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Scotty Olsen Puts On His Bigboy Pants

Looks like Scott Olsen is ready to step up and be a leader on this squad. Here is a collection of quotes from the various local papers put together by a buddy of mine over on MarlinBaseball.com…

“With Dontrelle being gone, someone has to do it. Whoever it is, obviously, it will be well deserving. But I’m not going to sit here and beat around the bush. I want to start on Opening Day. It’s just going to come down to how I pitch in Spring Training, and the shape I show up in, and the shape the other guys show up in. It will come down to the competition to see who gets it.”

“That’s over, that’s in the past and over with,” Olsen said about the fallout from the arrest. “On the field-wise, I was throwing a lot of balls, and I was walking a lot of people. I watched a couple of game-tapes, scouting people. You’d see, I’d get two quick outs on nine or 10 pitches, and then the inning turned into 28-30 pitch inning after two outs and nobody on base.”

“I think if you are the Opening Day starter, and you replace that No. 1 guy, there might be some more people looking up to you, and more people wanting you to be that guy who steps up every time out,” he said. “We knew [Willis] was going to be the Opening Day starter, but at the same time, he was still like, ‘Something might happen. I might have a 10-and-a-half ERA in Spring Training. Make sure you go for it, strive to do it. Give your best each day. Even if a position is set and locked, you still have got to go out and do your best.’ ”

“[Willis] always used to say that he didn’t like guys, who when they were winning, they are in the clubhouse, and they’re happy,” Olsen said. “Then when they are losing, they are down. You’ve got to be the same guy every day. He was really good about that, to maintain your composure every day, whether you win or lose.”

“It can’t get any worse than that, with all the stuff that happened last year,” he said. “All the bad, I think it’s made me probably stronger mentally and more able to handle everything that goes into this job.

“I’m looking forward to next year. It will be interesting, but it could be a lot of fun. I’ll be 24 in Spring Training. You’ve got to grow up eventually.”

It should be interesting next year. Especially since Miguel won’t be around to smack Olsen into line.

Olsen was at Select a Seat the other day and needless to say not many people were interested in seeing him and Fredi Gonzalez. Fewer than 50 fans showed up in the first two hours of a four-hour event Saturday to pick out their season tickets for next season. One fan at the stadium offered this interesting tidbit on his decision or not to buy tickets for the upcoming season…

“We’re thinking about it,” said Joe Schillan of Fort Lauderdale, perusing ticket prices with his girlfriend Cori Pasinetti of Boca Raton. “This is Montreal. They develop players for other teams.”

Scott Olsen and Fredi Gonzalez are not the fan favorites compared to Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera were. I understand where Joe from Fort Lauderdale is coming from.