The Hot Stove League

Some stuck out baseballs for Joe Torre to sign, others handed paper to the New York Yankees' manager. Many walked away with his signature scrawled across the backs of their yellow jackets.

About 34,500 fans came to the Tokyo Dome to watch free workouts Saturday by the Yankees and Tampa Bay Devil Rays. The fans squealed with delight as the videoboard focused on the former Yomiuri Giants star Hideki Matsui, who was surrounded by dozens of photographers as soon as he emerged from the third-base dugout to stretch.

Many of the "Shonen yakyu,'' the Japanese equivalent of Little Leaguers, were allowed on the field because they won promotions. As the 7-to-12-year-olds came out in their distinctive team jackets, some blue, some red, some silver, they looked up at Matsui and the Yankees with awe.

"The kids -- that sound is universal,'' Torre said. "It doesn't matter what language they speak, they all sound the same.''

They watched two very tired teams, which both left Florida on Thursday and arrived jetlagged early Saturday following a 19-hour journey.

"It's really tough to have a curfew when you don't know what day it is,'' Torre said.

"I went to sleep at 4, got up at 5:30,'' New York shortstop Derek Jeter said. "Then I went back to sleep for about an hour, ate, went back to sleep for 45 minutes.''

Upon getting up for his first full day in Japan, Jeter found out things sure were a whole lot different. He went to the hotel restaurant for some sushi.

"It's kind of mind-boggling, to say the least,'' Jeter said. "I don't know what I ate today -- he said, 'Special suggestion.' "

By mid-afternoon, players were at the Tokyo Dome, which looks a bit like Tropicana Field with the roof of the Metrodome and nicknamed "The Big Egg.'' The workout was boisterous as baseball drills go. Six aisles were filled with cheerleaders wearing Yankees' and Devil Rays' jerseys and hot pants, shaking silver and gold pompoms.

When players got to their lockers, they found white 3-inch patches on their shirt sleeves with the words "Ricoh'' in red. Just like when the New York Mets met the Chicago Cubs four years ago in the first Japanese season opener, major league baseball sold uniform ads.

Mussina kept running his fingers over the patch to smooth it out.

"Chico's Bail Bonds?'' he suggested, a reference to the team sponsor in the move "The Bad News Bears.''

On the scoreboard, videos were shown of the Yankees' players saying "kon nichiwa (hello)'' to the fans. All spoke Japanese phrases except Matsui, whose greeting was in English.

Showing how international the game has become, the Yankees' news conference include three languages -- Rodriguez and Mariano Rivera were asked to respond to one question in Spanish. Several of the Yankees on the dais laughed, wondering if the excellent interpreter would be able to translate the Spanish into Japanese -- she wasn't.

At breakfast, a fan who wanted a photo of himself and Torre handed his camera to the manager's dining companion, Yogi Berra, asking him to snap the picture.

"I thought that was priceless. It was absolutely priceless,'' Torre said.