Washington Nationals: Skipper Jim Riggleman On XM With Rob Dibble

Q: Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez? What do you expect? Will he mentor catchers or pitchers?

  Jim Riggleman: “Well, he’ll do both. I think he’s taken on that a little bit in the last couple years on clubs that he’s been on, whereas in the past that wasn’t part of his game, but I think he will mentor some other players. I think he’ll give us an air of confidence with our pitchers when they look in and see who’s back there, but, you know, he’s still a good player, he’s not just a senior citizen on the club. This guy can block balls, throws the ball very well, he’s an athlete back there and he kind of puts in the mind to the other ballclub that you just can’t get on and go. We’ve got a chance to stop your running game. If our pitcher gives him any chance at all, he can throw people out and he’s a good hitter. I only saw Pudge in games that we played against him, but the last couple years that I saw him, I actually commented to him a couple times through the last couple years that he really was swinging into some bad luck? He was hitting a lot of balls right on the barrel, right at people, and that’s just the way it goes sometimes. All you can do is try to hit the ball hard in our game and his numbers are not bad, offensively he’s still a productive hitter, but he can’t continue to hit into that kind of bad luck, cause this guy hit a lot of “at’em” balls…”

Cappydick wants to know if there is any truth to this…