LINK JARRETT: To explain the feeling of sitting up here Friday night is not something I can remotely relay to you. This team's response of playing arguably the best game we've played this year pretty much sums up what's in that dugout. And it's not easy to go to bed after that. It's not a pleasant day.
And to watch them play their best game, that was just a thrill I'll never forget here. And I've had some. That was beyond an experience I've had here and just the response.
And it's hard to say that, wow, you guys have responded all year. That's just your team. Well, when you're in this, it doesn't always tee itself up for you to just go and respond. You have to execute in every phase of the game.
The starting pitcher has to command his stuff. It's got to be good enough stuff to handle the best offensive team or one of the top two in the country in terms of their ability, bat-to-ball skills and athleticism. He had all four pitches going -- fastball, curveball, you landed your slider, was good, and the change-up.
And when he has all of that early and finds it and goes with it, it's exactly what you saw. And when you face those guys in Charlotte, it was a little different story.
So just the toughness to deal with how that relief appearance went in Charlotte that was not good and to respond today with that performance against that team, pretty remarkable.
I think Brian is one of the classiest people in the business. That is a model program. There are certain programs, as you're trying to figure out what you're doing in coaching, that you look to duplicating the things they have done. And that's an A-plus coaching staff.
Their team, frontline, they play the game the right way. So, again, hats off to them. It's not easy to be in this stadium this time of year, and they clearly are regulars.
I thought the fifth inning -- we talk about self-contained relief, if you're going to start games and get through enough of it to really make this a start, I thought the fifth, when he went F7, hit by pitch, walk, right, great play in center field by Williams to lay in on the little soft fly ball and then an L6.
And that's becoming your own relief pitcher. If you can't do that, you're not going to be in the conversation to pitch six or seven or eight innings of a game. So, huge.
And I think sometimes the momentum that you gain from getting out of it on the field, you come right in, and we had a really good bottom of the fifth. There were two outs and nobody on, if I'm not mistaken, and Cam hits the ball and turned into a double.
And Tibbs, I think they walked Tibbs. And Marco had the two-strike hit. Nice job by Ty Megahee of slowing it down. He sensed Marco was getting a little bit frustrated and used an offensive visit, which was well done on his part. And then Ferrer hits another home run.
I thought the fifth inning was really the turning point in the game. Lodise's nice home run. And Oxford, think about how that kid felt leaving here Friday when you've waited your whole life -- you've been in two programs and you wait your whole life to step on that mound -- and he had to deal with what he had to deal with in that game.
We should have won that game. And his response to be better -- his stuff was actually better. Really proud of him and happy for him.
Good play at second. Two good plays at short. Really three good plays at shortstop. Really nice play at third base, a nice diving play. And then Ferrer made a nice running catch towards the foul line and clearly probably didn't need to slide for the one that evaded him there late.
That's enough from me. These guys did the real work today. But I'm proud of the response and the answer by this team. I don't know that I've ever been through anything like Friday night, and I haven't been a part of a response to something that I'd never seen on this stage before.
Q. Carson, for you, obviously you clearly have respect for the Virginia offense and what they're capable of; you saw it firsthand. Curious, first off, how you adjusted your approach against them. I know it's different when you're starting. And just what has been the key for you to unlock the success you've had during these three postseason weeks here?
CARSON DORSEY: Yeah, today we had these guys behind us the whole time making great plays the whole game. But being able to have more than just the fastball working and trusting in those pitches is what really made the difference between today and the last time.
Q. Jaime, can you speak about the second at-bat, the home run there? And tell us about your approach today and how you were able to take advantage of a really big moment there for your team.
JAIME FERRER: I was just trying to see something up. He struck me out in the at-bat before on all heaters. I felt I was feeling the heaters. I was trying to be fastball timing. I was trying to see something up. And I saw a slider up in his hand. And I got enough on it to get out of the ballpark.
During BP we noticed a lot of balls were leaving the park if they were elevated to left field. At the end of the day you've got to stick to your same approach. You've got to look for one pitch. And when you get it, you can't miss it.
I think the team that does that more times than not will have a lot of success at the plate. We had a few key hits.
And being able to come out clutch for my team is awesome. We still get to dance and we still get to play on Tuesday and compete for a national championship, which at the end of the day is everyone's goal here. And all eight of these teams are championship-caliber teams. For us to come out here with a win means the entire world to us.
Q. Jaime, I know you homered on the first pitch against Woolfolk in that fourth inning, but you guys worked a lot of long at-bats against him early. Was that a game plan going in against him to make him throw a lot of pitches early in the game?
