Scott White

You can almost taste it now, can't you?

Teams have more or less finalized their rosters and made their cuts, discarding journeyman veterans and demoting top prospects who they decided need just a little more work.

Yes, that includes sending some of our most beloved young sluggers down to the minors. I know it hurts.

So we've shed our tears. We've torn our robes. We've lost our security deposits throwing our tantrums. What now?

Those of you who read my work consistently might have come to realize by now that I tend to approach rookies with a certain amount of skepticism. It's not that I don't think they can perform well or make a contribution in Fantasy. I just think, because of the hype generated by their arrival, you have to take more of a risk than necessary to acquire them. For the pick you'd have to use in drafts or the dollar amount you'd have to invest in auctions, you could easily land a comparable sleeper without as much uncertainty.

Sure, you might miss out on the next Ryan J. Braun, but you'll also avoid the next Alex Gordon. And the latter seems far more common than the former. Coming up from the minors, most of these young guys need at least some time to adapt.

And I don't mean to say I would never take a rookie if I could get him at fair value and he filled the right need, but if you draft a rookie and trust him to start for you (in a mixed league, anyway), you'll likely get burned.

Which brings me back to my original point. The Fantasy owners out there who drafted Evan Longoria, Jay Bruce, Cameron Maybin and Chase Headley probably feel a little bit burned right now. The mailbag sure seems to indicate so. Should they pull the plug? Should they hope for the best? Should they crawl into a hole somewhere and wait for 2010?

I'll examine the four on a case-by-case basis, ranking them in the order I'd prefer to have them at this point in the season.

Evan Longoria, 3B, Rays -- He's coming back, and he's coming back soon. The Rays sent him down saying they wanted to give him a little more time to work on his game, but they're not fooling anyone. By delaying his rookie season a few weeks, they'll delay his free agency a year. Why not trade a few weeks for a year? Of course, Longoria could always struggle as a rookie like Alex Gordon did, but he also has more minor-league experience than Gordon did. I think Longoria is the rookie hitter with the best chance of making an immediate Fantasy impact this season, but in a league as shallow as a 10-team mixed, I could probably find someone I like better on waivers.

Chase Headley, OF Padres -- He certainly made an impression this spring, hitting .349 with four home runs and a .744 slugging percentage, and the Padres all but came out and said they expect to bring him back soon. They just want the converted third baseman to work on his outfield defense. Because he doesn't get nearly the hype of some of these other rookies, I still like him as a sleeper in NL-only leagues, but again, mixed-league owners can probably find better on waivers.

Jay Bruce, OF, Reds -- This one bothers me the most. Bruce has enormous upside, no doubt -- it's absolutely through the roof. But because the Reds don't seem to approach his promotion with the least bit of urgency, I don't think it's simply a matter of him proving himself worthy. I think he would both have to prove himself worthy and have the guy in front of him, Corey Patteron, falter. And as little as a like Patterson, I think he does enough to keep his job. Bruce's upside makes him worth hanging on to in NL-only leagues, but I'm not saving a mixed-league spot for him at this point.

Cameron Maybin, OF, Marlins -- I think Maybin has a better chance than Bruce of hooking up with the big club early this season, but I'm not sure he offers enough immediate potential for you to save a roster spot for him. He's young. He's raw. He strikes out too much and doesn't yet hit for enough power. If the Marlins do call him up, the only thing I'd trust him to do at this point in his career is steal bases.

That's all for now.

I am so over Scott Olsen.

I said those exact words to a friend in a fantasy baseball draft room over the weekend -- right after that friend drafted the fiery Marlins left-hander of the 1.76 WHIP last year -- and then I found myself saying them again, to myself this time, in a wind-chilled press box Tuesday as the Orioles hosted the Marlins.

Yeah, yeah ... I know what you're thinking.

I am so over spring baseball.

