So you have made it through week 1 and are looking to make a splash. The 1st thing you need to look at is there any excess on your roster. Maybe you have a ton of players at a particular position or maybe you have a lot of players who produce in a similar category. If that is the case you have excess. While targeting your excess you should also have a player or 2 on your roster that you would like to trade because another owner will value them higher than you currently do and should.

The next thing you should do is look at the bottom 3 owners in your league. Are any of them truly falling behind in a category? More importantly, are any of them new owners. New owners are known for making mistakes and trading away players who start slow but end with legit numbers. Last year, if you were smart you tried to acquire Carlos Gonzalez in early June when he had 1 or 2 homers because he finished with his 40+/100+RBIs again. Certain players will always produce (unless injured) and trying to acquire them for players of lesser value is what wins leagues. Remember, no one is intentionally trying to take advantage of anyone, you are just looking for an owner who is giving up on their players.

Once you find an owner who is looking to make an early shake up, see where they think their team has gone wrong and how you can help them. Find out if they are looking to make a little splash or big splash. This will help guide you when making or contemplating an offer because you want to meet expectations. Once they say how things went wrong, try to get them to say who they wished they didn't take. 8 out of 10 times it is a very solid player. Once this guy is defined, if he was drafted within the first 7 rounds (I say 7 rounds because most teams can't make mistakes this early) you want to pounce. Guys drafted within single digit rounds are worth acquiring because they were drafted to be backbones of teams. They will be for yours if you can give up lesser value. Would you give me your 10th round pick for my 7th before the draft begun? What about my 9th for your 13th? As long as the player you drafted in that round wasn't a steal, it is always worth pulling the trigger.

Out of sheer principal in one of my leagues the team with Wacha needed a closer and after his 1st start I contacted them and ended up making a trade of Houston Street for Michael Wacha. I love acquiring rounds early in a trade so even though I value Street and needed a closer, I felt it was a no-brainer to do 1 week into the season.

The bottom line is speaking to your owner and finding out the players they are disappointed with is much better than assuming you know what's best for their team. Teams at the bottom typically have under producing players and teams near the top have players over producing. It is key to target those over producers and trade them away for under producers and get maximized value at each position.

If you have any trade questions, please do not hesitate to reach out through our "Real Help" forms and I would love to give any assistance to make sure our audience walks away fantasy baseball winners!