TAMPA — In case there were any questions about where the Yankees’ second-biggest offseason investment expects to play this season, Jacoby Ellsbury took care of that shortly after walking into the clubhouse at George M. Steinbrenner Field for the first time.
“I talked to Joe [Girardi] about playing center field and leading off,” said Ellsbury, who added he won’t be affected by pressure from his seven-year, $153 million contract.
“I’m the same player from Day One until the day that I signed,” Ellsbury said. “That’s the mentality I’m going to take and the mentality I’ve always had: Play the game hard and play the game the right way.”
The next step is staying healthy. Ellsbury insisted last year’s injury problems — he played through both a bone bruise in his left hand and a stress fracture in his right foot— are behind him and he has been 100 percent for most of the offseason.
He’s one of several Yankees the team needs to stay on the field — several of them freshly signed.
When Ellsbury was asked if he had played or worked out with anyone on the team in the past, he took a moment to soak in his surroundings.
“I’m trying to look around this clubhouse right now,” Ellsbury said. “There’s a lot of new faces.”
And with the signings come expectations.
“This team has a great chance to win and play deep into October,” Ellsbury said.
Another new Yankee, Carlos Beltran, said the same thing Monday.
“We’ve added great pieces and the sky’s the limit,” Ellsbury said. “One of the reasons I signed here was the opportunity to win a World Series. Once you get a taste of that one time — fortunately I’ve had the chance to do it twice — that’s what you go into each year striving for. It’s early, but I think that’s the goal you have to have coming into the season. I like that pressure, having the expectation to win and I think the fans like that.”
He called his signing the start of a “second chapter” after seven seasons in Boston and was looking forward to playing between Beltran and Brett Gardner.
“It’s a tremendous outfield,” Ellsbury said. “[Gardner’s] speed, being a center fielder, you have two guys out there — three really — who cover some ground. When you look in the outfield, it just looks like there’s nowhere you can hit it. You’ve got to hit it out.”
Which is something Ellsbury plans on doing himself, in part because of the short right-field wall at Yankee Stadium.
“Balls that maybe were caught at the track [other places] are going to be homers,” Ellsbury said. “So there’s no reason to change your swing, but you may get rewarded for something that might not have been a home run before.”