Kirk Gibson and starting pitcher Josh Collmenter talked after the game on Tuesday, when the Arizona Diamondback rallied in the eighth inning to beat the Milwaukee Brewers 5-3.
Collmenter discussed his spot in the rotation and turning things around now that the spring is done. Gibson discussed Stephen Drew and roster moves.
Josh Collmenter:
On why his performance on Tuesday contrasted his while spring:
"I felt really good. I just got back to basics and felt more like myself. The rhythm and tempo were there and I think that was the big thing I was missing. I was trying too much to try and figure out why things weren't happening and just got back to just getting the baseball and throwing it."
On why he seems to have particular success against the Brewers:
"I think they're just an aggressive club. They swing at a lot of stuff, so especially if you can get ahead of them, then you kind of get them on their toes, and they can swing at pitches they might not want to. They like swinging early, so if you can keep the ball out of the zone early, a lot of times you can have success."
On pitching at Chase Field again:
"Your surrounding puts everything more into perspective that you're gearing up for a season. It takes some of the working on the back fields and stuff out of it. You know it's 'go time' now."
Kirk Gibson:
On Collmenter's outing:
"Yeah, I thought he threw good. He hit a guy 0-2 and then we made an error, but he was throwing a lot of strikes and moving the ball around well. And after his last start we went in and looked at some tape. He went in and looked at it ans saw a little something, kind of how how he was throwing it a little bit. Just searching for that consistency and arm slot."
On Saito's tweaked calf:
"He did it while he was out there stretching. The doctors looked at him and it's really nothing serious. but I kust want to make sure to see what they see in there tomorrow and if there's nothing we'll go from there."
On Stephen Drew and what he has done this spring, and what he still needs to do to get back to playing:
"What we have focused on is pretty much he's taken a ton of ground balls. He's done a lot of resistance running with the rubber cord, and it's extremely intense. There's probably not a lot of guys in the clubhouse that could do it. They'd be gassed. So he's really in good shape that way. We were talking today about the primary lead, the secondary lead then a return back to the base. He did run the bases the other day.
"Just at shortstop, every time that Matty (Matt Williams) throws the ball, he hits it, so in a game, the reality of it is you're doing your pre-pitch, you're getting in to the pitch, and then you're reacting, so we're going to start doing some of that stuff now. Then the gameplan will to get him in some extended stuff with an at-bat, some really light running at the at-bat. No sliding yet. Maybe play a couple of innings or an inning of defense, because that will be quite different. You know sometimes you react to a ball and the guy swings and misses. So it's all a new movement to him.
"Overall, it's the ankle joint -- the ligament, the tendon -- it's great. The bone is healed. Everything is solid there. It's just that the joint sometimes gets inflammation as he goes on. He gets sore. We know how we can take him and have it be a good day. We know how to put him in a bad day. We do some high intensity running and curves and stuff like that. We know he's going to be sore the next day, so the goal is that we can get him doing baseball activities where he's recovering quicker, which he already is. But we don't have a timetable. We;re going to kind of segue into some different activities for Stephen."