JAIME FERRER: Not necessarily. At the end of the day it's great to get the starting pitcher out of the game early. But the at-bats that we put up, like, for example, having Marco, Tibbs, Cam and Max putting up long at-bats in front of me helps me at the end of the day. I get to see more pitches and a scouting report from them.
He's a great arm. For us to be able to knock him out of the game early was huge for us. And just the game plan that we have and the trust that we have in each other is what helps us put up big innings.
Q. Carson, that seemed like one of the highest volume usage of the curveball for you today. How good did you feel with the curveball? And how far has that pitch come since you started working with Micah this season?
CARSON DORSEY: Yeah, we saw it worked early in the game, and we decided to stay with it. Don't change what's working.
Q. Jaime, what's it like to see guys like Alex and also Cam getting it going for you guys in the fifth inning before you squared your second home run of tonight?
JAIME FERRER: It's awesome. I always say that hitting is very contagious. We see the guys in front of you that are putting up good at-bats and they're having success. It means the game plan that we're going up to the plate with are working.
And it gives us confidence. And you don't want to be the guy that doesn't get a hit when everyone's getting hits. It's super contagious.
We like to have fun. Seeing them in front of me gives us a lot of confidence and gives us a game plan. When they come back in the dugout, like I said, and we know how their fastball is looking that day because the guy that you're facing isn't the same arm every day. One day he might have a little more life to his fastball.
Getting that feedback from them and kind of having mature guys in the lineup, 1 through 9, is something that helps us a lot, for sure.
Q. Jaime, as one of the leaders of this team, what was the emotions like yesterday after coming off of Friday and what allows you guys to be able to respond the way you do?
JAIME FERRER: It's hard. It was a hard loss on Friday, a game we felt like we should have won late in that game. But for us to come back and have another opportunity to come out here and compete and play in front of these fans is a true blessing. It's something we don't take for granted.
We have leaders, 1 through 9, and the entire team. So for us to be out here to play and have another opportunity to play for a national championship is something that we don't take for granted. We started 0-1 but we've seen teams that have done it. We have that opportunity so we're not going to take it for granted.
Q. Being here in that uniform, how much do you think about 11 when you see the jerseys everywhere and how much do you think about your coach when you're coaching at Omaha?
LINK JARRETT: A lot. And I hear his voice. There's things that as the game's going I kind of hear: "You've got to have somebody on the mound at the end of the game that you trust. If you remember one thing I've told you, let it be that."
And then three hours later he'd say, "If I've ever told you one thing, don't get beat deep." It was on -- I just hear that all the time. And he's the best. Like, he's the best that's ever coached this sport at this level.
This is a different game than when you watched the Yankees and the Red Sox play. He mastered the art of coaching at this level. He did. So I hear it. I think about it.
And it burns me up that I didn't participate in the games that won it for him. It's tough.
I'm happy to be here, but I'm not going to be happy until we've delivered the result.
There's plenty of teams that are here that have not answered and done it. I get it. But when you've been on that field so many times as a player and you walk out of there and you were empty at the end, it sticks with you.
So my quest in coaching was to learn what to do to make sure that that did not repeat itself for the guys on our team. So that's all you do.
And then if that's not good enough you can lay your head down knowing you gave it all you had. And I hear his voice and his voice meant so much. And it still does because I still hear it.
Like I told you, I finally imitated him to him, and he was, "Oh my good...." he loved it. He's the best. And he laid the foundation for me in this game. And I didn't have anywhere to go.
It was probably about this time in June when he told me I could be on the team at FSU, as a senior, not as a sophomore and an eighth grader like the guys do now. I could go on and on, but he's the best.
Q. Did you guys do anything special in the off-day there after the tough loss on Friday to bounce back, get ready for today's game?
LINK JARRETT: I came and watched my son throw batting practice and sat behind the first base dugout like a normal -- I guess that's what a normal dad, maybe just something like that. My headache, I cannot tell you how bad my head ached Friday night. Saturday, I cannot tell you. There's no way to dodge it. That's how bad you felt.
We went to the Kiwanis and the American Legion Service Club lunch, and it was great. It was great. It's just weird how stuff happens.
The games were coming on. So they had ESPN on the back. And the second speaker was up there and behind it was us getting walked off.
And our guys sat there and had to take that, and so the headache got a little -- it wasn't anybody's fault. These are the things that happen when you don't win. There it is, boys, we didn't get it done. And you can take one more look at it.
