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May 17, 2007
You can push his starts up or back. You can tell him he’s pitching at noon, 7 o’clock at night or in the wee hours of the morning. Julian Tavarez will assure you that he’s ready to go.
``I grew up playing ball,’’ Tavarez, who hails from the Dominican Republic, said after pitching the Sox to a 2-1 win over the Detroit Tigers this afternoon. ``I never went to school in my life, not even one day. The only thing I did was play ball in the street, and that’s the only thing I know how to do. To me, everything is mental. My mind is always ready for anything. To me, nothing bothers me. I’m always like, ``I’m ready. I’m ready to play.’’ It doesn’t matter if it’s 3 in the morning. Let’s start the game. It’s the only thing I know how to do is play ball. I work really hard in the weight room and running and come early to the ballpark, but there’s only one thing that’s in my mind. If you think, `It’s only three days rest. I’m not strong enough to go out there,’’ just don’t go out and pitch because you’re not going to last long on the mound. To me, it’s like, `I’m ready.’ I’m fine, no pain in my body I’m fine. I’m going to go out there and give it my best.’’
Working a season-high seven innings, Tavarez gave up one run on four hits, walking four and striking out three.
After throwing fewer than 100 pitches in each of his previous 12 starts, he tossed 104 pitches today - his most since throwing 106 in a start on Aug. 30, 2002 against Pittsburgh when he was with Florida.
Sox manager Terry Francona on Tavarez' performance today: ``A couple of times, he pitched himself into a bind by getting ahead of the hitter and then walking. It's so nice to see him be able to dial up, making a pitch. After doing that, once to (Gary Sheffield), you see the way the inning is going so many times when you walk people to get to that situation and make a bad pitch and all of a sudden, it's a multi-run inning. Then he gathered himself and went out and was really good in six and seven.''
Posted by Carolyn Thornton 
at 4:20 PM to Thornton
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