**RYAN DOUMIT
On his big two-run pinch-hit single for the lead in 7th inning
“You just try to put together a good at-bat. You go up there, and I’ve been put in the situation where I’m either going to be the goat or the hero. I’ve been the hero the last couple of days, but it’s not easy. You go up there and at the end of the day you just try to put together a good at-bat.”
On the play at second base, could you tell his foot came off the bag?
“I really couldn’t. I wasn’t really focused on his foot, I was focused on his leg. I was just going to try to go in their hard, try to break up the double play. Fortunately enough, he was off the bag and J-Hey got a hit out of it.”
On the confusion and challenges and delays in seventh inning
“It’s a nightmare. There’s going to be some give-and-take with the replay, and that certainly (an example). The pace of the game, from a player’s standpoint you don’t like the waiting around, trying to decide what’s going on. It’s going to be a learning process with the replay, but I’m sure they’ll get it ironed out.”
Was it difficult to stay ready during the long delay in the pitching change?
“For me I was just trying to stay as focused as I can. I knew they brought the lefty in, I was just trying to focus on my at-bat. But after a while when everybody’s trying to … it gets a little old and a little monotonous. At the end of the day you’re like, are we going to do this or not? Hopefully they get something ironed out. As far as I’m concerned the replay (system) is more ‘eh’ than anything.”
“It was a weird at-bat. I think I fouled balls off both my feet. It was a painful at-bat, but it had a pretty good result.”
**CHRIS JOHNSON
Your at-bat started the seventh-inning rally, did you feel like Garza was tiring?’
“Not really. Just trying to get on base. Been trying to do that for the last couple of games. It was nice to stay in the big part of the field, stay up the middle and get something going. Dan and I were able to get on base and then the guys came up with big hits.”
What were you thinking during the whole fiasco with the relievers and the delay warming up?
“It’s a tricky situation. They didn’t have anybody going in the ‘pen, so they called down for the lefty and they were like, ‘well, who?’ The rule is eight pitches. If we’re going to take that to our advantage, so be it.”
On taking the four game series
“Yeah, that’s a good ballclub (Brewers) over there. Taking three out of four from them is huge. Especially the way we were kind of playing the week before. It was a big series for us and nice to do it in front of the home crowd.”
Did you feel like you built momentum from win Sunday at St. Louis
“Yeah, a lot of guys were pretty fired up after that. That’s a good closer (Rosenthal) and a really good team to come back and get a win off of, and not kind of cash it in, in that day game in the last game of the series. Yeah, that momentum kind of carried over. It was nice to see.”
On multiple replays tonight, most of which went your way
“I mean, replay kind of takes a lot of the momentum each way out of it. Just because there’s a lot of standing around waiting. I enjoyed it in the ninth inning (when he was awarded a hit on overturned call). But other than that, I don’t know.”
Ever seen something like that seventh inning when Brewers didn’t have a reliever warming up?
“I haven’t seen that. I’ve seen a lot of times when guys kind of get ambushed and they only throw a couple of pitches down there. But we were looking on the screen and they had nobody up. He came out and motioned to the bullpen and we thought our (video monitor) was broke. It’s a tough situation for the kid that had to come in.”
**FREDI GONZALEZ
On Doumit’s big pinch hit
“I tell you what, that was two big at-bats in that inning, Laird and him. They stuck their nose in there with some tough counts and facing some tough situations and got big results. They put the ball in play. When you put the ball in play in those situations, funny things can happen. We caught some breaks with the replay stuff. That’s what it’s there for. It’s kind of awkward, to stand out there and do that stuff but it’s there to get those plays right at the end of the day. And we sure got a couple of them our way today.”
Can you explain what happened between (relievers) Duke coming in and then Smith and discussions with the umpires?
“No, not really, I don’t want to explain that. I think we got the right situation. I don’t think it’s my job to explain that.”
On coming back after bit of rough start from Harang
“We hung around today. And I don’t think Aaron had a rough start. I don’t think it was one of our better ones but he gave us an opportunity. There were a couple times when he pitched out of a couple jams and made some big pitches. I thought Thomas coming in in that situation picking off the runner at first base right off the get-go, I mean we went from first and third and one out to man on third and we ended up walking Schafer to face Garza and got out of that with only giving up one run. Our bullpen did a terrific job keeping us in the ballgame.”
On Uggla’s at-bat to keep the rally going
“He had a great at-bat. He walked. We’ll use him whenever we can, in a situation, and he’s a great teammate, great guy on the roster. We’ll pick our spots, but he had some pretty good at-bats. But Laird and Doumit both had some terrific at-bats.”
On Horacio Ramirez (video-replay challenge coordinator) earning his salary
“Yes. Everybody’s looking at him. And he’s made some great decisions. On the one on second base there, I was arguing a little bit harder because they kept telling me it was a neighborhood play, and I said I don’t think it’s a neighborhood (play), I think he came off the bag. And so we finally got to where we wanted to challenge that. And we got it right. That was a tough one.
“I think we were lucky that we had the x-mo cam or the phantom cam over there on that play. And that camera in itself makes a difference. It really does make a difference when you slow it down that much.”
On if they ruled he went up, came off the bag that way
“Right. Because you can’t challenge a neighborhood play. If it’s a normal feed and what we thought we saw was he came off, up off the bag. So that becomes a ball off the bag, not a neighborhood play.”
**AARON HARANG
On his rough outing
“It was one of those days where I felt awesome in the ‘pen and then went out there (in the game) and the ball just wasn’t doing exactly what I wanted to do. I was falling behind and ended up having to kind of come back over (the plate) and try to throw strikes behind in the count. Some days you’re going to have that, but I was able to battle and the guys rallied there in the seventh. Got a couple of those challenge calls went our way, and the rest goes from there.”
On pitching from stretch most of night because of all the hits to start innings
“Yeah, like I said they were being aggressive. They know I’m going to throw strikes. Their bench coach, Jerry Narron, he had me for a few years in Cincinnati, so he knows what I’m going to go out there and do, and most of those guys do too from facing them so many times. They came out swinging and I was able to just limit a whole lot of damage and still keep us there.”
“Some of the guys could tell I wasn’t as sharp as normal. But Ian (Thomas) came in and picked me up that inning, got a big pickoff and then an out. That was huge. I think that kind of turned the page for us, and we were able to get to Garza there and were able to come back.”
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