Yankees" Swisher Hones His Physique and Changes His Attitude TAMPA, Fla. - When Nick Swisher talks about the stress he felt last season, he comes across like a walking contradiction. But he insists he felt the pressure. "Oh, yeah, man," Swisher, the Yankees" regular right fielder, said, his bobbing head punctuating each syllable. I was stressed last year. Super stressed. He laughed at how his words sound even to him, never mind how they must come across to those who perceive him as a carefree soul. He is, after all, one of the most ebullient Yankee players, someone who exudes enthusiasm. Stressed? Swisher? "It's crazy, man, isn't it?" he said. You wouldn't think a guy like me gets stressed, but I do. I think that's always kind of the inner fight for me. It affected me last year. So this year, Swisher arrived at the Yankees" spring training camp with a new physique and a new attitude, which he attributed to off-season workouts with N.F.L. players, a healthier diet and visits with a sports psychologist. Swisher, whose contract is up after this season, says he hopes the combination will produce the kind of season that will keep him with the Yankees through another contract. But Swisher realizes the odds of his returning to the Bronx might be against him. He is 31, and the Yankees, with new contracts for Robinson Cano and Curtis Granderson also on the horizon, are looking to get their payroll down to $189 million by 2014. "It could be my last year here," Swisher said. I don't want it to be, but it possibly could be. And for me, man, I just wanted to come in and be the best player I could be. I'm one of those guys who's never had an arbitration year, who's never had a contract year. I don't even know how to do it. So he took control of what he could. He worked out with N.F.L. players, including Ray Lewis, Clay Matthews, Antonio Cromartie and Dwight Freeney. He had healthy meals catered for him. And then there was his work with a sports psychologist, whose identity Swisher prefers to keep private. The results, though, he hopes will be evident. He feels stronger, leaner, lighter and faster. But as much as he feels his body has improved, it pales in comparison with how he has changed his mind-set. "I'm way more proud of the things I've been able to accomplish mentally this off-season than what I've done physically," he said. What caused Swisher the most concern last season was a slow start that developed into a slump. He did not hit a home run until the end of April, and as June approached his batting average was barely above .200. "You want to do so well, and in this game, I think, you get caught up in the numbers," said Swisher, who finished the season with a .260 average, 23 homers and 85 runs batted in. When I got out of the gate slow, it just ate me up. I wanted to pop out of the gate like a sprinter, and when it didn't happen I started getting frustrated. Those are things I worked on. How do you deal with failure? How do you set your expectations to where you feel they're obtainable and not a billion miles away? Because that's where I've always kind of kept my goals. I do a lot of things now that are a lot more non-outcome-related - you know, the process of getting to a point. The difference, Swisher said, was learning to "take each at-bat for that at-bat," and not to sabotage the fourth at-bat of an 0-for-3 day. Asked where he expected that outlook to take him, Swisher shrugged and said: "It's a very negative game, and you have to find ways to keep your spirits up, because you're going to go through tough times. And I went through some tough times last year. But regardless, at the end of the day, nobody is checking the stats to see how I did. They're checking to see how the Yankees did. That's all that matters. Let's go win another World Series, and then we'll figure out where this thing is going. Me? I'm just going to go out there and do my thing, and hopefully continue this journey. And not stress about it.