And the pitchers weren't stretching through the hitters. I asked the assistants. You ask the hitters what they want to do. We can go hit. We can not hit. Does hitting in the cage at this time of the year matter? It mattered to three guys that wanted to do it. The rest of them said we're good.
So the talk this morning was firm, and I talk to them before every game. We go over the starting pitcher -- tendencies of the team, top relievers -- and then I close it out and off we go.
So they knew. This is no fairytale here. You're either going to deliver the goods and go down the list of how you have to play correctly to win here, or you're not and you'll pack up.
So in a nutshell, that was part of it. And it's a tough reality, but it is a reality. Man, they came out, they were on it.
Q. What was the mood like this morning? Were they loose? Did they have a good warm-up? Did you feel like they were going to play one of their best games? What was your impression of how they were getting ready to go into this?
LINK JARRETT: Probably better than I expected at breakfast. Probably better than I expected. I had media from 7:45 to 8:30. And when I came back in, they were already in there. And it was okay. Better than I thought. And I can read the room fairly well. I think they were okay.
Now, the pregame, that was pretty good. I said, guys, you want to take ground balls during BP like you normally do. I don't care if we do our two-man fungo infield-outfield type. I don't care. You've earned my trust.
If you want to chill out eat your sandwich and get out of the sun and chill, I could care less. All I care about is, when it's 1:06 that you have your A game. So no in and out.
I could tell the BP was really good. The infield defense stuff, I hit the fungoes the whole time, they were on it. And the outfielders were moving around and moving into different positions. We have a lot of different spots we ask them to play. I saw them doing it. So they were really locked in.
Now, that can happen and you can still get your tail beat. But you could sense that the vibe and the focus was there.
Q. Going back to Dorsey for a minute here, I know it's been an interesting year for him, ups and downs. Feels like in the postseason, I know he had those two rough outings in the ACC tournament but --
LINK JARRETT: At Clemson? You were there, weren't you? Two grand slams in two days to the same guy.
Q. It was tough. To see what he's doing now, right, these three starts in a row in the postseason, just nails. How have you been able to get him there and how is he able to do this?
LINK JARRETT: Learning yourself and what it feels like. He's a talented kid. But Gulf Coast Community College, great. Tyler Younger great coach. Their guys are prepared.
But nobody's quite adept at this type of thing or some of those games until you've been in it a little bit. It's hard to feel how you might feel when you're on this stage, and the arm feels different, your body feels different, the adrenaline. It's new.
So maybe that had something to do with it. Mastering the pitches, and the breaking ball helps because, like Kershaw, the bigger kind of gets people off the riding fastball, the harder slider and change-up. If not, the change-up and the slider are almost the same speed. So that thing visually alters what the hitter sees and kind of feels and then the speed difference is big.
When you had Leiter, Arnold, Whittaker and we had Dorsey in the pen and Charles and others, it was different. So we were trying to use him out of the bullpen. So did we -- he said, Coach, I don't care, I just want to pitch and go to Omaha; that's what I want.
Some guys, when you talk about leverage relief -- starting, you throw once a week, you know when you throw your bullpen, you know when you lift twice, you know what condition you're doing, your flat ground. You know the day you can do PFP and the day you can't. It's a little more streamlined. So a lot of guys kind of enjoy that because it's easier.
So in the midst of what we had going early, when we had not lost a game for a third of the season and he was in relief, you saw the Clemson thing. It just worked out when Leiter went down that, hey, let's try this starting thing and maybe he can get more comfortable. And there have been some really, really good starts against some tough, tough, tough top national teams.
Q. When Woolfolk went out, how did the approach change with Savino coming in? I know you guys saw Savino in Charlotte. Did the approach change at all? And were you impressed with how quickly you adjusted to him?
LINK JARRETT: We have nine different things the hitters choose from to try to do when they're at the plate, nine things. It's not rocket science. You probably turn on TV tonight and watch a game here, the big leagues. They're probably doing similar stuff, but we try to work on that.
So what you need to grab as there's as many pitching changes as we've seen in these two games here, just different -- Woolfolk's fastball was hot. And those guys talked to each other early. It was 93, 94, but they're, that thing is riding as much as we've seen. I don't know what really happened.
But then Savino is more slice and dice and changeup and move it around. So it's a calibration of the feel of the fastball probably more than anything else. But the guys have taken to this and it allows you to go to a different golf club for the shot that you need to try to hit.
