Today's Fantasy Rx

Based on the strategies discussed that we discussed back on February 28th, we narrowed our options down to the following players. For a shorthand dollar valuation, we divided projected points by salary to give us a quick percentage look at the relative worth of players as points are of equal worth. Good players have ratings around .300, and the top bargains in the game will be over .350.

Salaries for these two games are roughly double that from the Challenges, but there are important differences that create new bargains. Here's the points' breakdown again:

Hitting Points
Single: 1 point
Double: 2 points
Triple: 3 points
Home Run: 4 points
RBI or Run: 1 point each
Walk: 1 point
Stolen Base: 1 point

Pitching Points
Win: 10 points
Save: 10 points
IP: 1 point each (.333 point for each third of an inning pitched)
Strikeout: 1 point

BBW Fantasy Baseball requires every team to spend 8 of their 12 bench spots on offense, so we're going to take a backup at each position to insure us in case of injury to a starter. It also allows us to maximize 7 game weeks.

We'll obviously take 4 starters with our remaining bench spots, but we'll discuss those after the offense.

Catchers: Lo Duca(1640) has a .302 rating, placing him among the top C with guys like Jason LaRue. Since we're looking to maximize our total points, he's a definite addition as Posada's priced right next to Piazza and IRod. Toby Hall's at .280 but is at the minimum 1000 salary. A.J. Pierzynski is also at 1000 and he holds a .291 rating, so he makes a great backup for either player. We considered Mike Lieberthal at a relatively inexpensive 1500, but we'd rather have someone that can sub for Hall instead of worrying about wasting a pickup in case of injury.

First Basemen: With 8 backup slots, our Coors' platoon will be out in full force at 5 different positions. Todd Helton(3400) will open on our bench, and we'll again take Jason Giambi and his acceptable .236 rating. David Ortiz(1580) is 5th among 1B with a .285 rating and he'll make a nice platoon partner for Giambi. We considered another 1B but wanted an extra OF instead; other solid alternatives include Nick Johnson(1200), Steve Cox(1160), and Carlos Pena(1160).

Second Basemen: We're again going to start Alfonso Soriano(1800) as his .271 rating is easily the best of those 2B likely to approach 500 points. Jose Ortiz(1500) is a must considering the required bench players. We have some cap room to spend, and Bret Boone's the only non-Alomar 2B likely to earn much over 500 points; he also could earn much more if he even approaches a repeat of last year. We'll take Boone at 2650 over Alfonzo at 2340 and Castillo at 2200, although those both seem like acceptable options.

Third Basemen: Eric Chavez(2270) has a solid .274 rating, 6th among 3B, and as we expect he'll earn the most points of any 3B, he's a nice addition to our team. Aramis Ramirez(1590) is a must-buy at a .338 rating. We're concerned about the playing time of Jose Macias(1070), so we're going to hold off on him despite a .406 rating. Felipe Lopez has the highest rating of anyone at .440, but Hank Blalock should have a better year at only 100 more. We'll consider Lopez if we need help later in the year, but we'd rather wait to see how Toronto's lineup evolves for now.

Shortstop: Owning ARod(3430) is again a must for most owners at this position, and Juan Uribe(1300) is still a great pick for almost every week at this salary, too. Uribe's .402 rating isn't even as good as D'Angelo Jimenez(1000) at .432; with the trade of Damian Jackson, Jimenez looks like a very safe gamble at this price. Despite the lack of overlap between Colorado road games and San Diego at home, we'll platoon Jimenez with Uribe to keep ARod in the lineup every week.

Almost everyone will again likely own Nomar, priced at 2160 here, but we're going to again wait until May so that he'll be playing every day. Boston is scheduled for the least games in April of any team, and they're also very subject to rainouts, so we'll wait on Nomar, and potential Manny and Nixon for at least the first month.

Outfield: The top rated players are Adam Dunn(1610) at .376 and Jeremy Giambi(1300) at .351. Cliff Floyd(2300) has easily the highest rating of top outfielders at .289, significantly ahead of J.D. Drew(2310) at .264. We'll own both and will try not to worry about their respective injury histories. For our fourth weekly slot, we decided on Daryle Ward(1590) at .257. Even if he winds up occasionally platooned with a defensive sub like Brian Hunter, he still should earn his salary and this gives us another relatively inexpensive player.

For the Coors' platoon, we'll again have Larry Walker(2790) and Juan Pierre(1880); we'll platoon Jeremy Giambi with one of them, and based on Texas' probable solid start and 7 game week to start the year, we'll gamble on Juan Gonzalez(253) while hoping he'll manage more than 500 AB.

As we need more inexpensive players in our lineup to accommodate top starters, we selected Steve Cox(1160) and Nick Johnson(1200) for our bench as believe they'll produce more than Felipe Lopez.

