Braves set their Grapefruit League rotation

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. -- Jair Jurrjens will begin throwing off a mound again on Monday and if he continues to make steady progress, the Braves will fit him into their Grapefruit League season rotation to prepare for his April 7 regular-season debut against the Cubs.

Along with announcing that Derek Lowe will serve as his Opening Day starter for the second straight season, Braves manager Bobby Cox also took time on Sunday afternoon to announce his Grapefruit League pitching plans.

Tommy Hanson will start the Grapefruit League season opener against the Mets on Tuesday at Port St. Lucie and Tim Hudson will get the start on Wednesday, when the Braves host the Mets to open the home portion of their exhibition season schedule. Both games will air on MLB.TV.

Kenshin Kawakami will make his first start on Thursday, when the Braves host the Pirates at Wide World of Sports complex, also on MLB.TV.

As he moves toward what will be his second consecutive Opening Day assignment for the Braves, Lowe will make his Grapefruit League season debut on Friday on MLB.TV against the Nationals. Closer Billy Wagner and setup man Takashi Saito are also scheduled to pitch in this home contest.

Peter Moylan and left-hander Eric O'Flaherty, the club's top two middle relievers, are scheduled to pitch during Wednesday's game against the Mets.

Jurrjens, who has been making steady progress and feeling less discomfort in his right shoulder that was inflamed earlier this month, will need to complete at least three side sessions before being placed in the Grapefruit League rotation. Because Jurrjens is currently unavailable, the Braves will have Kris Medlen start Saturday's game on MLB.TV against the Astros in Kissimmee.

Gardenhire sets spring pitching rotation

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Nick Blackburn will get the start in the Twins' Grapefruit League opener against the Red Sox this Thursday, manager Ron Gardenhire revealed on Sunday when he announced the starters for the club's first four exhibition games.

Gardenhire has already announced that Scott Baker will be the club's Opening Day starter with Carl Pavano likely to pitch the second game of the regular season followed by Blackburn and Slowey. So the early spring schedule is just to help line up pitchers for those slots and also to make sure everyone gets innings.

Here is how the starting pitching will stack up for the club's first three games, which are all against the Red Sox. Blackburn will get the start on Thursday night at City of Palms Park with Slowey backing him up. On Friday, Pavano will start in the Twins home opener at Hammond Stadium. Francisco Liriano will then get the start in Saturday's contest across town in Fort Myers.

Baker and Brian Duensing are each slated to start a contest on Sunday, March 7 as the Twins will take part in a split squad that day. They'll host the Yankees at Hammond Stadium for one contest while another group travels to Bradenton for a game against the Pirates.

Glen Perkins, who will compete with Liriano and Duensing for the fifth spot in the rotation, is expected to back up one of the starters during the first couple games, although the exact date has not yet been determined.

Players return to camp following illness

JUPITER, Fla. -- Four Cardinals players and a coach who had been struck by an internal illness returned to camp on Sunday. The ailment has swept through the Cards' clubhouse, with one player estimating that 18 players have come down with it since camp began. Kyle Lohse, Skip Schumaker, Blake Hawksworth, Robert Stock and first-base coach Dave McKay all missed Saturday's workout but returned to action on Sunday.

The good news is that in nearly every case, it has been a one-day matter. The bad news is that that one day can be extremely unpleasant.

"I feel a lot better right now than I did yesterday at this time," Lohse said on Sunday afternoon.

Hawksworth had been scheduled to throw live batting practice on Saturday but missed that session. Instead, he threw a bullpen session on Sunday, which will allow him to get back on schedule with a live-BP throw on Tuesday.

Lohse, meanwhile, remains slated to face hitters on Monday.

"I'm feeling pretty tired right now, but other than that, tomorrow I should be fine," Lohse said. "As long as I get some food in me. I've got a throw tomorrow and I should be all right for that. I've got to pace it a little bit I guess, probably."

Rehabbing Roberts takes live BP

SARASOTA, Fla. -- Brian Roberts took swings during Orioles live batting practice on Sunday for the first time since being diagnosed with a small herniated disc in his lower back.

Baltimore's leadoff hitter, Roberts progressively swung with more authority as he rotated through the team's five stations, taking some good hacks in particular off infield coach Juan Samuel.

"I always do BP fairly easy," Roberts said. "I've tried to increase the intensity a little bit as I went, kind of every round. But most importantly, [you] just try to get your body moving in that direction at a little higher rate than off the tee or flips or whatever."

In addition to bunting, Roberts took cuts from both sides of the plate, and he was encouraged with the results from Sunday's workout.

