Today's Fantasy Rx

After watching all of the Cubs/Reds game, a few innings of both the Mariners/White Sox and Rangers/Athletics, and at least a couple at-bats of the other seven games, we're looking forward to a nice break until the Giants/Dodgers start this afternoon.

Early observations from Opening Day:

- Hank Blalock has a great swing. In his first plate appearance, he calmly lined the ball to right field to drive in Kapler for his first hit and RBI. While he'll likely struggle at some points this year, he should easily finish in the Top 3 Rookie of the Year balloting.

- Jeremy Giambi looks very comfortable as a leadoff man. He began the first and third innings by ripping singles to the outfield. In the third, Frank Menechino followed Giambi by driving a double to the outfield. Giambi came tearing around third base and executed albeit mostly unnecessary slide into home. He received a standing ovation by an Oakland crowd collectively wishing he could have tried to slide in last year's playoffs.

- Another left-handed unconventional leadoff batter also had a great day. Todd Walker went 3-for-4, ripping two doubles and a homer. Unfortunately for the Reds, he only drove in one run outside of his homer, but he still keyed a relatively unimpressive Reds' offense.

- Jeff Fassero was absolutely awful, hitting three batters while losing the game for the Cubs. Although we can understand Baylor sticking with Fassero to face Griffey and Casey, Fassero had no business continuing to pitch after beaning Casey. Fassero only hit one batter in each of the last two years. After Casey, the Cubs had both Joe Borowski and Matt Clement available if necessary to face Aaron Boone, along with new closer Antonio Alfonseca. There was no possible reason for staying with Fassero at this point, so leave the Cubs at 0-0 and make Baylor 0-1.

- Roger Clemens should be fined $10K any time he makes a motion towards a batted ball with his right hand. We're quite steamed over his inexcusable lapse in judgement as not only did he set us back on all five of our Challenge teams, but he's also talking about missing his next start. However, so far we're glad we didn't start Pedro or Maddux this week.

Most everyone will notice the top hitting and even fielding performances from the news, papers, or on Baseball Tonight and Sportscenter. I'm going to focus on the top pitchers on a semi-daily basis.

Pitching performances that impressed me from 3.21.02 & 4.1.02:

Bartolo Colon, Win on 5:2 K:BB in 9 IP with 5 H and 0 HR; more strikeouts would have been nice but he still pitched a great game.

Tom Glavine, Win on 7:2 K:BB in 6.1 IP with 5 H and 1 HR.

John Smoltz, 2:0 K:BB in 1 IP with 0 H; 9/10 pitches were strikes.

Dave Weathers, Hold on 3:1 K:BB in 2 IP with 0 H; all three batted balls were grounders.

Ted Lilly, 2:0 K:BB in 1.2 IP with 0 H; 10/14 pitches were strikes.

Randy Johnson, Win on 8:1 K:BB in 9 IP with 6 H and 0 HR; 16/19 batted balls were grounders. One cautionary note: Brenly left him out for 128 pitches, and only 89 of those were strikes. We're a little concerned that they just might start Miguel Batista later this week.

J.C. Romero, Win on 2:0 K:BB in 2 IP with 0 H.

Matt Morris, Win on 7:2 K:BB in 7 IP with 5 H and 0 HR; 11/14 batted balls were grounders.

Joel Pineiro, 3:1 K:BB in 2 IP with 0 H.

Mark Mulder, 8:0 K:BB in 8 IP with 6 H and 1 HR.

Fantasy MVPs:

American League

Batting Average: .342, for Ichiro and Nomar, although we expect Ichiro to have a 175 AB advantage, which gives him about three or four more dollars of Draft Value.

Home Runs: 60, for Alex Rodriguez, a full 10 ahead of his nearest competitor, Jason Giambi.

RBI: 152, for Alex Rodriguez, three to six RBI ahead of Mike Sweeney, Manny Ramirez, Jason Giambi, and Juan Gonzalez.

Stolen Bases: 49, for Ichiro, only two ahead of Jason Tyner and ten in front of Alfonso Soriano.

Runs: 142, for Derek Jeter, one ahead of Alex Rodriguez and a dozen in front of Johnny Damon.

Wins: 20, for Mike Mussina, three ahead of Tim Hudson and four ahead of Clemens, Pedro, and Chan Ho Park. Hopefully Mussina's 20 will finally establish him as a true ace in the minds of those few who still doubt his abilities.

Saves: 42, for Mariano Rivera, one ahead of Urbina and Sasaki, and two in front of Percival.

ERA(reliever): 1.44 for Arthur Rhodes, nicely ahead of 1.71 for Chad Bradford and 1.77 for Jeff Nelson.

ERA(starter): 2.56 for Barry Zito, ahead of 2.72 for Cory Lidle and 2.73 for Mussina.

WHIP(reliever): .87 for Rhodes and Jeff Zimerman, ahead of Bradford at .89 and Keith Foulke at .92.

WHIP(starter): 1.02 for Mussina, ahead of 1.05 for Danys Baez and Lidle's 1.07.

Strikeouts: 221 for Mussina, comfortably ahead of Bartolo Colon at 202 and Pedro, Zito, C.C. Sabathia, and Clemens in the 190s.

National League

Batting Average: .351 for Todd Helton, ahead of .344 for Juan Pierre and both Vlad and Sosa, respectively at .333 and .332.

Home Runs: 70 for Barry Bonds, two in front of Sosa, and nineteen ahead of Luis Gonzalez. We see no reason why the two Hall-of-Famers shouldn't continue to post historic numbers, and we also don't envision anyone else joining their lofty levels this year.

RBI: 157 for Helton, ten in front of Sosa and twenty-five ahead of Bonds.

Stolen Bases: 56 for both Juan Pierre and Luis Castillo, four in front of Jimmy Rollins and five up on Roger Cedeno.

Runs: 142 for Todd Helton, seven ahead of Sammy and eleven up on Jeff Bagwell.

Wins: 19 for Randy Johnson, two ahead of Maddux and Schilling, and three up on Kile and Lieber.

Saves: 43 for Jason Isringhausen, one up on Billy Wagner and two up on Robb Nen; Alfonseca and Hoffman should also reach forty saves each this year.

ERA(reliever): 1.96 for John Smoltz, ahead of Isringhausen at 1.98, Dotel at 2.04, and Kim at 2.05.

ERA(starter): 2.37 for Javier Vazquez, ahead of Kevin Brown's 2.69 and Randy's 2.76.

WHIP(reliever): .84 for Smoltz, ahead of Kim at .94 and Hoffman, Wagner, and Felix Rodriguez, each at .99. If Benito Baez returns from injury problems, he should be able to post a WHIP under one.

WHIP(starter): 0.93 for Vazquez, ahead of Randy and Maddux at 1.06, Oswalt at 1.07, and Schilling and Beckett and 1.09.

Strikeouts: 359 for Randy in another historical performance. Another half-dozen NL pitchers should clear 200, with Schilling reaching 275, Kerry Wood to 233, Nomo to 225, and Beckett, Morris, and Vazquez should also help in this category.

Today's Fantasy Rx: Ignore earned runs when examining starting pitchers. Focus on the PQS categories: IP, K, BB, H, and HR, since they provide a better indication as to a pitcher's effectiveness than something as arbitrary as ER.