Vikings-Saints Opening Night Reactions

Well the opening game has come and gone, and while it felt like Christmas Day, this holiday lasts for the next 17 weeks. But before we start looking forward to those next few months, let's take a look back at the 2010 opener and the fantasy implications it brought:

Garret Hartley definitely proved why you should wait to take a kicker. If you spent an early pick on him thinking that the Saints' high powered offense would lead to lots of fantasy points, the Aint proved that kickers are too unpredictable to count on. Imagine, you could have had...

Devery Henderson really didn't prove much in my eyes, but the TD was nice. He will always be a deep threat in my opinion, able to go off for 100 yards or go catchless in any given week.

Adrian Peterson might not have ended up with a jaw-dropping stat line, but he did show that he is still the king of Minnesota as he was turned to early and often. I was a little disappointed in the fact that he only had 1 catch, but he is still a workhorse who you can bet the house on. Just like...

Pierre Thomas. Saint Pierre was a tale of two halves. 1 total yard in the first half led to an offensive explosion in the 3rd and 4th quarters. The Saints leaned on Thomas, and he delivered, consistently ripping off 5 or 6 yard gains against an otherwise stout Vikings D. The goal-line TD reinforced the fact that Mike Bell is not around and scores should be aplenty for Thomas.

Another eye-opener was Visanthe Shiancoe, who was targeted a whopping 7 times from the TE position. I'm not quite sure about whether or not this was just Favre depending on his tight end because of jitters, or if he is going to be the number one option in the Vikings' passing game in Sidney Rice's absence. Either way, if you have a deep bench and could use a back-up TE, look to Shiancoe like Favre did so many times last night.

Both QBs, Brees and Favre underwhelmed in their debuts, but I don't expect that to last. Sure, Favre might not put up the same insane stats as last year, but he also only had a week's worth of practice to get into the game. And if you are a Brees owner and have any doubts, I have absolutely no idea why you drafted him.

Well that's about it from my fantasy point of view, a few great performances along with some mediocre. Oh, and the trainwreck of Hartley of course. Well good luck the rest of this weekend, and don't fret: one week a season doesn't make.

Knee Jerk Reactions: Opening Day

Well Opening Day has officially ended, and now its time to embark on that 161 game trip to the end of the season. Well, unless you're the Orioles or Rays, that is. But the future and the playoffs seem so far away. So let's reflect on the opening games and see what is the most important info to take away. Oh, and I might talk about that Heyward guy somewhere in there.

Business as Usual:

• Albert Pujols had an unbelievable line going 4 for 5, with 2 homers, 3 RBIs and a run to match every hit. This would be big news if there weren't commercials proclaiming him as the best hitter in baseball during his games.
• Tim Lincecum and Roy Halladay showed why they were the undisputed top 2 starters off the board. Each went 7 innings and recorded a run. Halladay had 2 more Ks, but Lincecum didn't give up a run. If you had either one of these guys starting in a roto league, you are probably towards the top of your standings right now.
• Zack Greinke went 6 innings and only allowed one run. Of course, being a Royal prevented him from getting the all important W. It would be interesting to see just what kind of record he could rack up without a terrible bullpen/offense.

 Great Starts:

• It would be hard to write an opening day blog and leave out the man I so crudely photo-shopped into a Superman costume. Jason Heyward looked very impressive after going 2-4 with 4 RBIs. In addition to his bomb in his first career at-bat, I was scared for Justin Berg on Jay-Hey's single up the middle. He hit it so hard that I was afraid it might just knock the Cubs pitcher's leg right off.
• Even after an explosive day from "The Machine" the MLB leader in RBIs is Placido Polanco after the first day. If you picked him to give you some cheap, average boosting hits, and some runs, courtesy of the Phillies' stacked lineup, you sure had a nice surprise. There's nothing better than getting a grand slam and 6 RBIs from a late pick, in a single game.
• Garrett Jones showed his legit power by hitting a dinger to right and left field. Even though the Pirates lineup looked pretty atrocious on paper, they managed to hang a wicked number on Vicente Padilla thanks to Jones. Maybe next year Joe Torre won't start a has been on Opening Day.
• Despite going 0-3, Chone Figgins had 2 runs and is the league leader, for the time being, with 2 stolen bases. Imagine what he might be able to do if he actually got a hit.

Stumbled out the Gate:

• The opening night game featured a poor performance from Josh Beckett. While his roto stats were mediocre, the stat that was most alarming was that he had only made the Yankee hitters miss once midway through his start. If Beckett can't miss the hitters' bats it will be a long season of 1 strikeout starts.
• If anyone thought they were getting a consistent starter in Carlos Zambrano, they were sadly mistaken. Big Z was absolutely shellacked by the Braves, making him the goat of the day. It is days like Zambrano's that scare me from trying streaming in a head to head league.
• While the three most fantasy relevant Padres (Adrian Gonzalez, Chase Headley and Kyle Blanks) all had homers (even though the last two were completely irrelevant), I still hung my head as a Friar fan. Stephen Drew's inside-the-park homer made me shudder. It was a rocky start, that's for sure.
• Jason Frasor took the ball in his first save attempt this year and ended up with a loss as well as an astronomical ERA. It would seem that he is instantly on the hot seat, since they have Kevin Gregg and Scott Downs waiting in the wings. If you have Frasor and a bench player you don't mind dropping I'd snatch up Gregg just to be safe.

I hope that all of your season's have gotten off to a good start. If not, then I hope it turns around quick.

Also, if you would like any fantasy advice with lineups, matchups or trades, feel free to comment.