"Any time you are coming off of any type of injury, that psychological part is as much as the physical part," he said.

"It got better. The physical confidence as well as the psychological part ... the more you [take swings], the more confidence you get and the more effort you are able to put in."

The 32-year-old Roberts began experiencing nagging back spasms during his offseason workouts at the Athletes' Performance Institute in Arizona, and was originally misdiagnosed with kidney stones before doctors found the herniated disc a week later.

Roberts said on Tuesday that he had hoped to be able to swing a bat against live pitching within the next week. Prior to Sunday's workout, the Orioles second baseman had been a regular fixture at fielding practice and in the cages, and was only limited in swinging the bat during BP.

"That's the last phase, start hitting live," manager Dave Trembley said of Roberts' program. "So, it was good to get that started."

With the Orioles set to play an intrasquad game on Monday and open Grapefruit League play against the Tampa Bay Rays on Wednesday, the timetable for Roberts' spring debut is still undecided.

"I don't know [when Roberts will get in games]," Trembley said. "I will wait until I see what [head athletic trainer Richard Bancells] tells me, what [Roberts] tells me. I can't put a timeframe on it."

For now, Roberts said the plan is to slowly increase his workload and intensity, and try to limit the stopping and starting action that often results from waiting around in between turns at the plate.

"I don't think I'm going to start hacking off pitchers throwing 95 [mph] yet," Roberts said. "But we will increase with the batting practice and the intensity and maybe a few more swings, as well."

One of Baltimore's most consistent players, Roberts hit .283 with 16 homers and 56 doubles last year, breaking Lance Berkman's record for the most doubles by a switch-hitter in a season.

Tribe catchers find Alomar a vast asset

GOODYEAR, Ariz. -- The name in the catching slot on the Double-A Binghamton Mets' lineup card before a game in 2007 was a familiar one to Tribe catching prospect Wyatt Toregas.

Toregas, a member of the Akron Aeros at the time, had grown up hearing the name from his mother, Laura. She worked for an insurance company based in St. Paul, Minn., and on business trips she'd go to Twins games at the Metrodome.

The Indians always seemed to be the visiting club, and Laura always came home gushing about one player in particular.

"Every game she went to, he hit a home run or had three hits," Toregas said. "I was a young catcher in middle school, and she would tell me, 'I saw Sandy Alomar Jr.'"

So when Toregas saw that name on the Binghamton roster, he was shocked. He didn't realize the Mets were shuffling the veteran Alomar around their system near the end of his career.

"I looked at the lineup card, and I see 'Alomar Jr.,'" Toregas said. "I thought, 'The same guy?' I get out on the field, and it's him. I got pumped up to play that game."

Now, Toregas and the other young catchers on the Indians' roster -- Lou Marson and Carlos Santana -- are pumped to be on the same field as Alomar, under much different circumstances. He's not an opponent; he's on their side, brought aboard to be the Tribe's first-base coach and catching coordinator. And he has the knowledge that comes with 17 years of Major League experience, including 11 memorable years with the Tribe, to pass along to them.

"He's seen everything 100 times," Toregas said. "I can't wait for these days coming up. I feel like I'm going to learn a whole lot. You get to a point where you've learned a lot and things start to come slower to you, whereas early in your career you're taking in a lot of things fast. But I feel like I'm starting over again. I can tell he sees things I don't see, and he knows how it's going to work out before it happens."

That's why the Indians felt it so important to bring Alomar in as a member of new manager Manny Acta's staff. They knew of his playing credentials, of course, but they also heard laudatory things about Alomar from the last two years he spent as a catching instructor with the Mets.

While with the Mets, Alomar developed a program for catchers that he's begun to pass along to the Tribe's backstops.

"You want the players to be aware of every situation in the game," Alomar said. "And that's how I started my program. It's not just the same thing over and over, because that becomes boring. You have to throw different situations in the game at them so that they're mentally aware."

The program here in camp begins with a series of morning drills in which Alomar has his catchers work on their footwork, their backhand and forehand scoops, and their blocking of wayward pitches. The number of repetitions is high, and the speed is advanced.

"It loosens your hips up," said Marson, who is expected to be the Tribe's regular behind the plate at the outset of the season. "That's something he wants us to do before the game, too, so that we're loose before the first inning. Sometimes you go into a game and your hips are still kind of tight and you have to block that first ball. He's stressing that you can lose a game in the first inning, so you want to be ready in the first inning."

The conditioning element of the drills should also help the catchers be more physically prepared to handle the grind of the season and the sheer length of games.

