Larry Hays Quotations

With Tomlin and Hynes out we're looking for something. If those two guys come back healthy the fact that we're finding some other people - Butler had a good outing last night -- it's going to help us later on hopefully. Richardson's had two great games in a row. We need him to be ready to go next Thursday and do it again.

People were more worried then about who was going to block and who was going to tackle. As far as keeping your job, guys were still trying to win. That competition is still there, but the demands on the coaches have changed.

To come in here and put up a shutout, the way these guys hit, that says a lot.

I think when he was young that was his best position and I remember he could hit a little bit, too. This is something we're looking at. Catching depth is a real problem for us this year. (Tim) Ahern, a key guy that was supposed to be our No. 2 catcher, got hurt and we don't have him for the year so we're searching.

Our hope was we could give them a normal fall (semester) ? go to class, go work out and have a regular schedule. We think we did that.

Roger has hit the ground running. He's been thrown out a few times trying to stretch a single into a double or a double into a triple. But he's also made it several times. We like that aggressiveness.

That doesn't happen very often; everything kind of went to script. It all goes back to the job Morgan did Friday night. When that Friday guy goes out and burns up a lot of innings, it really helps the rest of the weekend.

Brooks was one of the greatest competitors we ever played against.

I've been pleased with these guys all year, coming back after bad things happen and playing, and they did it again today. They didn't start off good and they just hung in there.

It's a new bunch that we like, but I guess you could say that we've got one obvious weakness and that's experience at this level.

They just have good balance. They're good. They take what you give them, and we gave them quite a bit.

Hopefully that was a coming-out party for some of these guys. When you're young and new and all the different things that these guys go through, it takes a little while to get in the comfort zone. Maybe we're seeing signs of that.

The main thing is his mentality and his aggressiveness. That old linebacker comes in handy behind the plate.