Jim Gray: We are here with Jeff Paulson, manager of the Los Altos
Undertakers who just lost once again in the postseason. Jeff, what happened
to your offense out there?

Jeff Paulson: What an extremely disappointing loss. The ballclub fought so
hard out there, but we just didn't match-up well against their starting
pitchers. About the only success we had out there was game 3 against Brown.
Other than that, their starting pitching staff just owned us. 

Gray: Lets talk more about your offense. How do you explain some of these
stats? Albert Belle, 1 for 17 in the series. Kenny Lofton, 3 for 18. Terry
Shumpert, 4 for 25. And the most telling stat of all, Albert Belle and Paul
Konerko had zero RBI's in 6 games.

Paulson: I can't explain it Jim. To have zero production from Belle and
Konerko and still be that close to going to a game 7 really shows the
overall effort of our team. Obviously its very disappointing not having
those players produce. But this is a team game. And we were just one clutch
hit away. Just one hit in four or five situations and you might be
interviewing Paul and not me. It all boils down to the fact that they got
the clutch hits when they needed it, and we just did not. 

Gray: While we are on the subject of your offense, let me just point out
that your team hit .232 for the playoffs.

Paulson: Thanks Jim.

Gray: Several people in the media, me included, are second guessing many of
your decisions. Albert Belle playing first base? Rich Aurilia, who drove in
100 RBI's during the year on the bench for most of the series? What were
you thinking?

Paulson: I tried everything I could to get as much offense on the field as
possible. Cliff Floyd was the only person who was really hitting the ball
well. I thought Konerko and Aurilia didn't match-up well against their
starting pitchers.

Gray: Do you feel you were out managed during the series?

Paulson: I don't think you are qualified to ask a question like that. But I
will go ahead and answer it. It is obvious what a great manager Paul is. He
was voted manager of the year by his peers last year and could very well
win that honor again. I know in my mind, I didn't do a couple of things I
wish I did. A few times in the series I think Paul made some moves that I
could have countered differently but didn't. There are 4 or 5 moments in
the series which I wish I could have made different decisions. Bottom line,
the Zoots are moving on and we are moving home. So I guess that means he
did out manage me.

Gray: You must be very disappointed with your overall season and with your
second straight exit out of the playoffs.

Paulson: Not at all Jim. In fact, I couldn't be more proud. For the second
year in a row, we won our division. For the second year in a row, we were
projected by the experts to finish in the bottom half of our division and
won our division. For the second year in a row, we had the 2nd best record
in the league. I am extremely happy by the accomplishments of this
organization. We beat our division rival Litchfield on the last day of the
season to win our division, we beat the Cowtippers in the first round of
the playoffs and just came up short in the end. 

Gray: How does your team look going into next year.

Paulson: We are in decent shape. We have a few holes to fill, just like any
other team. As of right now, we don't quite have the offense we did this
year. But the strength of this team has always been the bullpen and right
now the bullpen is set going into the 2001 season. Right now I feel we are
in good shape to win our 3rd division title.  What I think we need to do as
an organization is look at how we have built our teams. I think we have
built teams here in Los Altos designed to do well over the course of a long
season. However, come playoff time, I don't think we are necessarily built
to do well in a short 5 or 7 game series. Its something we are going to
look into this offseason.

Gray: Thanks Jeff. Best of luck next year.