Ted and I tackle the subway serious:

[Photo Credit: Washington Post]

Berg, Eck, ’nuff said.

Robbie Cano is not in the line up tonight.

…to the great white north.

Yanks at the Jays tonight. Cliff has the preview and so does SNY:

The great Pete Hamill talks boxing:

Hank Steinbrenner popped-off today and the press is grateful.
Alex Rodriguez also spoke to reporters. “Did anyone watch the Super Bowl?” he said. Rodriguez talked about losing weight. From Chad Jennings:

“Kevin Long described it as, he likes to have power, but with the freedom of a swing,” Rodriguez said this afternoon. “I think over the last several years — you’ll have to talk to K-Long a little bit more about it — but he felt there were some restrictions in my swing and some limitations. I think it affected my power.”

…“Kevin Long believes that in order for the power swing to be perfectly right, he really wants you to stroke the ball to left-center,” Rodriguez said. “We always hear right-center, and he has his reasoning behind it, and a lot of it has to do with flexibility, which I think I’ve gotten back.”

;

Finally, Andrew Brackman impressed Joe Girardi today.

Derek Jeter spoke to the press yesterday. Here’s Tyler Kepner in the Times:

Reporter: “Most shortstops in your age range are just no longer that productive. What gives you the confidence you’re going to be one of the exceptions?”

Jeter: “Well, you said ‘most.’ You didn’t say ‘every.’ So there you go.”

Then Jeter gave a quick laugh, that signature expression of self-assurance he has always shown, the one that lets you know he can win any joust with a writer, but not make him feel too bad about it.

And here’s Joe G:

Mariano Rivera reported to camp yesterday and spoke to the press. Chad Jennings has a thorough recap:

Mariano Rivera left home yesterday, doing what Andy Pettitte couldn’t bring himself to do this winter.

“It’s hard,” Rivera said. “One of my kids was, the little one was attached to my hip, crying. It’s hard. A lot of people don’t see that, that part of the game. You have to leave your family. Even though you’re going to see them, being detached from your family is hard.”

It seems Rivera never seriously considered retirement this offseason, but he admitted that leaving home “gets harder and harder,” and now that his oldest son is 17, Rivera realizes he’s “missed a lot of things.”

“Baseball is not everything,” Rivera said. “That’s what we do, yeah, but there’s still life after baseball. There will come a time when you have to make a decision, even though you still have the abilities to play. That comes within yourself. If you don’t feel it in your heart, you don’t feel it in yourself no more, it’s time to say goodbye because, why are you going to do it if you don’t have the desire to do it? That’s why I thank God for Andy, and I respect him because he just didn’t have the desire to do it no more.”

As always, it will be a pleasure to watch the man work.

;