Staying out of Limbo

Join me in Fantasy Baseball's version of limbo. A place where solid hitters plague your lineup and adequate starters jepordize your ERA and WHIP every week. Have too many players that aren't good enough to put in your lineup and too good to drop to the waiver wire? Then you know what I'm talking about. If not, let me provide you with a few examples:

Brian Giles

An ultimate stud in an OBP league, however, in any other league just an average UT player. I have him in one league and I have no idea what to do with him. He's been sitting on my bench for forever but I feel guilty dropping him. Is he undroppable? I just don't know.

Livan Hernandez

A great rotation guy on any team, well, any MLB team. In fantasy, I wouldn't touch him (although I drafted him in 17th round). I have finally came to the realization that he's a cancer. In his good starts, he'll give up 2 or 3 ERs in 7 innings but in the bad ones (1 out of 3 starts) he gives up 6 or 7 ERs. Not to mention a WHIP in the 1.40 region. These numbers will never help you in a fantasy week. I'd much rather take a chance on a Daniel Cabrera, who has dominant potential than this guy. (I dropped Livan in my one league).

Greg Maddux

He's started off hot this year, but I can't help but label him a "limbo" player. I had him last year and I just could never get a read on him. He's one of those pitchers that get that "good" label but he'll rarely be great. Maddux also is a victim to what umpire he gets on a given night. If he gets that outside corner he's fine but if he doesn't look for a blowout.

Garret Anderson

He's not the hitter he once was. He'll never get the RBI totals he had earlier in his career and he has never put up great runs numbers. So what makes this guy a viable option on fantasy teams. His past track record makes him too good to drop and for those who have them they'll pay the price in their offensive categories.

If you have these players with the exception of Giles (I still don't know where to place him) I would advise you to drop them. Push them to the curb and take someone with potential such as Alex Rios. Which gets me to my second point....

The Value of Roster Flexibility

Here are two points to take under consideration with that extra roster spot:

1. Keep one spot on your roster that is fluid.

By this, I mean to make one spot a revolving door with a different player taking up shop every week. Why you ask? This allows you to make more moves on hot players and stops you from being hestitant in making free agent pickups. Who cares if you drop Mr. Irrelevant for a pontential young stud. And if that young stud fails to work out, you can just try again next week. Using this strategy you'll be able to pick up guys like Grady Sizemore and John Patterson and hold onto them when they impress. I've passed on too many guys that I liked because I felt I couldn't drop some average guy. Don't be a victim of "limbo" players.

2. Give up your waiver wire priority NOW

One of the most overated things in fantasy is having waiver priority. It gets in the way of making waiver wire decisions every time. Should I waste my waiver priority on So and So? If you have to ask yourself this question, then do it and do it quick. If you don't, you'll have to ask yourself this question several more times and miss out on some really good players. Very rarely does a player come around that the #1 waiver priority is needed for (ex. Felix Hernandez). So don't waste time deciding whether to use it and just use it. You'll thank me later.

Keep yourself out of limbo,

Brablc