And these guys are -- like Jaime is starting to figure it out and Tibbs is figuring it out. Cam Smith, the development and use of some of these approaches makes the adjustment much easier when you know what mental button to push.
And to watch them play their best game, that was just a thrill I'll never forget here. And I've had some. That was beyond an experience I've had here and just the response.
And it's hard to say that, wow, you guys have responded all year. That's just your team. Well, when you're in this, it doesn't always tee itself up for you to just go and respond. You have to execute in every phase of the game.
The starting pitcher has to command his stuff. It's got to be good enough stuff to handle the best offensive team or one of the top two in the country in terms of their ability, bat-to-ball skills and athleticism. He had all four pitches going -- fastball, curveball, you landed your slider, was good, and the change-up.
And when he has all of that early and finds it and goes with it, it's exactly what you saw. And when you face those guys in Charlotte, it was a little different story.
So just the toughness to deal with how that relief appearance went in Charlotte that was not good and to respond today with that performance against that team, pretty remarkable.
I think Brian is one of the classiest people in the business. That is a model program. There are certain programs, as you're trying to figure out what you're doing in coaching, that you look to duplicating the things they have done. And that's an A-plus coaching staff.
Their team, frontline, they play the game the right way. So, again, hats off to them. It's not easy to be in this stadium this time of year, and they clearly are regulars.
I thought the fifth inning -- we talk about self-contained relief, if you're going to start games and get through enough of it to really make this a start, I thought the fifth, when he went F7, hit by pitch, walk, right, great play in center field by Williams to lay in on the little soft fly ball and then an L6.
And that's becoming your own relief pitcher. If you can't do that, you're not going to be in the conversation to pitch six or seven or eight innings of a game. So, huge.
And I think sometimes the momentum that you gain from getting out of it on the field, you come right in, and we had a really good bottom of the fifth. There were two outs and nobody on, if I'm not mistaken, and Cam hits the ball and turned into a double.
And Tibbs, I think they walked Tibbs. And Marco had the two-strike hit. Nice job by Ty Megahee of slowing it down. He sensed Marco was getting a little bit frustrated and used an offensive visit, which was well done on his part. And then Ferrer hits another home run.
I thought the fifth inning was really the turning point in the game. Lodise's nice home run. And Oxford, think about how that kid felt leaving here Friday when you've waited your whole life -- you've been in two programs and you wait your whole life to step on that mound -- and he had to deal with what he had to deal with in that game.
We should have won that game. And his response to be better -- his stuff was actually better. Really proud of him and happy for him.
Good play at second. Two good plays at short. Really three good plays at shortstop. Really nice play at third base, a nice diving play. And then Ferrer made a nice running catch towards the foul line and clearly probably didn't need to slide for the one that evaded him there late.
That's enough from me. These guys did the real work today. But I'm proud of the response and the answer by this team. I don't know that I've ever been through anything like Friday night, and I haven't been a part of a response to something that I'd never seen on this stage before.
Q. Carson, for you, obviously you clearly have respect for the Virginia offense and what they're capable of; you saw it firsthand. Curious, first off, how you adjusted your approach against them. I know it's different when you're starting. And just what has been the key for you to unlock the success you've had during these three postseason weeks here?
CARSON DORSEY: Yeah, today we had these guys behind us the whole time making great plays the whole game. But being able to have more than just the fastball working and trusting in those pitches is what really made the difference between today and the last time.
Q. Jaime, can you speak about the second at-bat, the home run there? And tell us about your approach today and how you were able to take advantage of a really big moment there for your team.
JAIME FERRER: I was just trying to see something up. He struck me out in the at-bat before on all heaters. I felt I was feeling the heaters. I was trying to be fastball timing. I was trying to see something up. And I saw a slider up in his hand. And I got enough on it to get out of the ballpark.
During BP we noticed a lot of balls were leaving the park if they were elevated to left field. At the end of the day you've got to stick to your same approach. You've got to look for one pitch. And when you get it, you can't miss it.
I think the team that does that more times than not will have a lot of success at the plate. We had a few key hits.
And being able to come out clutch for my team is awesome. We still get to dance and we still get to play on Tuesday and compete for a national championship, which at the end of the day is everyone's goal here. And all eight of these teams are championship-caliber teams. For us to come out here with a win means the entire world to us.
Q. Jaime, I know you homered on the first pitch against Woolfolk in that fourth inning, but you guys worked a lot of long at-bats against him early. Was that a game plan going in against him to make him throw a lot of pitches early in the game?
