JUSTIN UPTON
On excitement he felt from teammates when he hit grand slam:
“Everybody was excited. We took the lead and gave ourselves a chance to win. Everybody had a lot of energy after that.”
On what looking for in that at-bat:
“He had nowhere to put me, so I was looking to be aggressive in my zone and not swing at his pitches and he threw one over the middle that I could handle.”
On the first pitch, almost got it:
“The first one I got a pretty good gauge for my timing and then after that it was just getting a good pitch to hit.”
On if that was as solid as he’s hit a ball this year:
“I got that one pretty good.”
On Heyward’s return:
“It’s nice to see him back and swinging the bat the way we know he can. He’s going to be big for us this year so it’s nice to have his bat back.”
On indication of what having left/right/left in the order can do:
“Yeah that’s a situation that you put the other team in and what decision they make is up to them. I think that helps us out, giving us a little bit of an advantage.”
On coming home to win after tough road trip:
“It’s always nice to get a win but after the way we struggled on the road, to get back home, get back in front of our fans and get a win is nice.”
JASON HEYWARD
On his night:
“It’s a great way to come back, contribute, do something good, make some plays on defense, get some hits, have some good ABs, positive at-bats. That’s all I can try and do and tonight, fortunately enough, came through for us.”
On if blast like Upton’s can energize a team:
“Always. Things like that, you feed off of as a group. Good ABs are contagious regardless of the outcome. I think we did a good job of getting their starter out of the game early tonight.”
On opposite field hits vs. lefty:
“For me, I want to hit it where it’s pitched. That’s my strength. I’ve grown a little bit. That was a big thing for me last year. They came in, I was able to turn on it and be effective. If they went away, I was able to do that and not try to do too much, stay within myself, not overthink anything and react.”
On if he just put head down and ran on homer:
“I knew it was gone. Carl not moving out there was reassurance. But you know what they look like after a while.”
On the home run:
“I didn’t really see where it landed. I’m going to go back and look at it and I’ll check but that was definitely a no-doubter from first base. I saw the ball hit, I was like all right, that one is gone. The crowd is like yes. Carl went like this (looking over his shoulder). It was good for him. He didn’t try to do too much but he did what he can do and that’s what he can do when he gets his pitch to hit. That was awesome for everybody.”
PAUL MAHOLM
On nearly escaping jam before pitcher’s hit:
“Shatter his bat and gets up the middle. I’ll take it as a pitcher hitting. 3-2 I’ve got to challenge him with a fastball. I’m not going to throw a breaking ball or anything, if I walk him 3-2 with a breaking ball then I look like an idiot trying to punch him out and not really worry about anything. Obviously not the way I wanted that inning to go. He gets a hit and then I hung a slider to Crawford. They put up two but I made a lot of good pitches. Obviously the groundball hurt, extended the inning but it’s part of it and I’ve got to make a good pitch to the pitcher.”
On how good to see the grand slam:
“I’ll take it every time I start. I’ll have to make sure I compensate Justin pretty well for that, but no, obviously it was good. We had a rough road trip, and to be down by a couple here and to come up with a huge hit and a huge homer obviously a huge lift for the team and the lineup. Those guys had some great ABs tonight and Mac hit the ball hard to left center twice and got robbed. Hopefully we can get on a roll like we did when the season started. Obviously we have the normal lineup out there each and every day now, so as a starting staff we’ve just got to go out there and put up some zeros and let those guys get comfortable.”
On where he was when Upton homered:
“I was still sitting there watching, just after you come out, you know you’re coming out. Obviously I’m going to watch the extra inning and kind of hoping he would hit a grand slam and obviously with the first swing he took against him it was a pretty good swing. I don’t know exactly where the pitch he hit out was but I’m assuming it caught more plate and he was able to do some damage.”
On if came out of seat pretty fast, violently:
“Yeah, not violently, but you knew it was out as soon as he hit it. You know me, I’m a big rah-rah guy so probably doing cartwheels and stuff.”
On if one-hit like that can change tide:
“Obviously it can. You saw a lot of good ABs throughout the top of the order and the middle of the order and those guys, if you miss, they can do some damage. It’s good to get the normal lineup out there so that way, 1-8 we can hurt you. They grinded out some ABs against Ryu and got him out and took advantage of the next guy.”
On if you got back on track, or if results not indicative in recent outings:
“Even in San Fran, there were a couple plays, I give up one or two and not six. I pitched well in Cincy. I threw well here last time. So am I in perfect rhythm, no, but I’m making pitches when I have to. And today if I make two or three pitches, then I give up zero. It’s right there where I need to be and you’re going to have starts where you’ve just got to grind it out and that’s kind of what I’m going through right now. And going to keep doing it, keep working on stuff between starts and hopefully get on a roll a little bit.”
FREDI GONZALEZ
On the offensive approach:
“We did a nice job drawing some base on balls tonight. We didn’t expand the strike zone against the starter. I think we ended up getting seven base on balls and plugging away, got his pitch count up high and had great at-bats. Great night by Justin, had five RBIs. I don’t know when the last time we had second and third and no outs and we got the runner in front third and then the runner from second over to third. We got another run out of that later in that inning. Paulie did a nice job. He really did. He gave us six innings, kind of hung around and got the W.”
On Heyward using opposite field and got back in groove:
“I saw a bunch of good at-bats tonight. I really did. Guys going to the opposite field, guys being patient at the plate, guys getting deep in counts. Looking back at that series in Arizona, even though we didn’t get any hits or win ballgames, we were hitting the ball hard and hard at somebody. Today Simmons doesn’t get anything out of it, unless we change the scoring. He gets a rocket to the third baseman that the guy just looks like he’s trying to defend himself and he doesn’t get a hit. And then the rocket to the left field and doesn’t get a base hit there. 1-for-5 and really could have been a lot better than that. In my books, he (had three hits).”
On seeing the fruits of alternating lefty/righty in the lineup:
“Exactly. If you want to go left, right, you’ve got to go through Justin, or later on, you’ve got to go through Chris Johnson. It’s not easy. I’ve been sitting across the dugout when that situation arises again and it’s not easy to do that. And today they went left, right, left and tried to go through Justin with it.”
On marvel at that homer:
“As soon as he took a swing, you knew that ball was going to be out of the ballpark. That was one of the prettiest swings I’ve seen him put on a baseball.”
