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Rodriguez likely to make Yankee debut vs. Angels

Jul 31, 2008 - 10:21 AM LA Angels (67-40) at NY Yankees (59-48) 7:05 p.m.

BRONX, New York (Ticker) -- On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim put all of baseball on notice with the acquisition of first baseman Mark Teixeira. One day later, the New York Yankees made a statement of their own, replacing the injured Jorge Posada with another potential Hall of Fame-caliber catcher in Ivan Rodriguez.

The Yankees expect Rodriguez to make his debut on Thursday when they host the first game of a four-game set with the Angels.

New York reacted quickly after Posada's season-ending shoulder surgery, trading reliever Kyle Farnsworth to Detroit in exchange for the 14-time All-Star backstop.

"(Rodriguez) is a significant upgrade with all due respect to who we got," Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said. "How it works out all remains to be seen, but he's having a good year and we're excited to have the opportunity to believe that we addressed an important area of need."

The Yankees fared quite well without Rodriguez in the lineup on Wednesday, avoiding a three-game sweep with a 13-3 rout of Baltimore.

They'll look for a repeat against Jon Garland (9-6, 4.30 ERA), who overcame a poor outing in Saturday's 11-6 victory over Baltimore to get the win despite surrendering five runs and seven hits over 5 1/3 innings.

Anaheim dealt first baseman Casey Kotchman and minor league pitcher Steve Marek to Atlanta to acquire Teixeira, who made his debut in Wednesday's 9-2 three-game series-sweeping win over the Red Sox.

Teixeira drew a walk but went hitless in four at-bats, but it did not matter as the Angels won for the 10th time in 12 games after the All-Star break.

"I'm very excited," Teixeira said. "If you ever get traded, you want to get traded to a team that has a chance to win it all. This is a great team here - great pitching, great defense and timely hitting. This team knows how to win and I'm happy to be a part of it."

Andy Pettitte (12-7, 3.76) will be the latest pitcher trying to derail an Angels offense that has scored 80 runs since the break, something he may able to do if he can emulate his last two outings. After holding Oakland to one run and striking out nine on July 20, the lefthander yielded three runs - one earned - and five hits with seven strikeouts in the Yankees' 10-3 over the Boston Red Sox on Saturday.