JAIME FERRER: Not necessarily. At the end of the day it's great to get the starting pitcher out of the game early. But the at-bats that we put up, like, for example, having Marco, Tibbs, Cam and Max putting up long at-bats in front of me helps me at the end of the day. I get to see more pitches and a scouting report from them.
He's a great arm. For us to be able to knock him out of the game early was huge for us. And just the game plan that we have and the trust that we have in each other is what helps us put up big innings.
Q. Carson, that seemed like one of the highest volume usage of the curveball for you today. How good did you feel with the curveball? And how far has that pitch come since you started working with Micah this season?
CARSON DORSEY: Yeah, we saw it worked early in the game, and we decided to stay with it. Don't change what's working.
Q. Jaime, what's it like to see guys like Alex and also Cam getting it going for you guys in the fifth inning before you squared your second home run of tonight?
JAIME FERRER: It's awesome. I always say that hitting is very contagious. We see the guys in front of you that are putting up good at-bats and they're having success. It means the game plan that we're going up to the plate with are working.
And it gives us confidence. And you don't want to be the guy that doesn't get a hit when everyone's getting hits. It's super contagious.
We like to have fun. Seeing them in front of me gives us a lot of confidence and gives us a game plan. When they come back in the dugout, like I said, and we know how their fastball is looking that day because the guy that you're facing isn't the same arm every day. One day he might have a little more life to his fastball.
Getting that feedback from them and kind of having mature guys in the lineup, 1 through 9, is something that helps us a lot, for sure.
Q. Jaime, as one of the leaders of this team, what was the emotions like yesterday after coming off of Friday and what allows you guys to be able to respond the way you do?
JAIME FERRER: It's hard. It was a hard loss on Friday, a game we felt like we should have won late in that game. But for us to come back and have another opportunity to come out here and compete and play in front of these fans is a true blessing. It's something we don't take for granted.
We have leaders, 1 through 9, and the entire team. So for us to be out here to play and have another opportunity to play for a national championship is something that we don't take for granted. We started 0-1 but we've seen teams that have done it. We have that opportunity so we're not going to take it for granted.
Q. Being here in that uniform, how much do you think about 11 when you see the jerseys everywhere and how much do you think about your coach when you're coaching at Omaha?
LINK JARRETT: A lot. And I hear his voice. There's things that as the game's going I kind of hear: "You've got to have somebody on the mound at the end of the game that you trust. If you remember one thing I've told you, let it be that."
And then three hours later he'd say, "If I've ever told you one thing, don't get beat deep." It was on -- I just hear that all the time. And he's the best. Like, he's the best that's ever coached this sport at this level.
This is a different game than when you watched the Yankees and the Red Sox play. He mastered the art of coaching at this level. He did. So I hear it. I think about it.
And it burns me up that I didn't participate in the games that won it for him. It's tough.
I'm happy to be here, but I'm not going to be happy until we've delivered the result.
There's plenty of teams that are here that have not answered and done it. I get it. But when you've been on that field so many times as a player and you walk out of there and you were empty at the end, it sticks with you.
So my quest in coaching was to learn what to do to make sure that that did not repeat itself for the guys on our team. So that's all you do.
And then if that's not good enough you can lay your head down knowing you gave it all you had. And I hear his voice and his voice meant so much. And it still does because I still hear it.
Like I told you, I finally imitated him to him, and he was, "Oh my good...." he loved it. He's the best. And he laid the foundation for me in this game. And I didn't have anywhere to go.
It was probably about this time in June when he told me I could be on the team at FSU, as a senior, not as a sophomore and an eighth grader like the guys do now. I could go on and on, but he's the best.
Q. Did you guys do anything special in the off-day there after the tough loss on Friday to bounce back, get ready for today's game?
LINK JARRETT: I came and watched my son throw batting practice and sat behind the first base dugout like a normal -- I guess that's what a normal dad, maybe just something like that. My headache, I cannot tell you how bad my head ached Friday night. Saturday, I cannot tell you. There's no way to dodge it. That's how bad you felt.
We went to the Kiwanis and the American Legion Service Club lunch, and it was great. It was great. It's just weird how stuff happens.
The games were coming on. So they had ESPN on the back. And the second speaker was up there and behind it was us getting walked off.
And our guys sat there and had to take that, and so the headache got a little -- it wasn't anybody's fault. These are the things that happen when you don't win. There it is, boys, we didn't get it done. And you can take one more look at it.
