Yankees News and Notes on a Thursday Morning

The Yankees will play their second straight night game tonight at home against the Tampa Bay Rays. Here are some news and notes to get you through the day until game time. Remember I have a twitter account and can be read @gmarchesej and also on facebook. I will have the lineups up later on today through Twitter. Ivan Nova did not have a good feel for his curveball last night in the bullpen so he scrapped it. He went with what is supposed to be a cutter but it acts as a slider. Joe Girardi said "That is as good as it gets, the best pitching performance so far." He got 11 outs on the ground and only one of his last 12 outs were in the air, he wanted to keep the ball down last night and he sure did that. He said his slider is like a new toy, that he has to play with it sometimes but not too much because he has other pitches also. He said he feels good about all of his pitches right now. Nick Swisher had a typical Swisher type play during the game while running full speed after a foul ball, he jumped right over the fence into the bullpen to try and catch the ball. Joe Girardi said great effort and all but don't do that again. Russell Martin says his knee feels so good he has stopped using the protective brace, he said I don't need it, I don't even worry about the knee anymore. Martin hasn't been talked about much this spring and that is a probably a good thing, he is good behind the plate and no one ever complains about defense like they do with Posada or Cervelli. The thing to remember is this guy is still only 28 so after a rough couple of years he should bounce back. Rafael Soriano will pitch at the minor league complex today. He said he didn't want to pitch against any AL East team so the Yankees won't have him do that. Teixeira of course was hit in the hand, he is always getting hit, but he is fine, made the Yankees hold their breath for a couple of minutes. Boone Logan is scheduled to pitch today. He was shut down briefly early in the spring due to elbow fatigue but he feels fine. He said he just hasn't pitched in a game in a long time. Teixeira had two doubles last night giving him seven on the spring, he has worked hard this spring on trying to get off to a good start which he never does. He looks great though and ready to go for the season. Joba Chamberlain said he doesn't know the severity of his oblique injury but knows that he feels fine and can do everything. He said they just want to be cautious with him and even during the season he would miss a couple of days because he wouldn't want it to get worse and turn into a big problem. Yankees vs. Rays tonight at 7:00PM. As far as I know the game isn't televised.