Good afternoon Yankee fans! It’s Wednesday February 22, 2012 and Spring Training is in full swing (pun intended). More players are showing up to camp, more stories are emerging and real baseball is just around the corner.

The Yankees made a couple of moves yesterday: Signing both Raul Ibanez and Eric Chavez to deals. Ibanez’s deal is for $1.1M with performance bonuses and was finalized yesterday. Chavez’s deal, pending the outcome of his physical, is for 900K.

There was some encouraging news, Joba Chamberlain threw off a full mound this morning and according to the 26 year-old reliever it “went really, really good.”

Now for some stories from my fellow Yankee bloggers:

Frank Campagnola over at Pinstripe Alley makes a case for Phil Hughes as the Yankees’ fifth starter.

Over at River Avenue Blues, Mike Axisa writes about how the new Collective Bargaining Agreement will affect the Yankees when the 2012 Draft comes around.

Michael Eder of the Yankee Analysts amusingly writes about who’s in shape and who has some dieting to do before the start of the season.

Rebecca Glass over at the Pinstriped Bible writes a nice piece about the great Mariano Rivera. And she’s right, a lot of things have changed in the past sixteen years.

On final link, from New York Daily News beat writer Mark Feinsand. In this one is Derek Jeter talks about appreciating Mariano Rivera.

**As I was about to publish this post, word surfaced that the Yankees signed reliever David Aardsma to a Major League deal. This move is more than likely for 2013 as Aardsma is recovering from Tommy John surgery. Brian Cashman said the Yankees had been talking to Aardsma all winter.

I guess you really can’t have enough pitching.