He's going to have a lot more good days than bad days, because he gets it.

He's been terrific. He looks to me like a very good baseball player and a very good number two hitter.

He's a good little offensive player. He looks like he belongs in the majors. This kid knows how to play. And he's a winner.

We threw a ton of strikes and we made some very good 0-2 pitches.

He got 13 ground ball outs, and that's good for a nine-inning game. That's an indication of how well he pitched. That's a very positive sign ... It's March 18th, and you want to see your pitchers starting to sharpen.

Go ahead and take that gun. What was important was the life of the pitch when it's entering the hitting area. That was as good as I've seen him.

I could sit here and talk about those things until I'm blue in the face, but those are things if you're going to become a good club you have to pick up on and capitalize. Thus far, we've not been able to do that.

I don't care what the numbers suggest. I thought the life to his fastball was as good as we've seen all spring. I think there could have been a couple different choices he made in a few two-strike counts, but I'll tell you: He was throwing nothing but quality pitches in the strike zone. ... He was actually too fine.

If this kid maintains the same type of mentality and approach that he possesses right now, it's a matter of time before you start strongly talking about the fact that he is a candidate to come here and start a Major League game. I look at this guy as being a very good starting pitcher some day.

I would be remiss if I said there were not philosophical differences as far as the club and how we put it together, what would work and not work. The disruption and focus loss with players is not good for anyone. That's where I felt strongly that it was important to wipe the slate clean.

Only the one run wasn't going to be good enough, and we gave them two others.

Obviously, he helped make us a good baseball team two years ago.

We did everything we could to get ourselves back in it. We were a base hit from tying it or a ball in the gap from taking the lead. You have to have a lot of good things happen to do that.

The guy has good stuff. His sinker could be devastating -- if he would just trust that.

This is a good facility; you can get a lot of things accomplished. Even on a day like this, you can get something done.

He's making good passes at the ball and not favoring the leg, so let's get it going. He's probably as good as he's going to get as far as a shot. Let's see how he looks.

He threw the ball very nice. He's got some good elevation to his pitch, and I like his approach.

I knew he was fine. It was good to see him out there, good to see what the guy can do for us.

It's nice to talk about where guys are going to finish and what guys are going to do, but to me until you knock off the big boys I think it's fair to say they are the favorites. I feel good about our chances, obviously, and preach to our players constantly about winning. But you've still got to do it first.

It was good to see him relax a little bit and get going. Obviously, spring training is not the best barometer for how you base these guys but, you know, he was 0-for-20 or whatever and he had a couple knocks so that's why you don't put a lot of emphasis on games like this because you can turn it around in one day.

It was a good game for us to get back on the winning ways. Hopefully we're going to turn the corner here, and get into a nice little run.

Everyone is strong early in the season. I think it's best to wait a little longer and see if the trend sticks. I just think some good hitters are off to some good starts.

It's nice to finish strong and end the season on a good note. It's nicer to be above .500 than below it. But .500 is mediocre. We want to be better than that.

It's easy to look good when Pedro pitches. But it was more than that. I like the way we're winning.