I am too. Believe me, I am. The Red Sox-Athletics game in Japan on Tuesday gave us the rush of opening day already, but pretty soon we'll have to go right back into exhibition mode. And stay there. Forever.

OK, not forever. The end is in sight. But for now -- for 28 teams, anyway -- we can still only look at spring performances and wonder what to make of them.

Which brings me back to Olsen. The 24-year-old, who looked on the verge of becoming a staff ace in 2006, gave up his first six runs of the spring Monday at the Orioles, which sounds both good and bad at the same time. He also surrendered his first walk in only 12 innings -- a good sign after control issues plagued him part of last year. Now the bad news: He threw two wild pitches, allowed eight hits and recorded more than a few of his outs on hard-hit balls.

I just didn't see anything from him that gave me the impression of dominance. He put together a decent enough spring, I guess, but nothing to make you think he's going just to snap his fingers and make that 1.76 WHIP go away. You could take worse gambles in NL-only leagues, but for the money you'd have to pay to get him, I'd look elsewhere.

On another note, don't look for Aubrey Huff to play third base much this season. The Orioles gave him a look at the hot corner Tuesday, probably just to see if he could handle the position in a pinch during the season. He left me thinking a resounding "no." On his first opportunity of the game, he made a weak through to first base, forcing 1B Kevin Millar to dig the ball out of the dirt. Then in the second inning, he had an easy ground ball bounce right off his glove, avoiding an error only by virtue of the official scorer's generosity. On the very next play, he let a little blooper fall just beyond his glove in shallow left field, apparently unsure whether he or the shortstop should field it.

It was not pleasant. I swear, you almost felt bad for the guy.

Huff, who began his career as a third baseman, played only 15 games at the position last year, and I bet that number drops a bit more this year. He'll remain nothing more than a first baseman in Fantasy, which, in these days when he struggles to hit 20 homers, should pretty much limit his Fantasy appeal to AL-only leagues.

That's all for now

Look ...

Jake Westbrook -- see all those crazy stats he's putting up this spring? The zero earned runs through 14 innings? The five hits allowed? The 16 strikeouts?

Stop looking.

Turn off your monitor if you have to. I won't mind. I'd rather the rest of my words fall on deaf ears than you put in a claim for Westbrook, thinking he's somehow going to save your Fantasy season. It ain't gonna happen. And his six shutout innings against the Braves on Monday aren't going to change my mind.

Westbrook's monster spring is the exact reason so many Fantasy experts tell you not to pay one bit of attention to spring statistics. Oh, some of them might mean something, sure, but if you open the door to interpretation, too many people aren't going to know where to draw the line.

Westbrook is 30 years old. He's been a full-time major-league starter for the better part of five seasons now, and we know exactly what he does. He posts an ERA above 4.00, a WHIP of around 1.400 and a strikeout rate of less than five batters per nine innings. Unless you play in an AL-only league, where any serviceable starting pitcher becomes a useful member of a Fantasy staff, you don't want those numbers in Fantasy.

Why would this year be any different? Why would a pitcher with a track record like Westbrook's suddenly emerge as a Fantasy ace? Did he learn a new pitch? Did he just discover he was left-handed and throwing with the wrong arm all along? Is there a fountain of pitching dominance hidden in the lowlands of the Ohio River?

Transformations like that just don't happen. With the exception of Esteban Loaiza in 2003 -- and what has he done since? -- veteran pitchers don't go from serviceable to studly overnight. They don't. I promise. Chris Carpenter didn't have Westbrook's track record when he broke out. Neither did Dave Bush (if he ever did qualify as studly).

Westbrook got hot -- it's as simple as that. He'll get hot again during the season. Then, he'll get cold. Then, he might get hot again. Then cold. The point is his stats should even out to their norms by season's end.

So if you want to put in a waiver claim for Westbrook, I won't stop you. Hey, he should win a few games for the Indians, if nothing else. But if you grab him, grab him for his career numbers, not his spring numbers.

That's all for now.