Soriano: Happy Yankees Have Confidence In Him

In a brief conference which ended a short while ago, the Yankees introduced set-up man, Rafael Soriano. He officially became a Yankee yesterday after results of his physical revealed he is in great health.

There wasn't much controversial back-and-forth between Soriano and the NY sports media, which was to be suspected since the only real controversy surrounding this acquisition seemed to be more about the Yankees front office squabbling over bringing Soriano aboard. I was sort of hoping that some reporter would dare ask Cashman, who was suspiciously brief in his introduction and quick to pass the mic to Girardi, his feelings of being overruled on this signing. Didn't happen, of course.

But one juicy tidbit, somewhat relative to Cashman's autonomy being ignored, was Soriano's confirmation that Mariano Rivera did indeed use his "power" to bring his new jedi aboard.

"Mariano is one of the ones who did something for me to sign with the Yankees," Soriano told Wallace Matthews of ESPN New York, who mentioned rumors of their relationship. "I'm going to learn a lot from him. He's one of the greatest closers and the communication between he and I is wonderful. We're going to do a lot of good for the team."

When this bit of information came to light over the weekend, many fanatics were somewhat unnerved by its implications. That no matter how great Mo is and no matter how great his legacy as a Yankee already is and will be, forever, no player should have the "power" to influence moves; that that should be left for management to decide. Well, my answer to that is, if you don't believe that Mariano should be allowed that kind of influence, you haven't really been paying attention to who he is in Yankees Universe. The phrase "a God" pretty much comes to mind. Even more so, Mariano knows good pitching and would never put his name on the line, I believe, if he didn't believe that Soriano was the best option, right now, for the team.

Soriano, like so many others given the opportunity to play for the Yankees, seemed humbled by his new home and was very thankful to be given a chance to prove himself on the big stage.

"[This is] one of the most important days of my career to represent this uniform," he opened with. "I feel very happy...that the Yankees have a lot of confidence that I become part of this team."

So, Soriano is officially a Yankee. Like this move or hate it, fanatics, there's no arguing that today, the team officially made their bullpen one of the best in baseball. Let the comments commence!

Follow Rasheeda Cooper on twitter: @ra_cooper