TAMPA — In December there was enough common ground between the Yankees and Johnny Damon to get a deal done.
They needed him to play left field or DH, and he needed them to win another World Series.
Of course, it didn’t happen, and now Damon needs only to pass a physical before becoming the Tigers’ left fielder for $8 million this season.
When Damon rejected a two-year pact for $14 million from the Yankees, the club started spending money elsewhere. Curtis Granderson and the $25.75 million on his contract was acquired from Detroit. Andy Pettitte signed a one-year deal for $11.75 million. Javier Vazquez was brought in from Atlanta with his $11.5 million for this season and Nick Johnson was signed as a free agent for $5.75 million.
So Damon went looking for a job and landed in Detroit.
“Once spring training starts, it’s real,” Jorge Posada said. “Your team is set and you know he isn’t coming back. We will miss the guy. He was really key for us throughout the years, especially last year. I am happy for him. I don’t know why he wasn’t signed. I don’t know what the deal was.”
“I am happy for him because he knows where he is going to go,” Joe Girardi said. “For players, that’s an anxious time figuring out where you are going to be. Usually, it doesn’t go on this long. I wish Johnny luck. Johnny was good for us here. We all miss Johnny. This is the hard part of the game when relationships change a little bit. I will root for Johnny except when he is playing against us.”
* The original schedule called for Vazquez’s initial bullpen session to be Wednesday. But Vazquez asked pitching coach Dave Eiland if he could move it up and work yesterday, which he did.
“It had been a week and a half since my last bullpen (in Puerto Rico),” Vazquez said following the 35-pitch effort that was limited to fastballs and change-ups.
In his second tour with the Yankees, the quiet Vazquez says he is more comfortable.
“It feels better than the first time,” Vazquez said of 2004, when a strong first half resulted in an All-Star appearance but the second half was miserable. “I know a lot of the guys. It’s like I never left.”
According to Vazquez’s father, his son was suffering from a physical problem in the second half of 2004.
“In the second half something was bothering him,” Posada said. “His dad told me he was hurt although (Javier) wouldn’t tell me.”
* Here is what the Yankees have gotten back on the $4.55 million investment in Andrew Brackman, a first-round pick in 2007 out of North Carolina State: a Tommy John surgery and a very ugly 2009 season at Charleston (Low-A), where he went 2-12 with a 5.91 ERA in 29 games (19 starts) and gave up 76 walks in 106 2/3 innings. Brackman also threw 26 wild pitches.
So, it was encouraging that Brackman had pop on his fastball during yesterday’s bullpen session and appeared to be a lot smoother in his delivery.
“He looked good. He was down in the zone all day today and his mechanics are cleaner,” Girardi said. “He has had some physical ailments he has had to deal with and this is not an easy game. When you are 6-foot-11, there is a lot that can go on mechanically. I thought he looked really good today.”
* Phil Hughes has never met New Jersey Congressman Bill Pascrell but it’s safe to say the Democrat from Paterson is a big Hughes fan.
Why else would Pascrell send Hughes an American flag that flew on top of the Capitol on June 24, 2008? That’s Hughes’ birthday.
“Never met him,” Hughes said as he displayed the flag inside a frame at his locker yesterday. “But he sent this.”