31 Quotes by Joel Pineiro

I was playing catch-up all year. But I'm not making excuses, because even if you're throwing 85 or 86 mph, you can still get guys out. You just have to learn from your experiences and improve.

To me, they have the best pitching staff all around. The last three days have been amazing.

Every season's big. I don't want to say it's my biggest year. But ... personally I want others to respect me as a proven pitcher in this league.

I've been feeling great all year. It was just a matter of having that extra confidence to go out there and challenge people. Maybe it's a little too late in the season, but it's something I can carry over to next year.

Once we got that eight-spot up there, I felt a little more relaxed. I knew I had to throw strikes early in the count and get some ground balls. That's what happened.

I told myself I wanted to finish the game (once the lead grew to 8-1). The defense behind me was very good, and that kept my pitch count down and enabled me to stay in the game.

It starts from here, taking it back to Spring Training and go toward April. I like to have a strong start and go out there continue it. Hopefully we can get these two games out of the way and go on to the next round for us and for the people of Puerto Rico.

It's been a frustrating year. I've been down, then up. I never settled into a place to be steady.

That helped me to go all nine right there. A 3-1 lead is nothing. Getting those five runs there was a big lift for the team.