Ex-Phillie Burrell Adjusting To Rays, New DH Role

Joining any other team after spending his entire professional career in the Philadelphia Phillies organization would have been a bit strange for Pat Burrell.

But the fact that the locker room he now calls home is filled mostly with players he helped beat in the World Series last fall adds a bit of a twist to the whole situation.

"It's strange," Burrell admitted this morning on his second day in the Tampa Bay Rays' camp. "The thing I keep thinking about is, when you've been in a place like I was for a long time, you have a hard time turning the page and accepting some of the new things. It's going to be an adjustment period for me, but these guys have made it very easy for me as far as making me feel welcome and stuff like that."

Burrell spoke a few minutes after disengaging from a recent Rays rite of spring - a bunch of guys sitting in chairs in a circle around the chatty reliever Troy Percival - and it seems the slugger already is blending in fine.

"He seems like he fits right in the atmosphere over here and what we're trying to do," center fielder B.J. Upton said.

Right up there on the to-do list along with learning everyone's name is figuring out how to best approach his new job. Burrell is slated to be the Rays' primary designated hitter, which will be something of a departure for him after a career spent entirely in the National League and serving mostly as a left fielder. With the Rays, he'll probably get to fill in for Carl Crawford occasionally, but his primary focus will be hitting.

"For me, playing every day [in the past], I'm going to have to find a way to stay active," Burrell said. "I don't think I'm going to be somebody who can just sit in the dugout and wait for his time to come up."

Burrell expects his pregame preparation to remain basically the same, "but once the game starts, I think that's when I'll probably have to change my program. If I could just go stand behind Carl in left, I think it'd be great."

In lieu of that opportunity, Burrell will settle for picking the brain of others who DH regularly, including his friend and former Philadelphia teammate Jim Thome. He said Thome already has told him it will take some time to get used to the switch.

"It is a change," Burrell said. "I'd like to sit here and say I've got it all figured out and I know what I'm going to be doing, but it's kind of a work in progress."

Burrell and the rest of the position players already in camp (they aren't due to report until midnight Tuesday) got in a workout this morning. Willy Aybar was among the group, and the infielder said before practice that he's pleased to have completed the multiyear contract that is expected to be officially announced sometime today.

"It's good for me, and the team is giving me a good chance," Aybar said. "I like the team, I like my teammates, I like the manager - everybody. Good people."

Aybar should be as sharp as anyone in camp, given that he has been playing regularly for Licey in the Dominican Republic for months. Licey reached the Caribbean Series a couple of weeks ago but came up short in its effort to defend its title.