Jones says he feels much better, expects to play this weekend

Orioles center fielder Adam Jones isn't in tonight's lineup for the series opener against the Rays. However, he says that he's feeling much better and expects to play this weekend.

Jones sat out last night's game with soreness in his rib area. Rule 5 pick Joey Rickard played center field and Nolan Reimold was in left.

"Good. A lot better than yesterday," he said today while sitting at his locker. "Just going to make sure that it's right. Take another day and see how it feels. It's April 8. Obviously, I want to be out there with my men, but Rickard and Reimold looked really good last night, so let this thing heal up right and I think tomorrow or Sunday I should be a lot better.

"I don't know when exactly I felt it, just that it's something I never felt before. It's not my oblique, so whoever's writing that, it's not my oblique."

Rib area?

"Probably say ribs, yeah," he replied.

Jones only feels the discomfort when swinging a bat.

"It's the only thing I do really ferocious," he said. "I think I need to tone down swinging out of my (butt). Just swinging at better pitches. You swing at better pitches and make contact off good pitches, then you don't have to worry about things like this. Extending myself and going out of the zone, those are the things that cause all these unfortunate injuries."

Jones is available off the bench.

"For sure I could play tonight, but it's April instead of September," he said.

Jones talked last year about paying more attention to his body as he entered his 30s.

"I don't care about the age factor. It's not the age," he said. "I've played a lot of games. I've never necessarily thought of myself as invincible, but I thought I could bounce back. Little nicks there, little bruise there, I could play through it, but things like this you don't want to linger during the season. Let's just get ahead of it. The trainers we got here, it's smart to use their expertise over mine.

"It's not about how important I am to our lineup. Have you seen our lineup? Rickard moving to the leadoff stuff last night got his first career home run. Nolan stepped in, got two hits. It's not about me. It's about the group of guys. We've got a collective group of guys that bounce back and pick up the pieces for other people. Obviously, I want to be out there, that's my forte, but the guys that we have, i have all the confidence in the world in them. Let them go out there and do what they know how to do."