"The first couple days [of Alomar's program] tire you out," Toregas said. "But once we catch up with it, we're going to be a lot quicker and a lot more explosive. Sandy's a smart man. He knows how to train. And he's the coolest guy I ever met."

Alomar is one of the most popular players from the Tribe's glory days of the 1990s. In 985 games with the Indians, he batted .277 with 92 homers, 453 RBIs and 416 runs. He was the American League Rookie of the Year in 1990 and a six-time All-Star.

But for all his successes, Alomar, like many of us, wishes he would have known then what he knows now.

"If I would have known what development and evaluation is about," he said, "I would have evaluated myself much better and known what to do. The goal -- and it should be everybody's goal as a coach -- is to teach the player that eventually the player can manage himself or coach himself on the field."

Alomar said Joel Skinner, Junior Ortiz and Tony Pena were all tremendous teachers for him early in his career. Now, he hopes to have a similar positive influence on Marson, Toregas and Santana, the Tribe's top prospect who figures to be the club's catcher of the not-too-distant future.

But even grizzled veteran Mike Redmond, who will be the Tribe's backup backstop this season, sees the benefits of having Alomar around.

"Some teams don't have anybody who can help the catchers," said Redmond, who played the previous five seasons in Minnesota. "We didn't have a catching coordinator with the Twins. It's nice to have a guy who has been in the battles and understands the grind of catching and handling a staff."

Alomar also understands elements of the catcher's job that he believes go too often overlooked.

"The simplest, No. 1 thing in catching that a lot of people don't even cover is covering signs," he said. "The majority of stolen bases are when people steal your sign from first base. Breaking ball? They're gone. People don't work on that, but we will."

The work began last week and will continue throughout camp and into the season. Catchers usually don't have a set pregame conditioning routine before regular season games, but Alomar's catchers will.

And Alomar already has their ears.

"I asked him the other day how many years he played," Marson said. "He said '17,' and I thought, 'Wow.' I have a lot of respect for guys who can play that long and be consistent for that long. You can listen to and learn from a guy like that. He's been through it all."

Pitchers' fielding practice is a rite of spring

PEORIA, Ariz. -- The drill begins with a bell, a horn or the voice of a pitching coach.

And it's usually met with a few sighs, shoulder shrugs and occasionally, a clap.

It doesn't matter if you want to do it. And it doesn't matter if you are New York's Andy Pettitte, Boston's John Lackey, reigning Cy Young Award winners Tim Lincecum and Zack Greinke or an unknown Minor League pitcher -- you will practice fielding your position during Spring Training. You will move station to station to improve your defense, and it will be the first thing you do every single day for the next six weeks.

Every. Single. Day.

It's called pitchers' fielding practice, also known as PFP, and it could be the most dreaded part of Spring Training. But it's also among the most important. PFP gets pitchers in tip-top shape and can mean the difference between a run or a game in the regular season.

"During the course of the year, most of the pitchers that succeed and win games will have a PFP play a couple of times a game," Padres pitching coach Darren Balsey said. "The guys that get the job done and execute may end up winning the club the game. There are a lot of times that a pitcher throws the ball away or doesn't field a bunt correctly and a run scores. That can't happen. That's why we work so hard on it during Spring Training."

Each club has its own version of PFP and time spent on the exercise varies from 15 minutes to an hour each day. PFP usually starts immediately after the morning stretch and includes these practices: covering first base and third base, pitchouts, pickoffs and rundowns, bunt plays, backing up relay throws, slow-rollers, comebackers, double plays, and balls hit in-between fielders.

"As a pitcher, if you have the opportunity to get that out, you have to help yourself," Padres pitcher Jon Garland said. "If that ball is right there in front of you, that's a lot better than being in the outfield so you better make that play. It does get boring and these first few weeks of Spring Training, it's all you are doing, but you have to take it seriously."

In the National League, pitchers hit, bunt, slide and review the signs during Spring Training PFP. Most teams revisit pitcher's fielding practice two or three times during the regular season.

"There is a proper way to cover first base and there are proper angles to fielding, fielding a bunt or hitting the bag," Padres manager Bud Black said. "I don't want our guys just going through the motions. We work on this stuff in Spring Training and during the course of a season, if a pitcher does not make the right play, we get really ticked off."

Some believe Greg Maddux is the best fielding pitcher of all-time. He has 18 Gold Glove Awards to back the claim. Retired pitchers Kenny Rogers and Mike Mussina, along with White Sox ace Mark Buehrle and St. Louis star Adam Wainwright, who each won a Gold Glove in 2009, are often the first mentioned as strong defensive pitchers.

