It was the first time I've ever seen Ronny play. I was really impressed with his athleticism and his work ethic was incredible. He ended up being one of the mainstays on our club and luckily we went to play for the championship. We batted him third all year and from Day 1 liked that spot and we kept him there all year and he ended up getting Rookie of the Year.

The first impression I had was hitting ground balls to him and you realized that he was a special person because of his athleticism. You could see how light he was on his feet and how gifted a person he is to play baseball.

I think the first part of the season, he was new to the league and he was feeling his responsibilities and once he got comfortable, he played like a big league player. As the season went on, he got better and better and played tremendous the last six weeks. When we made our run for the playoffs is when he played his best defense. He was a big factor in our offense the whole time.

It's made me work a little bit harder because I want to stay on this time. I want to play every day. Last year I really didn't prove I could.

I play everybody the same amount of ice time. We work as a team and play as a team.

We'll work on that next time. I just went out there and played hard. When you play with these guys, it's easy to get it going.