YANKEE NOTES
BALTIMORE – Twenty minutes before the Yankees’ first bus departed the team hotel for Camden Yards, Rondell White had enough of waiting in his room.
“Couldn’t take it anymore, I was so antsy,” White told The Post in a cab. “Opening Day with the Yankees.”
White was thinking so much of being in pinstripes after missing almost all of spring training with a rib-cage problem that he left a portable CD player in the taxi.
“I’ve got some butterflies,” White admitted in the clubhouse.
“It feels good knowing I am going out there. I can’t stay still in the clubhouse. I have waited for this day for a long time, and it’s nice that I can play. [Trainers] Gino [Monahan] and Stevie [Donahue] did a great job getting me ready.”
Thanks to suffering a strained left rib-cage muscle on Feb. 26, White played in one exhibition game.
White, who signed a two-year deal worth $10 million, is known as a clubhouse rat.
“I like to get here before anybody else so I can start getting loose,” White explained.
He has been told he facially resembles Magic Johnson when he smiles. While White agrees and laughs at that, he said we shouldn’t be looking for that infectious smile during games.
“When I play, I don’t smile,” White said. “If I am too loose and smiling I don’t feel like I have an edge.”
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Joe Torre could have pitched Roger Clemens on four days rest Saturday against the Devil Rays at Yankee Stadium and saved Orlando Hernandez for Sunday. But Torre told El Duque he would go Saturday.
“We want to keep everybody pitching in line,” Torre said.
Hernandez complained of a tired arm in the final week of spring training, but the Yankees believe he is healthy enough to pitch after going 4-1 with a 4.91 ERA in the exhibition season.
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Yankees don’t have a problem with Bobby Alejo, Jason Giambi’s personal trainer, working out their first baseman, traveling on their charter planes and throwing BP to him in an indoor cage. However, Alejo won’t be a clubhouse presence like he was yesterday, when he hung out at Giambi’s locker, because it’s against MLB rules for a non-employee of a team to have clubhouse access.