And the pitchers weren't stretching through the hitters. I asked the assistants. You ask the hitters what they want to do. We can go hit. We can not hit. Does hitting in the cage at this time of the year matter? It mattered to three guys that wanted to do it. The rest of them said we're good.
So the talk this morning was firm, and I talk to them before every game. We go over the starting pitcher -- tendencies of the team, top relievers -- and then I close it out and off we go.
So they knew. This is no fairytale here. You're either going to deliver the goods and go down the list of how you have to play correctly to win here, or you're not and you'll pack up.
So in a nutshell, that was part of it. And it's a tough reality, but it is a reality. Man, they came out, they were on it.
Q. What was the mood like this morning? Were they loose? Did they have a good warm-up? Did you feel like they were going to play one of their best games? What was your impression of how they were getting ready to go into this?
LINK JARRETT: Probably better than I expected at breakfast. Probably better than I expected. I had media from 7:45 to 8:30. And when I came back in, they were already in there. And it was okay. Better than I thought. And I can read the room fairly well. I think they were okay.
Now, the pregame, that was pretty good. I said, guys, you want to take ground balls during BP like you normally do. I don't care if we do our two-man fungo infield-outfield type. I don't care. You've earned my trust.
If you want to chill out eat your sandwich and get out of the sun and chill, I could care less. All I care about is, when it's 1:06 that you have your A game. So no in and out.
I could tell the BP was really good. The infield defense stuff, I hit the fungoes the whole time, they were on it. And the outfielders were moving around and moving into different positions. We have a lot of different spots we ask them to play. I saw them doing it. So they were really locked in.
Now, that can happen and you can still get your tail beat. But you could sense that the vibe and the focus was there.
Q. Going back to Dorsey for a minute here, I know it's been an interesting year for him, ups and downs. Feels like in the postseason, I know he had those two rough outings in the ACC tournament but --
LINK JARRETT: At Clemson? You were there, weren't you? Two grand slams in two days to the same guy.
Q. It was tough. To see what he's doing now, right, these three starts in a row in the postseason, just nails. How have you been able to get him there and how is he able to do this?
LINK JARRETT: Learning yourself and what it feels like. He's a talented kid. But Gulf Coast Community College, great. Tyler Younger great coach. Their guys are prepared.
But nobody's quite adept at this type of thing or some of those games until you've been in it a little bit. It's hard to feel how you might feel when you're on this stage, and the arm feels different, your body feels different, the adrenaline. It's new.
So maybe that had something to do with it. Mastering the pitches, and the breaking ball helps because, like Kershaw, the bigger kind of gets people off the riding fastball, the harder slider and change-up. If not, the change-up and the slider are almost the same speed. So that thing visually alters what the hitter sees and kind of feels and then the speed difference is big.
When you had Leiter, Arnold, Whittaker and we had Dorsey in the pen and Charles and others, it was different. So we were trying to use him out of the bullpen. So did we -- he said, Coach, I don't care, I just want to pitch and go to Omaha; that's what I want.
Some guys, when you talk about leverage relief -- starting, you throw once a week, you know when you throw your bullpen, you know when you lift twice, you know what condition you're doing, your flat ground. You know the day you can do PFP and the day you can't. It's a little more streamlined. So a lot of guys kind of enjoy that because it's easier.
So in the midst of what we had going early, when we had not lost a game for a third of the season and he was in relief, you saw the Clemson thing. It just worked out when Leiter went down that, hey, let's try this starting thing and maybe he can get more comfortable. And there have been some really, really good starts against some tough, tough, tough top national teams.
Q. When Woolfolk went out, how did the approach change with Savino coming in? I know you guys saw Savino in Charlotte. Did the approach change at all? And were you impressed with how quickly you adjusted to him?
LINK JARRETT: We have nine different things the hitters choose from to try to do when they're at the plate, nine things. It's not rocket science. You probably turn on TV tonight and watch a game here, the big leagues. They're probably doing similar stuff, but we try to work on that.
So what you need to grab as there's as many pitching changes as we've seen in these two games here, just different -- Woolfolk's fastball was hot. And those guys talked to each other early. It was 93, 94, but they're, that thing is riding as much as we've seen. I don't know what really happened.
But then Savino is more slice and dice and changeup and move it around. So it's a calibration of the feel of the fastball probably more than anything else. But the guys have taken to this and it allows you to go to a different golf club for the shot that you need to try to hit.
And these guys are -- like Jaime is starting to figure it out and Tibbs is figuring it out. Cam Smith, the development and use of some of these approaches makes the adjustment much easier when you know what mental button to push.
