CANO WORKING HARD, DROPPING WEIGHT

(Zell's Pinstripe Blog)

  As I have said before..Cano will have a big year in 2009. If he doesn’t..I would be very suprised. The Yankees are very impressed with what Robbie Cano is doing so far this off-season. The Yankees were concerned with Cano’s body weight, but Kevin Long has told them not to worry. Cano’s body fat is at 11 percent, and he is slimming down. He even hired a personal trainer to get him going. I guess thats exactly what he needs. A kick in the butt..kind of like what Larry Bowa did to him. Now Kevin Long hopes to teach Robbie more plate discipline.

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“I was as impressed with what he looks like as I have ever been in my whole life,” hitting coach Kevin Long said of Cano yesterday after spending six days last week in the Dominican Republic with the second baseman who led the list of Yankees disappointments last season.

“He hired a personal trainer from New Jersey who is kicking his [butt], and he looks great,” Long said. “His body fat is at 11 percent, his stomach is cut.”

“He works on hitting and doing agility drills for two hours, rests and goes to the weight room for three hours,” Long said of Cano, who enters the second-year of a four-year, $30 million deal. “There isn’t a whole lot of heavy lifting. It’s more cardio and light weights.”

“If he is going to be a third- or fifth-place hitter, which we need him to be, he has to learn about the strike zone and taking a lot more often than not,” Long said of Cano, who drew 26 walks last year. Only 11 players with at least 477 at-bats drew fewer walks than Cano.

“He can do that, because he hits as well as anybody with two strikes.”

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