MLB

Yankees’ Teixeira: I won’t rush back this time

MARK DOWN: The Yankees have few options to replace Mark Teixeira, out 8-10 weeks with a wrist injury. (
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A year ago, Mark Teixeira came back from a calf injury too quickly. He isn’t going to make the same mistake with the strained tendon in his right wrist that is expected to shelve the switch-hitting Yankees first baseman for eight to 10 weeks.

Teixeira has been told to rest the wrist for four weeks before resuming baseball activities and he plans to comply with that suggestion in order to avoid surgery.

“[Surgery] doesn’t look like it’s necessary,’’ Teixeira said on a conference call yesterday. “The problem is that the doctors told me it’s a classic baseball injury, just an over-use injury where I have to let it heal. It’s not one of those things that I can play through. I can’t play at 70 or 80 percent because then you have the opportunity of completely tearing it and then you would need surgery. That’s why we have a conservative timetable. We don’t know exactly how long it’s going to take.’’

Ten weeks would put Teixeira on schedule to return in mid-May. However, the wrist is the worst place for a baseball player to be hurt because it’s involved in every action.

“Any wrist injury is scary to me because it is so important to hitting and it is not like you can protect it,’’ Yankees manager Joe Girardi said.

PHOTOS: YANKEES SPRING TRAINING

Yankees general manager Brian Cashman is not confident the trade market houses an answer to filling Teixeira’s spot and believes the free agent waters are about fished out, so the Yankees will search for his replacement from within the organization. However, there are hurdles at almost every turn.

The cleanest way to cover for Teixeira is to move Kevin Youkilis from third to first and transform Eduardo Nunez from backup shortstop to third baseman.

However, what if Derek Jeter isn’t ready to play regularly at short? And the Yankees are wary of moving Nunez around because they believe that strategy led to his defensive problems a year ago.

“Right now there are no plans to [move Nunez to third], but that can change,” Girardi said.

Replacement first basemen in camp are Dan Johnson, Juan Rivera and Youkilis. The latter makes the most sense because he has played in more games at first (607) than at third (442).

“I don’t think he has forgotten how to play first base,’’ Girardi said of Youkilis, who won a Gold Glove there in 2007.

He hasn’t.

“I can move over there,’’ Youkilis said. “I have played first so many times in my career it would be definitely a lot easier than third base. Third base is the hardest position.’’

Youkilis added he has no preference since his main objective is to play wherever he is needed.

Girardi said Youkilis was slated to play first because Teixeira was supposed to be away from camp for the World Baseball Classic.

Since the Yankees will start the season without Alex Rodriguez, Curtis Granderson and Teixeira, a power outage is predicted.

“You don’t replace guys like Alex, Tex and Grandy. But you still have to find a way to get it done,’’ Girardi said.

Staff ace CC Sabathia said the onus is on the pitchers.

“It’s going to be a tough couple of weeks but we will get through it,’’ Sabathia said. “We know defending our American League East title starts with the pitching. We put a lot of pressure on ourselves and we know what we need to do. I don’t think there is any added pressure.’’