Francona on Dale and Holley: Daisuke to the 'pen not happening
By: DJ Bean
Red Sox manager Terry Francona, appearing in his weekly segment on the Dale & Holley Show (with Mike Felger filling in for Dale Arnold), touched on many topics Wednesday at noon, with Daisuke Matsuzaka being a topic of note.
Francona on why he doesn't feel sending Matsuzaka to the bullpen would be beneficial:
"My first thought was that if we tell him that we're putting him in long relief that's probably not going to build his confidence a whole lot. You know, there's a lot of things to think about. When you put a guy in the bullpen, who comes out of the bullpen? When you send a guy to the bullpen, how does he react to the bullpen? Daisuke is typically our guy who takes the longest to warm up, that's a given. He goes out there a good 45-50 minutes before the game and throws a lot, so is that going to work? If you put a guy in the bullpen and he hasn't pitched a lot in three weeks and you need a starter is he capable of throwing a lot of pitches? I think there's a lot of things to look at besides just the obvious which has been performance which we can't allow ourselves to look past. We've got an obligation to try to keep this team going and there's a lot of variables. We can't just get caught up in what the fans and [media] are caught up in because we'll make some poor decisions."
Francona also talked about David Ortiz finally coming into some luck:
"If you're consistent, you put the bat on the ball, you're going to get your hits, you're going line out. The luck will even out."
The conversation rounded out with talk about Major League Baseball's attempt at cleaning up the game in light of big-name players testing positive for performance-enhancing drugs:
"What's happened in the past with baseball [is that] they've tried almost desperately to get it right and you can't undo what happened. We have to figure out a way to make it better, but I think the mistakes were made a long time ago."
By: DJ Bean
Red Sox manager Terry Francona, appearing in his weekly segment on the Dale & Holley Show (with Mike Felger filling in for Dale Arnold), touched on many topics Wednesday at noon, with Daisuke Matsuzaka being a topic of note.
Francona on why he doesn't feel sending Matsuzaka to the bullpen would be beneficial:
"My first thought was that if we tell him that we're putting him in long relief that's probably not going to build his confidence a whole lot. You know, there's a lot of things to think about. When you put a guy in the bullpen, who comes out of the bullpen? When you send a guy to the bullpen, how does he react to the bullpen? Daisuke is typically our guy who takes the longest to warm up, that's a given. He goes out there a good 45-50 minutes before the game and throws a lot, so is that going to work? If you put a guy in the bullpen and he hasn't pitched a lot in three weeks and you need a starter is he capable of throwing a lot of pitches? I think there's a lot of things to look at besides just the obvious which has been performance which we can't allow ourselves to look past. We've got an obligation to try to keep this team going and there's a lot of variables. We can't just get caught up in what the fans and [media] are caught up in because we'll make some poor decisions."
Francona also talked about David Ortiz finally coming into some luck:
"If you're consistent, you put the bat on the ball, you're going to get your hits, you're going line out. The luck will even out."
The conversation rounded out with talk about Major League Baseball's attempt at cleaning up the game in light of big-name players testing positive for performance-enhancing drugs:
"What's happened in the past with baseball [is that] they've tried almost desperately to get it right and you can't undo what happened. We have to figure out a way to make it better, but I think the mistakes were made a long time ago."
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