Arizona Diamondbacks' Torey Lovullo responds to Mad Dog Russo: 'Love to see him quit'

Arizona Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo was asked before Game 7 of the NLCS against the Philadelphia Phillies for his thoughts on sports talk host Chris Russo's comments about how he'd "retire on the spot" if the Diamondbacks beat the Phillies to advance to the World Series.

Lovullo definitely had thoughts on the subject.

Arizona's manager discussed Russo's comments at length, addressing how he and his team "love proving naysayers wrong."

"That type of stuff is kind of entertaining to me because I know Mad Dog has a show and he's got to do his thing, but I would love to see him quit if we won today," Lovullo told reporters. "You know what I mean? There's nothing better than a wise guy New Yorker saying something and then having to chomp on those words, so that's how I'm processing it and it will be great. He's a friend of mine. I love Mad Dog and I know that he's going to end up hearing this. I didn't want to get into this, but I did and we have a little thing going on about it and I think you just internally use it as motivation. You have a sense of pride when you play this game and you want to do your job to the best of your ability and you want to help your team win a game. I want to manage these players the best way to help us have the best outcome."

He continued: "I am extremely motivated at the end of the day on my own, but when you can prove some people wrong, and we all walk around with chips on our shoulder and I guarantee everybody in this room has been told my someone that they couldn't do something and it led you down this road, to be great."

Lovullo concluded: "I just know that there's an under-riding theme here that we, A, don't deserve to be here, B, that we're going to get our butts kicked, and, C, there's bullies all over the National League that can manhandle us. It really excites me to know that we're playing in Game 7, and we're right on the verge of doing something that's unbelievable, and we love proving naysayers wrong."

Update: Mad Dog Russo is eating his words after Diamondbacks' win. Here's what he will do next

More: If DBacks beat Phillies, sports talk host says 'I will retire on the spot'

Lovullo's comments were in response to Chris "Mad Dog" Russo, who said on Mad Dog Radio before Arizona's Game 6 win over the Phillies on Monday:

“To make a long story short, I’ve been wrong on Arizona from Day 1," he said. "I’m stunned they beat Milwaukee, I thought they’d be swept by the Dodgers, I never thought they’d even go back to Philly for a Game 6. I’ll try it one more time: I would not be stunned if they won tonight (Monday's Game 6), I’d be floored.”

Russo wasn't done.

"I’ll say this right now …  write it down," Russo said. “If they win the next two days, they win the next two games and win this series in seven games, if they win, I will retire on the spot."

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The Diamondbacks won Game 6 of the NLCS in Philadelphia on Monday, 5-1, which must have "floored" Russo.

They face the Phillies in the deciding Game 7 of the series on Tuesday night with a chance to go to the World Series and a chance to send the sports radio host into retirement, at least according to the host's own words.

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Reach Jeremy Cluff at jeremy.cluff@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter @Jeremy_Cluff.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Arizona Diamondbacks' Torey Lovullo responds to Chris Russo, naysayers