Dusty Baker Far Quotations

Woody is the most advanced. Miller and Prior aren't too, too far behind.

No. 1, you have to make sure he's OK so this thing doesn't linger all year long. Fortunately for us, he did get some at-bats during the World Baseball Classic and the fact that he did pretty well shows he's not that far off. He saw better quality pitching in that than he would down here. It was to his advantage and ours that he did play.

We're trying not to get that far ahead of ourselves. We're trying to take it slower versus faster. He is a rehab player. We'll analyze him and see how he feels.

You've just got to play smart when something is wrong. You still play hard. What you don't want to happen is altering his swing and creating bad habits. As far as how many at-bats down here, it depends on how he feels.

You might think it matters to some of the guys who are still in contention. But at the same time, how many guys think that far in advance?

The young man has done a great job as far as not being affected by outside influences.

That's the best he's looked so far this spring. It's the right time for him to get it together.

I'll use the DH as long as I can until the end of spring, when the pitchers will be going far enough to hit. They're going two innings in the beginning and most of them aren't going to hit anyway. Once they get going four, five innings, I'll start using the pitchers. Initially, I'll try to DH whenever I can to get guys at-bats.

I heard Woody was very promising. He was low- to mid-90s with some of the things he threw. He's not that far off. But I can't speculate on what soon means.

His main thing is he's trying so hard he's not swinging at strikes. They're not getting him out, he's getting himself out. I've talked to him about it. When they come in the zone, he's not far from it. It's like fishing. You got to get that first one in the boat, everything is cool after that.

He's strong. He's going to love Wrigley Field. He has tremendous sock to left field and to left-center. He doesn't hit the ball up in the air. He keeps it relatively low. The ball jumps off his bat. So far I like his swing. He can hit that fastball, which is where it starts.

If he's in long relief, that's just like starting. If he's in long relief, we have a pretty good idea as far as time to get loose and get ready. It's not like I have to hurry up and get him ready for one batter.