Chris Carpenter
Chris Carpenter
Christopher John "Chris" Carpenteris an American retired professional baseball starting pitcher. He played 15 seasons in Major League Baseballfor the Toronto Blue Jays and St. Louis Cardinals from 1997 to 2012. A Cy Young Award winner and two-time World Series champion, he was also a three-time All-Star selection. In addition, he was twice named the Sporting News National League Pitcher of the Year, and voted for a number of Comeback Player of the Year awards for surmounting injury...
ProfessionBaseball Player
Date of Birth27 April 1975
CityExeter, NH
Shows consistency. But that's what my goal is: trying to be consistent as often as I can. I've said this (before): If you go out and be consistent and give this team a chance to win with the defense, offense and bullpen we have, we're going to win a lot of games.
When I was out there in the sixth, my hands and my fingers started cramping up, ... The same thing happened when I went up to hit.
We have a solid staff and we have five guys that have experience and know how to pitch. It's going to be a fun year. We've still got to go out and play the games, but we have the potential. We'll see how it plays out.
When you're trying to learn and establish yourself and be consistent in the major leagues, it's hard to do that with the amount of pressure everybody from the outside is putting on you. But obviously all three of us were able to continue to be successful, move on and do the things everybody expected us to be able to do.
I was in command of it all night,
It feels fine. I was a little stiff.
It feels nice to get zeros and get a win. You go out there to execute pitches and give your team a chance to win and I was able to do it all day.
I think people misunderstood, ... I had cramps all over my body. It wasn't just about my hand. I had it in my hamstring, my shoulder, both hands, my calves, so I'm not concerned about that. I think it was just a day that was hot.
I think everybody is ready to go and we're excited about this series.
I think that I wasn't going to throw many pitches today,
I went back out to go and they weren't going to take a chance with an 8-0 lead,
I was just lobbing it to the point Mel was catching it with his bare hands. I was just lobbing it to feel it come off my hand and feel the spin it was supposed to have.
I think the toughest thing this year is going to be to continue to do what I did last year, and that's being mentally strong every fifth day and to be able to be consistent. Am I going to win as many games? I don't know. But I believe the mental part of the game, if I continue to do the things I did last year, the success I had was because of that.
It is an honor. It's an honor to be a part of this group. This season was an incredible season. Personally it was good, but team-wise we didn't get to where we wanted to get. I'm looking forward to 2006 and hopefully having the opportunity to do it again.