But is a good fielding pitcher born or is he made? Athleticism plays a role in defensive success, but just how big of a role?

"To me, it's all about how good of an athlete you are," Rangers pitcher C.J. Wilson said. "I was an outfielder and I think a lot of guys that used to play a position just do it naturally. Personally, I'd rather spend the time going over strategies and pitching techniques than do PFP. It's just boring."

Instinct plays a role on defense for pitchers. Can instinct be taught?

"I think a lot of what happens comes naturally," Buehrle said. "You don't have a lot of time to think and that ball is coming at you pretty fast sometimes. You make the play without thinking."

Buehrle has an advantage on the mound. He spent his childhood playing roller hockey with his buddies and was usually the team's goaltender. The sport taught him how to move laterally and he sometimes uses the hockey techniques to stop baseballs.

He's not above a kick-save or throwing his hip into a ball if it means a chance at saving a run or getting an out.

"I've taken some pretty good hits off my body, but so far, I've been fine," he said. "I know there is going to come a time when I get nailed and I'm going to ask myself, 'Why the heck did I just do that?' but you just do what you have to do. It's all instinct."

During the World Series last year, Mariners pitcher Cliff Lee, then with Philadelphia, made a few defensive plays, including a behind-the-back catch -- on instinct. The plays cemented his status as a solid fielding pitcher.

"Some of those plays, I was just trying to get a glove on it and it's not anything you work on," he said. "It's just something that happens. I think my athletic ability had something to do with that, but it's also about being ready. Once you let that ball go, you are a fielder."

Pitching coaches acknowledge that instinct and athleticism play roles in PFP, but also say repetition can improve a pitcher's skill and remind him of proper technique. It makes sense. It's not like pitchers are taking ground balls or covering first base in drills during the offseason.

Pitchers, like most players, run or lift weights during the winter months. It's not uncommon for a big league pitcher to start throwing in January, but offseason PFP is unheard of.

"You hear all the time that you want the pitchers to be involved in as few plays as possible and the pitching coaches want the exact opposite," Reds pitching coach Bryan Price said. "We want our guys to be able to handle the ball and make plays. The only way to feel confident in these guys is to give them the repetition and make sure they are confident on the infield."

One of the only ways to keep the pitchers from losing interest during the monotonous drill is using games to keep PFP fun. The Rangers pitchers play Wiffle ball. The Padres have a contest to see which pitcher can make the most PFP plays without making an error.

In one of the most notable moves by a manager in the history of PFP, Detroit's Jim Leyland agreed to take on Tigers pitcher Justin Verlander in a pitcher's fielding practice showdown this spring. After Leyland hit ground balls by Verlander in the first two days of workouts, Verlander declared that he would not let his manager get another ground ball past him for the rest of camp.

The result has been an entertaining -- and beneficial -- competition for all of the pitchers in camp.

It was Detroit that brought PFP back into the spotlight after the 2006 World Series against St. Louis when Tigers pitchers made five errors, four of them on throws to first or third base. Verlander had two miscues as the Tigers lost the Series to the Cardinals in five games that year.

"Everybody saw what happened in the World Series a few years back with Detroit, but that just happened to be on the big stage," Garland said. "That can happen every day or ever year in a game. You make an error and it can make the difference in a game."

D-backs announce spring rotation schedule

TUCSON, Ariz. -- D-backs manager A.J. Hinch announced his rotation for the first few games of the Cactus League schedule, which begins on Thursday against the Rockies.

Billy Buckner, who is the frontrunner to nab the No. 5 spot in the rotation, will start Thursday's home game against Colorado.

On Friday, the D-backs travel to Mesa, Ariz., to take on the Cubs and will send ace Dan Haren to the mound. Haren was named by Hinch as the team's Opening Day starter just prior to the start of camp.

Edwin Jackson will start on Saturday against the Giants at Scottsdale Stadium. The right-hander is slated to start the second game of the regular season.

On Sunday, the D-backs play split-squad games against the Rockies, and Kevin Mulvey and Ian Kennedy will get the starting nods.

Mulvey is in competition for the fifth spot in the rotation, while Kennedy, who came over from the Yankees in a three-team deal last December, is the heavy favorite to win the No. 4 starter role.

The D-backs hope to work Brandon Webb into the rotation sometime around mid-March, which would allow him enough time to start the third game of the regular season.

Hinch said he will not try and have his pitchers not face National League West opponents during the spring, though, he might take another look at that during the last week of spring when the D-backs face the Rockies and Padres.