So much good news!

The Skwirls have moved up to 6th place with 70 points!

We have been on a steady march up the standings for weeks now.  This past week, we won the HR (13) RBI (45) and Runs scored (52) categories.  We also won the Wins (5) and WHIP (1.05) cats, with strong showings in all the other categories.

Hell, we even picked up our first save of the season! That broke the tie for last place and gave us a half-point. Thank you Daniel Bard, at $14 the most overpaid set-up guy in the league by far.  (I bid him up this year thinking about next year, when he could be an attractively priced closer.)

The news wasn't all good this past week, however. I did receive a bit of a shock when Jake Fox was waived by the O's. It's never a good sign when a guy you own in fantasy isn't even good enough for his team in real life. But that's life in AL-only sometimes. The deal on him is basically the wants (and needs) more playing time, and he feels his sporadic PT is responsible for his .188 BA. So he was designated and, according to reports, will likely be traded. Given that he's got serious pop (10 homers in Spring Training) and qualifies at C, I'll just keep him and see what happens. 

When you consider that I've gotten essentially nothing from my 2 catcher slots, my recent surge in the standings is all the more heartening. To add a guy like Joe Mauer sometime this month will be the equivalent of making another blockbuster trade.

Speaking of which, Miguel Caberera is good.  Really good.  Since I traded for him, he's hit 5 homers and has 13 RBI... in 13 games.  On the flip side, Mark Trumbo has 4 homers, and Franklin Gutierrez has 1. So I guess we're even. Nice trade so far for both sides, but Miggy's BA is way higher. 

And the trade I didn't make? Juan Pierre is really heating up, scoring 10 runs in his last 11 games and stealing 2 bags, and (get THIS) hitting his first home run of the year.  The window to buy him at a discount is closing. 

Andino scored 4 runs this week but hit only .208.

One to Watch: SS Yunel Escobar. Scored him with FAAB last season for a reasonable $12, and kept him -- that move is really paying off. Offered him for Papelbon recently and am now rethinking the wisdom of that. Overshadowed on my team and in AL-only fantasy in general by the mighty Asdrubal Cabrera, Escobar has quietly put up some very nice numbers himself: .290 / 7 HR / 24 RBI / 36 R / 1 SB  Bear in mind, his .256 last year is the outlier in his career thus far (.326 .288 .299).  That's a career .289, and he's hitting .290, so... there you go. 

1B Daric Barton was an absolute pest in Fenway this weekend, with 2 hits in all 3 games. He looked very comfortable hitting in the Cozy Confines, taking the ball the other way off the Green Monster. The announcers on radio and TV kept ragging on him for his low batting average and lack of a single home run, but this is a guy who hit 10 last year and walked over 100 times. He's not a slouch. He's just off to a pathetically slow start, and I think playing in Oakland is a real detriment to his style of hitting. He's an everyday player at $6; a good AL-only team needs a couple of those slot-fillers.

RP Al Alburquerque turned out to be a brilliant move, as he vultured not one but two (2!) wins in relief immediately after I rostered him.  That's just the way I drew it up on on the chalkboard.