We wanted one more OF on the bench, and after thinking about Sammy Sosa again, we decided to wait until he normally heats up in May and instead take Barry Bonds(3360) on these teams as well as our Challenge squads. As we switch our starting pitchers next week and begin the first of four straight weeks with our five Rockies at home, we should be able to deploy Bonds at least three of the first six weeks.

After considering Greg Maddux(2920) and Kevin Brown(2800), we decided that we'd rather own starters with more recent histories of dominance. Maddux just appears too expensive for us, although we'll likely wind up adding him later in the year at some point.

Without Maddux and Brown, we wound up with the same six starters from the Challenge games: Randy Johnson(3580), Schilling(3160), Clemens(2870), Morris(2650), Vazquez(2600), and Wade Miller(2040). We don't have to worry about Brown or Pedro's injury recovery, and we still own six very dominant pitchers.

For week two, we want at least three guys with two starts, and thankfully Mike Mussina(2940), Kerry Wood(2300), and Brian Lawrence(1000) all look solid for the first quarter of the year. Lawrence may surprise some people, but we wanted one cheap starter, and unless Nick Neugebauer dominates quickly and stays healthy, Lawrence should be perhaps the best bargain of any starter in the game.

With our last starting slot, our choice is between Maddux, Brown, and Pedro(2950). As long as Pedro's healthy, we need to have him active much of the time because his upside is equal to any pitcher in the game, so we're going to take him as our fourth pitcher on the bench and wait on Maddux/Brown for later in the year, if at all.

One advantage of BBW Fantasy Baseball over the Challenge games is that top relievers will be able to contribute in IP and strikeouts. Pitchers with high projected K totals and the ability to convert 2 IP saves are even more valuable, so we're definitely taking Byung-Hyun Kim(2230) again. John Smoltz has the best chance at seeing extended work; we're happy to roster him at 2610.

We don't have the money for Mariano Rivera and we're worried about a potential Esteban Yan trade, so we want to go relatively cheap with our other two closers. Matt Anderson(1990) is 10 more than Scott Strickland but should wind up saving more games. Jason Isringhausen(2370), who we rank as perhaps the best NL closer this year, will round out our pen has he's only the 18th most expensive closer.

As in Diamond Challenge, we expect to add Roy Oswalt for the week of May 6th and an A's starter or two by the end of May. We're also looking to pickup Sosa and Nomar if we have the roster space, and considering our extensive bench, we should be able to make the switch.

We have an extra 100 left unspent in week one, but we just don't see any area where we can make substantial improvement at this time. We've left ourselves enough roster flexibility to deploy almost any combination of our starting pitchers, and we can run out Bonds and Gonzalez with our Colorado players when we don't have a great group of starts in a particular week.

Here's our probable opening roster for:

The Umpire Chronicles

C	Paul Lo Duca		1640
C	Toby Hall		1000
1B	Jason Giambi		3320
1B	David Ortiz		1580
2B	Bret Boone		2650
2B	Alfonso Soriano		1800
3B	Eric Chavez		2270
3B	Hank Blalock		1100
SS	D'Angelo Jimenez	1000
SS	Alex Rodriguez		3430
OF	Juan Gonzalez		2530
OF	Jeremy Giambi		1300
OF	J.D. Drew		2310
OF	Cliff Floyd		2300
OF	Daryle Ward		1590
OF	Adam Dunn		1610
DH	Steve Cox		1160
DH	Nick Johnson		1200

SP	Randy Johnson		3580
SP	Curt Schilling		3160
SP	Roger Clemens		2870
SP	Matt Morris		2650
SP	Javier Vazquez		2600
SP	Wade Miller		2040
RP	John Smoltz		2610
RP	Jason Isringhausen	2370
RP	Byung-Hyun Kim		2230
RP	Matt Anderson		1990

taxi squad

C	A.J. Pierzynski		1000
1B	Todd Helton		3400
2B	Jose Ortiz		1500
3B	Aramis Ramirez		1590
SS	Juan Uribe		1300
OF	Barry Bonds		3360
OF	Larry Walker		2790
OF	Juan Pierre		1880
SP	Pedro Martinez		2950
SP	Mike Mussina		2940
SP	Kerry Wood		2300
SP	Brian Lawrence		1000

Lumber Co. Budget Baseball Note: We're going to enter the same roster for our LB teams as our FB team despite the availability of additional strategies to take maximum advantage of free transactions.

Tomorrow I'll discuss in-season strategies that you can use to gain an advantage on your opponents. If anyone would like to see a discussion of a particular draft strategy for those drafting next weekend, please let me know and I'll be happy to accommodate your requests.

Today's Fantasy Rx: Make sure to join ESPN2 to watch at least part of Cleveland @ Anaheim at 7pm Central tonight.