Ned Yost Win Quotations

Poor Jenkins, he was distraught yesterday. He was having a monster year. We're having fun; we're in the midst of a 10-game winning streak, and he was enjoying himself.

The only sense of relief is that I don't have to talk about it. My focus here is totally on winning games and it always has been. I've always thought that if you take care of your business, then the rest of the business will take care of itself.

I told our guys it's very important for us to go home this winter and not give anybody the ability to call us losers again. They've been called that for 12 straight years.

Vargas was on his game today. We had some good swings and hit some balls on the nose, but we just hit them straight up.

The average person probably doesn't understand what he has done and the accomplishments he's achieved, ... To win 14 consecutive years, it's like Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak - it's a record that never will be broken. He has done it with tremendous turnover in roster. He has done it under difficult circumstances. He has done it with rookies. He has done it with veterans. He just does it year after year after year.

He's growing, he's learning, he's trying. He's going to make mistakes. His fielding is improving. You look at the number of errors he has made and how many of them have been throwing errors? Those things are easily fixed.

They make a living throwing the ball. It's a mental thing, it's in their heads, and don't ask me why.

It's been a lot different. In years past, we focused on playing baseball games. From Day 1 (this year), we've gotten ready to win baseball games. We've focused more on little things, fundamental things.

Tomo was very crisp today. He was sharp, he was throwing his fastball as hard as he has all year.

We figured that would be a good chance to gamble and take a shot. Davies was throwing the ball very well at that point. The odds of trying to get a two-out hit probably weren't in our favor. We thought we'd go ahead and gamble, and it worked.

It's not a concern to me. I hadn't even thought about it. Jenkins is swinging the bat OK.

He threw the ball OK, but he got a few pitches up in the strike zone. The wind blowing out didn't help him.

He's going to be a 3, 4, 5 hitter throughout his career. He's not going to sit in the seventh spot. And I don't know if you've noticed lately but we haven't been winning too many games, so something's broke.

It was a big win right there. Prince takes care of business like that. It worked out just great.

Those guys should be proud, for what they had to do to accomplish that. They started out with a great team, a very talented group of kids. By the end, we had taken all their best players, and they still persevered through it and found ways to win a championship.

(Cappy) had pretty good stuff but he fell back behind and you can't do that against St.Louis. We're glad we could get the win for him.

That was a tough play but it was within (Weeks') reach. It's a play, if you're going to win the ball game, that's got to be made.

We'll see what happens his next start. If he can win his next start then he'll start the last game of the year.

Not only are they so good talent-wise, they're so good in every phase of the game. You come in here and play them, you know they're not going to beat themselves. They're going to play the game hard and they're going to play the game right. If you sit back and wait for them to make mistakes so you can win a game, you're going to be in trouble.

Not knowing who's going to be the starter, the other two guys will probably fall back in and be in the pen. It depends on who has the most versatility to fill those spots.

To get this win off of a guy the caliber of Chris Carpenter , it's just a huge win for us. We had timely hits and big nights out of J.J. (Hardy), Overbay, and Billy (Hall).

I'm happy with the way we're swinging our bats.

You just kind of felt that. I turned around and said, 'Prince is going to win it for us right here.' He's too good a player, too good a hitter, to have it go an extended amount of time.

There's a reason why guys win 300 games. They can field their position, they can swing the bat and they can throw strikes. That's a big part of his game. There's not a lot of pitchers that catch that ball. That ball was smashed. That was a big play.

That's the class of the league over there, the class of the National League for 14 years. And we did everything we needed to do to win this game, and yesterday and the day before.

We've been swinging the bats OK, with the exception of (Wednesday night), ... I think every team has those games where it seems like you can't get anything done.

Knowing he would be a little more geared up, he wanted to back off on his breaking ball. It's something we all talked about. The second inning he had easy life on his fastball. You could see he was feeling good. He's right on schedule.

Not everybody is cut out to be a Cardinal. There's a certain standard, a certain type of player you have to be if you're going to play on that team. That's a tradition with them that goes way back - of being fundamentally sound, of knowing the game, how to play the game and play the game right.

We've got a bunch of young kids that have a lot of heart. Anytime you're down four runs and get the winning run to the plate in the ninth you've done something.

It's a matter of commanding his fastball and being consistent. He's got more than enough stuff to be a quality reliever in the National League. It sets everything else up when he's throwing his fastball. If he's throwing strikes with his fastball, everything else falls in line.

We were happy with the home stand, but when you win the first five you surely want to win the last game.

He'll play until Brady gets back. He's been swinging the bat real well. He can do a lot of things to help you win.

He'll fit in quite nicely. You can't win without talent and we couldn't pass up the ability to pick up someone with talent and experience, too.

It was a win for Davis. We were hoping it'd be for Doug Davis, as well as Doug's pitched. Doug's been sitting on nine wins for a long time.

I put him up there with the intent of him winning the game. You know, he's had such a great spring for us, he's such a veteran-type player who really is comfortable in those situations.

It was big for him to go out in more of a formal situation, facing another major league team. He didn't throw any breaking balls. His second inning was much better than the first. He got in the swing of things.

Playing .500 is the first step. Eventually, we're trying to get to where we can contend with St. Louis for the division. I'd rather have a winning record. We're tired of being labeled a loser for the last 12 years. We want to get past that. We don't want anybody calling us a loser again.

We were swinging the bats really well today.

It's a great feeling, ... A lot of timely hits. It's a huge win for us.

I don't think there is a guy I would more want to see up there in that situation than Carlos because he's been swinging the bat so well.