know until you get there.  Back then when we got swept by the Phillies, we were playing one of the best teams we'd ever seen in modern baseball from pitching staffs to speed to hitting, to everything.
There are a couple of things that happened in those games where we lost the ball in the lights, a couple of other plays and that's all they needed to get‑‑ to sweep us.  We're just older‑‑ we're all older, younger‑‑ some of 'em are younger, but experience helps.

Q.  You talked about maybe this part suiting Arroyo in this series.  Did you see that in this first inning, the bat of Angel Pagan went deep.
DUSTY BAKER:  There were a few balls that went deep, Huff hit a ball deep, some of the guys‑‑ I can't remember but this is a very for giving ballpark.  It's one of the most for giving ballparks, I think, in baseball.  I remember when Barry Bonds was playing here.  We had Smitty and he told Smitty to trust the ballpark.  That's what‑‑ it's a lot easier to pitch here than a lot of places because it's forgiving.

Q.  Can I assume that had you not had the long inning Bronson would have gone back out there?
DUSTY BAKER:  Yeah, yeah, that's safe to say.  But we might have to pitch him on three‑days rest, too.  So at that period of time we had to save him for later.  Plus that long inning we scored a lot of runs.  About time to give some of the other guys a break.

Q.  Can you talk about going home?  Cincinnati is going to be fired up to see you guys, playing in front of the home crowd?
DUSTY BAKER:  I'm looking forward to going home.  Seems like we haven't been home in a long time.  We need some rest.  It's going to be a long night for all of us, and I think we get home at 5:30, 6:00 in the morning.  So let us get rest and then we will worry about that other stuff later. 

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports




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