Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic <\/p>\n
PORT ST. LUCIE \u2014 Clay Holmes knew the day would arrive, but this soon?<\/p>\n
The Mets pitcher \u2014 sporting a neatly trimmed beard \u2014 indicated he was caught by surprise Friday to learn his former team, the Yankees, had eliminated a long-standing rule prohibiting facial hair.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone always talked about the day will probably come, but it felt like a day far off,\u201d said Holmes, who is scheduled to start and face three ups (meaning at least pitching into the third inning) in the Mets\u2019 spring training opener on Saturday. \u201cIt\u2019s surprising that it\u2019s here and I think it\u2019s probably something the players have wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though he now wears a beard, Holmes said it\u2019s something that was never a big deal for him when he played for the Yankees. <\/p>\n
The right-hander arrived to the Mets on a three-year contract worth $38 million in the offseason.<\/p>\n
Holmes recalled the need to change his look after arriving to the Yankees in a trade with the Pirates in 2021.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a thing for me, when I got traded over I had long hair and a big beard and I shaved it off,\u201d Holmes said.<\/p>\n
But Holmes said the mandate also served the purpose of reminding him he wasn\u2019t in Pittsburgh any longer.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s something about it \u2014 a physical, tangible thing,\u201d Holmes said. \u201cAnd like, \u2018I\u2019m with the Yankees now, [the beard] is gone.\u2019 It kind of makes things a little more real.\u201d<\/p>\n
Holmes was asked who among his former Yankees teammates is most likely to grow a beard now that the policy has been changed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would say [Carlos] Rod\u00f3n,\u201d Holmes said. \u201cHe already has a mustache.\u201d<\/p>\n
Carlos Mendoza is ready for his team to begin the Grapefruit League season.<\/p>\n
The Mets\u2019 opener is Saturday against the Astros at Clover Park, with Holmes as the scheduled starting pitcher. <\/p>\n
Juan Soto, Francisco Lindor and Pete Alonso are among the starters who will play.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were ready to play games a few days ago,\u201d Mendoza said. \u201cNow we get to see some of them in full uniform, against real competition. You are facing different arms, you are not facing your own teammates. You get to play baseball and I am excited about that.\u201d<\/p>\n
David Peterson pitched two innings of live batting practice and surrendered a homer to Alonso. <\/p>\n
Tylor Megill also pitched two innings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic PORT ST. LUCIE \u2014 Clay Holmes knew the day would arrive, but this soon? The Mets pitcher \u2014 sporting a neatly trimmed beard \u2014 indicated he was caught by surprise Friday to learn his former team, the Yankees, had eliminated a long-standing rule prohibiting<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":216402,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-216401","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216401"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":216403,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216401\/revisions\/216403"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}