Mark Shapiro
Mark Shapiro
contend last move trying
It was acknowledging that we lacked upper-level prospects. That was a middle-of-the-road move, trying to contend and rebuild. But it was the last middle-of-the-road move that we made.
anybody august coming contending last late looking spring team time year
Every time we go through something, it's a young team and we're going through it for the first time, ... Last year, it was contending late in the season, in August and September. This year ... coming out of spring training, it was the first time anybody was looking at us.
coming contending expectation games leading record yankees
To say we're contending with the Yankees and the A's was not our expectation coming into the season. If you told us our record would be 14, 15 games over .500, I would have said we'd be leading our division.
absolutely careful chance gotten keeping players risk tools
We're so careful in our risk assessments that we may have a better chance of keeping our players on the field. And risk-assessment tools have absolutely gotten better.
address aware comment dangers decides further players short until
We want our players to be aware of the short and long-term dangers of these substances. Until Rafael decides how he will address this finding, we will have no further comment on the situation.
factor hard maybe point quality season throw
We want him to throw quality strikes, not just hard strikes. He's going to be a contributor for us this year. Maybe not from day one, but at some point this season he'll be a factor for us.
five pitch
We want him to pitch every five days.
abruptly created farm good instead letting naturally players run traded
We were at the tail-end of a championship run. Instead of letting that run naturally just play out and transpire, we abruptly traded good players and artificially created an upper-level in our farm system.
decisions early
We want to set the roster as early as we can. This year, the decisions are so few.
again crucial filling forward looking role
We are looking forward to him again filling a crucial role in our bullpen.
baseball cup equity excitement flag generate given history interested league major pastime proposal soccer sure waiting winning
We're interested and we're waiting for a proposal from Major League Baseball. It's not going to generate the kind of excitement that World Cup soccer does, given the history and the equity just isn't there yet. But at least for this country, anything with the America's pastime and the American flag is sure to be a winning combination.
addition approach fits mental physical teammate trade
When you trade for a guy, you don't know his mental approach and the kind of teammate he is. That was probably the most encouraging thing, in addition to his physical tools. He fits in well with our team and our clubhouse.
again agreement clear deal next reach value
We're not going to reach an agreement on a multi-year deal with Cliff. We'll look at it again next year. It will be more clear what his arbitration value will be. We couldn't reach a value on that right now.
bullpen sentence sight welcome worry
Worry and bullpen are always in the same sentence for me. He'll be a welcome sight for us up here at this point.