TAMPA — Did the Yankees finally get a break, or will Boone Logan awake today with a bruised left hip and need a few days off?
In the final Florida exhibition game of spring training Thursday, the lefty reliever was struck by a liner off the bat of the Pirates’ Jose Tabata and removed from the game.
Considering the Yankees watched Curtis Granderson and Mark Teixeira suffer broken bones in camp, saw Derek Jeter’s surgically-repaired ankle bark and witnessed Phil Hughes’s back become an early problem, it’s a wonder Logan didn’t need an ambulance to leave the mound.
“I think I am scheduled to pitch [Friday] and I expect to pitch,’’ Logan said.
Manager Joe Girardi, who will start the season with lefty reliever Clay Rapada on the disabled list because of shoulder bursitis, might hold Logan out of today’s game against the Nationals.
“I don’t know if that’s in his cards right now. Let’s see how he feels,’’ Girardi said. “He might have been able to pitch more but I said, ‘It’s silly.’ ”
* Teixeira said he is hopeful Monday’s doctor visit results in the brace being removed from his right wrist.
“I will see if it comes off,’’ said Teixeira, who unlike fellow DL brothers Granderson and Jeter, will travel and stay with the Yankees until he is cleared to begin baseball related activities.
On Tuesday, Teixeira’s wrist problem, which has been diagnosed as a partially torn sheath on the tendon, will be four weeks old. He has progressed to the point where he is swinging a bat with just his hand, taking ground balls and running.
The earliest return Teixeira and the Yankees are hoping for is sometime in May. However, since it involves the sheath, nobody is sure if eventually the wrist will require surgery.
* Kevin Youkilis will play the Red Sox for the first time in a Yankees uniform Monday at Yankee Stadium.
No matter what side of sports’ best rivalry the participants play for, the meetings are painful.
“As players, a lot of times we kind of dread it [Yankees-Red Sox series]. You’re excited to play it, but you know you’re going to be on FOX, you know you’re going to be on ESPN, you know it’s going to be a four-hour game,’’ Youkilis said. “It’s one of 162. If you get too hyped up, you never know what can happen.”
* Ronnier Mustelier had very little chance of making the club when camp opened and when Ben Francisco, Lyle Overbay, Brennan Boesch and Vernon Wells were acquired, the odds got longer.
Yesterday the outfielder/third baseman was sent to the minor league camp with a bruised knee.
“He had an outside chance, but with the additions of the other guys changed it,’’ Girardi said of the Cuban refugee, who has built a reputation as a hitter in the minor leagues.
* Lefty Vidal Nuno was named the winner of the James P. Dawson Award, which is given to the best rookie in Yankees’ camp.
Nuno, 25, is 1-1 with a 0.61 ERA and a save in seven exhibition game appearances