LOS ANGELES - Phillies manager Charlie Manuel said he never considered stepping away from his duties after his mother's death last week “because we've come this far, and like I just want to be there.”

June Manuel died Friday in Roanoke, Va., after a brief illness. She was 87.

“My mom and I are very close,” Manuel said Sunday in his first public comments since he found out about her passing. “I know that she would definitely want me to finish the season, if possible. There's no way I'd miss her funeral, but at the same time, hopefully this is going to work out.”

June Manuel called her son four or five times a week.

“She'd tell me things like, `You go tell those guys that I said I'm praying for them and I want them to bear down and really get after it,”' Manuel said. “I used to say, ‘Yeah, Mom, I'll be sure to tell them.' Sometimes I might get a little upset. I'd say, `One of these days I'm going to bring you up here and let you tell them.”'

Manuel said he likes being by himself and that it's been “annoying” to deal with the volume of phone calls he's been getting.

“I understand that,” he said. “Seems like every time I sit down the phone rings. Every time I get up the phone rings. But that's kind of what you got to adjust to. And it's OK.”

Manuel said he didn't want his mother's death to be a distraction to the Phillies, who played Game 3 of the NL championship series Sunday night against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

“But I feel like the type of players that we have, and knowing them like I do and their attitude and the way they like to play baseball and the things that happen, I don't think nothing's going to get in their way,” he said.