Q&A: Brewers manager Craig Counsell 'excited' about chance of making another postseason run

LAS VEGAS – Each major-league manager has a 30-minute “meet the press” session during baseball’s annual winter meetings, and the Milwaukee Brewers’ Craig Counsell had his turn late Tuesday afternoon.

Counsell was runner-up to Atlanta’s Brian Snitker for National League manager of the year after the Brewers surged to the NL Central crown, knocking off the Chicago Cubs in an extra game No. 163. The Brewers went on to sweep Colorado in the NL Division Series and extend the Los Angeles Dodgers to seven games before bowing out in the NL Championship Series.

Here are some of the questions reporters asked Counsell and his answers:

Q. You said something on radio recently that was interesting. You said that after the initial disappointment and sadness of losing (in Game 7 of the NLCS), like a week later, you felt angry or mad or something. Can you explain that?

A. I think that explains it. Look, we had a lot of fun in the month of October. And you do like to reflect on that. But then when there's a little space that you realize how close you were, how difficult it is to get there, how difficult it was to get to that game, how much work it's going to take to get back to that situation. So, when you're that close, there's always a little bit of you that feels like, "Man, we've got a lot of work to do to get to that point again." It's ultimately what drives you. But it makes you a little bit mad. That's how it made me feel. I was a little mad.

Q. How do you feel about your chances of getting back to that? When you look at where you are with the roster and this off-season, how confident are you that you will get back?

A. I think we have a lot of work to do. I think we do have a team that we're able to bring back the core group of what was there. And there's going to be newcomers and it's going to be different. But we feel like we'll be in a position to certainly try to make a good run at it. We're all excited about it, for sure. I think everybody knows the season finished and we have something left to do. And that's going to be part of next season, for sure.

Q. How different is the feel up in the room, this winter meetings, compared to previous ones when you were still actively rebuilding?

A. I think really for us, it turned over. You always judge how agents and players are treating you as far as a destination. That changed last year, in my opinion, with what we were able to accomplish last year. We took it a step, a couple steps further this year. But overall I think it's the same feel from that sense.

Q. When those California fires were lapping at the houses of Ryan Braun, Christian Yelich, just how close they were to peril, what did you think about those reports and what do you think about what they've done since as they've tried to raise money to help those people who lost their homes?

A. Christian, I feel like, has really kind of continued, just my admiration probably has grown this winter. You see how he's kind of taken this upon himself, and Ryan and Mike (Attanasio, son of owner Mark Attanasio) as well, of taking this on themselves to be leaders. So, I think anytime you see your players act as leaders -- and this is something completely apart from baseball -- you're really proud of them. To see them take this leadership, it does, it makes you proud.

Q. Have you thought about how things change where you are now, when you become the hunted instead of the hunter? When you have raised expectations, all the things that come with things after you win? 

A. I think we've been a good baseball team for a while. I don't think things change that much. Wherever you're at, whatever happened the year before, I don't think at game time you think about it too much or you feel like the hunter or hunted, whatever. You get in the action and you've got to beat them. There will be different obstacles for our team this year, different challenges for sure. I don't feel like that will be one of them and feeling like we're the hunted.

Q. With your coaching changes, especially (pitching coach) Derek Johnson leaving, (new pitching coach) Chris Hook is a guy you know and everybody respects, but is that going to be a big loss for the organization?

A. Well, we're going to have a different challenge for us, for sure. I think for the pitching program that we had, I think we were getting to a point where we felt like we were pretty locked into some really positive things. Now our challenge is to build on them. But at the same time, we're going to have to start over a little bit with Chris. And so the challenge will be just for him to get up to speed as fast as we can. The positive is that Chris has worked with and has developed a fair number of our pitchers already (in the minors). So, he comes in with a really advanced start from that perspective. And so that's why I feel that we can make a very quick transition and get up to speed quickly.

Q. You and David (Stearns) have always spoken about being successful by making good decisions and stacking good decisions on top of each other. Do the margins for those decisions become more difficult now when you guys feel that you're as close to where you want to be?

A. I think that's exactly right. It's more difficult to come up with ways to make your team better. They are, the margins are smaller. And it's hard to subtract from a big-league team and do moves if you're really trying to make yourself better. So, I think that's probably a challenge for any team that's having success. I think most teams that are having success probably find it that way. That's the new challenge of an off-season like this.

Q. With that said, are you surprised there hasn't been an outside (personnel) move yet, a major-league import yet?

A. No, I really am not. I think it has to happen at the appropriate time and deals come together when deals come together. You just don't look for a name to make a transaction. Our best deals came together in January of last year. It could come together in February this year. So there's no timetable put on them. We don't have a game until April, or maybe late March. So we'll have enough players by then.

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Q. When you look at what you have right now at catcher, in bringing those guys back, if you had to stack your priorities of what you want from your catchers, what is your philosophy? What do you prioritize from your catchers?

A. Different players are good at different things and there's different ways to bring value. You can't always get the perfect of what you want. This player is good at this and this player is really good at this. So I think that's what we feel like we have, and we got two guys that I think are very sound defensively. It's a position where they hit as much as Christian Yelich hits, so offensively they have an important job as well. So, you need some offense from that position as well.

Q. Considering how much you depended on your relievers last season, and the fact that they pitched three extra weeks, are you going to be different with them next spring? Will you have  different schedules for them?

A. Yeah, it's something we've talked about already. You are bound by the schedule a little bit as far as how much you can back off. But I think it's just going to be really important for us to be kind of cautious at the start, I think, and make sure we know exactly where the guys are as they come in to spring. Spring training does let us go at kind of our own pace, and specifically for guys that don't need to be stretched out, there is plenty of time.