DODGERS NOTEBOOK: BATTING ORDER STARTING TO COME TOGETHER.

Byline: Tony Jackson Staff Writer

VERO BEACH, Fla. - A day before the Dodgers' first spring-training game, the top half of their regular-season batting order appears to be coming together. With a little deductive reasoning, one can pretty much figure out the bottom half, too.

Manager Jim Tracy said Monday that outfielder J.D. Drew, who probably will play right field but might play center, will bat third, and Gold Glove shortstop Cesar Izturis will bat in the leadoff spot. Tracy said Sunday that second baseman Jeff Kent would bat fourth.

``It's very safe to say that, yes, (Drew) will hit third,'' Tracy said. ``He's the perfect guy to hit third.''

That leaves the two and five holes undetermined, but Tracy hinted that left fielder Jayson Werth will bat second and the switch-hitting Milton Bradley, who will play whichever outfield spot Drew doesn't, will bat fifth.

``(Werth) is staking a claim (on the second spot),'' Tracy said. ``But before I put the cart before the horse, that's something where, during the course of spring training, I want to try a couple of things and see what makes the most sense. It depends on how things go. Jayson and Milton are a little bit interchangeable. But the prospect of having a switch-hitter who can hit the ball out of the ballpark from both sides (batting fifth) is fairly intriguing to me.''

--New combo: Izturis, the incumbent Gold Glove winner at shortstop, and Kent, the newly signed second baseman, both say they are growing comfortable as a double-play combination after just three days of full-squad workouts.

Third-base coach Glenn Hoffman, also in charge of infielders, agrees.

``There is a little bit of bonding going on,'' Hoffman said. ``They're asking each other a lot of questions. They're trying to get familiar with the feeds. You need that to come quickly in the middle infield, because a lot of stuff happens in the middle of the diamond.''

Kent spent the past two seasons playing across from Adam Everett in Houston. He says the biggest adjustment to playing with Izturis might be the difference in personalities.

--Fourteen signed: The Dodgers on Monday announced the signings of 14 of their so-called ``zero-to-twos'' - players on the 40-man roster who haven't accrued the minimum three years of major-league service time to become eligible for salary arbitration.

Pitchers Yhency Brazoban, Duaner Sanchez, Edwin Jackson, Frank Brooks, Joel Hanrahan, Derek Thompson and Orlando Rodriguez have signed split one-year contracts. So have catcher David Ross, infielders Choi, Willy Aybar and Joe Thurston, and outfielders Jason Grabowski, Chin-Feng Chen and Henri Stanley.

Thurston, Chen and Stanley are not on the 40-man roster, but they were in December, when the deadline came for teams to tender contract offers. Those offers are binding, so the three players had to be signed to contracts despite their non-roster status.

There are 10 players still unsigned. Assistant general manager Kim Ng, who is heading negotiations, expects to have all of them signed by today.

Tony Jackson,[phone]

tony.jackson(at)dailynews.com