With Opening Week concluded, we can start examining the ramifications players will have for fantasy leagues. Although we can’t take such a small sample of games as gospel, unless Kansas City and Tampa Bay are your front runners for the ALCS, we can gather some perspective going forward as the season takes shape. While it remains to be seen if Juan Pierre will be completely out of the picture in Los Angeles, some of the decisions made regarding player roles are becoming clearer, both for real-life teams and their fantasy counterparts. Now that the season is underway, there are some possibilities for you to consider, both for the sprint and for the marathon that is baseball season.

For those of you playing in leagues with no transaction limits, use your DL slots. Now that players have been officially placed on the real-life DL, you can take advantage of roster flexibility by stowing away players that might have an impact in a few weeks or months. Even if all your current players are healthy, consider picking up injured players off the free agent list while you’re completing your first transaction. For example, if you know that you’re going to drop Yorvit Torrealba in favor of Mike Napoli, drop Torrealba first without adding Napoli in the same move. After you leave yourself with an open roster space, add any available DL-eligible names from the free agent list you think can help your team, and move them to your team’s DL until all those slots are filled, then grab Napoli to round out your roster. So far, I’ve added players like Mark Prior and Wily Mo Pena, just in case I could use them later in the season. Don’t be afraid to be greedy, as it’s better for you to hog players that you may never use, than to let your opponents grab them for free when they become valuable.

Many owners are still fine-tuning their rosters, and are constantly scrambling to find the hot hand. In a Yahoo! Winner’s league, I’ve seen Joe Blanton, Matt Garza, Andy Pettitte, and Dontrelle Willis all tossed to waivers on the same day. You can practically form an entire rotation, albeit without a staff ace, using those castaways alone and you would still be able to compete throughout the year. When you’re in a competitive league with a fair amount of teams, don’t make rash decisions based on only a few starts. You spent a lot of time leading up to the draft to find the players you felt were primed for successful years, and it would be a shame for you to ignore your instincts now all because your outfielder happened to be hitless in nine plate appearances. If you’re feeling bold, tinker with the marginal players you almost didn’t draft, but did. If you took a late flyer on Jason Bartlett and it’s not working out, you may not miss him if you cut ties and try someone else. It’s too early, though, for you to give up on the players you had high hopes for all because Mark Ellis has two homeruns.

It never takes long for the injury bug to hit and ruin the chances of fantasy teams. Luckily, some of the injured players have very competent backups behind them, and they’re worth a look. With Curtis Granderson on the shelf, Brandon Inge is getting some playing time, and he should get OF eligibility back once he reaches enough games. As I’ve said before regarding Inge, he can be a real bargain as long as he’s in a lineup regularly. Detroit is under-performing so far, but they have tremendous offensive capabilities for their hitters. It remains to be seen if Inge will still play often once Granderson gets back, but you can at least get production from him for this month. In deeper leagues, I also like Joey Gathright filling in for David DeJesus. He’s Michael Bourn without the fanfare, provided he finds his way to first base. Oh, and for those who need to fill a rotation spot (Mike Hampton, anyone?), take a gander at the Angels rotation behind Weaver.

Be aware of any games and innings limits imposed by your leagues. It may sound simple, but sometimes you lose sight of the pace your games and innings are being used. One owner I drafted with was so used to playing head-to-head style without an innings cap, he was prepared to spend the first half of the draft taking eight or nine SPs, thinking he could dominate just by playing all of them and having no bench hitters during the year. Another owner dropped the aforementioned Pettitte and Garza in favor of next-day starters Tim Redding and Carlos Silva. Unless he has eyes on Redding for a permanent roster spot, it’s likely he’s picking up probable starters with no regard to the fact that he’d be better served sticking with six of his best starters for the whole year, than streaming SPs until he maxes out his innings limit in July. Conversely, try not to fall too far behind in the innings or games count, as you don’t want to keep your solid backups on the bench when they have a favorable match-up during your regular’s off day.

Feel free to provide me with any questions or comments you may have. You’ve probably taken a lot from the experiences of the first week. Imagine what you’ll gather after this week’s action.