Pregame Notes: Rain and a Nunez-less lineup

First things first, no I have no idea if the start of the game will be delayed, but Joel Sherman heard from the Mets that the rain will keep up until 2:30pm ET or so. So yeah, there figures to be some kind of delay at some point. The tarp has been on the field all morning and the players did all their pregame stuff indoors.

Secondly, Eduardo Nunez will not play today because his hamstring tightened up yesterday as he ran out his first double. Joe Girardi doesn’t believe it’s anything serious, especially since he continued to hit the snot out of the ball after first feeling it, and there are no tests scheduled. He just doesn’t want to play him on the wet grass, so Ramiro Pena will get the start at shortstop. There was a late report today, so Girardi’s still waiting to talk to everyone to make sure they’re okay before settling on a lineup. No reason to believe anyone besides Nunez is hurt, just standard operating procedure.

• Bartolo Colon felt fine after yesterday’s start, so that’s good news. Day-after soreness is always the concern when a guy comes back from an injury. Bart told Girardi he could start today, but not tomorrow. Love him.
• Girardi did not talk to Derek Jeter last night, but he heard everything went well in his first rehab game with Double-A Trenton. He’ll talk to him today to see how he feels. There’s no plan in place for Jeter should Trenton get rained out today, that’s something they’ll discuss if it comes to it. Girardi said he doesn’t expect to alter Derek’s rest schedule once he does come back, and he has no issue with him playing in the All-Star Game if he’s healthy.
• There’s still no plan in place for the starting rotation beyond tomorrow’s game, which A.J. Burnett will definitely start. Phil Hughes lines up to pitch tomorrow, but they still haven’t decided if they’ll activate him or have him make one more rehab start. The All-Star break is a consideration in that if they activate him this week, he’ll have to sit for another ten days almost immediately, but Girardi said that’s not necessarily a bad thing because Hughes has been rehabbing pretty hard. They’re likely to get this allsorted out by the end of the day, but no promises.
• Part of the reason why they’ve waited so long to make the decision is a) these things tend to take care of themselves (i.e. injury), and b) everyone is pitching well. Girardi feels there is no wrong decision to be made for that reason, everyone’s performing well, especially of late.
• As for Jose Reyes, he is having his MRI this morning and Terry Collins did not have an update during his pregame press conference. They’ll have one soon, but for now Angel Pagan takes over as leadoff hitter. Reyes won’t play again until he’s 100% healthy though, hamstrings are tricky and the last thing they want him to do is re-aggravate the injury and kill his trade value miss more time.

Update: Lance Pendleton just walked into the clubhouse. His name and 25 others are listed on the roster sheet, so there’s a move coming. Also, same lineup as yesterday, just Pena in for Nunez.