Rough day for Soriano, but no worries ... yet

MESA, Ariz. - It was a rough day for the Cubs and left fielder Alfonso Soriano in Wednesday's 11-0 loss to the Los Angeles Angels.

Soriano struck out twice and grounded into a double play. For the spring, he's batting .235 with 1 homer, no walks and a .245 on-base percentage.

However, neither Soriano nor manager Lou Piniella seems overly concerned.

"Well, we'd like to see him start swinging the bat, yeah," Piniella said. "I've said that. Spring training has taught me in the years that I've been doing this not to concern myself too much with what you see here. You concern yourself more what you see when the bell rings.

"I'm going to go with my veteran players. I feel confident they'll get the job done. If not, we'll make some adjustments."

Speaking of adjustments, Soriano said he has made some at the plate with hitting coach Rudy Jaramillo.

"I see the ball better and I stay more back," he said. "I think I have more balance. I don't jump to the ball. I just stay back."

He said his surgically repaired left knee is fine and attributed Wednesday's rough day to wanting to get the regular season started.

"I think mentally everybody's not here," he said. "It's more like (we're) ready to go because it's a long spring, and I think mentally everybody just wants to get out of here and play some real games."

Getting hit: Sean Marshall was the only pitcher who was untouched Wednesday. Starter Carlos Zambrano gave up 6 hits and 4 runs in 4 innings, throwing 71 pitches.

Jeff Samardzija gave up a 2-run homer to Peter Bourjos. James Russell (0.75 ERA) gave up his first run of the spring. Justin Berg allowed 3 hits and 2 runs. Esmailin Caridad gave up a hit and 2 unearned runs in the ninth.

Making it work: Lou Piniella said he will indeed be able to find playing time for outfielder Tyler Colvin, who has torn it up this spring. He had a single and an RBI double in a split-squad game Wednesday against the Milwaukee Brewers.

"I've got to find playing time for Colvin," Piniella said. "I've said that already. And I've got to get (Xavier) Nady in there occasionally, too, because he needs to get some at-bats and he needs to play some. I'm going to have to juggle a little bit in the outfield, but it's doable. I'm not being asked to do anything impossible.

"I said that if we carried Colvin - and he deserves to be here, no question - that we'd have to find playing time for him, and we will."

Nady, who is coming off elbow surgery, played right field against the Angels and went 1-for-2 with a walk. He had 3 putouts and had to throw a ball back in on a double.

Nady has been a No. 5 hitter in the past. The question will be where to put Colvin when he plays.

"It's going to depend on how we're doing," Piniella said. "It depends on whether (Kosuke) Fukudome's in the lineup or not when we play Colvin. Colvin, to me, looks like we can hit him second. He's fit very comfortably there in these games, and I can hit him fifth or sixth."