Week 1 Hitting Planner

The Fantasy Baseball Hitting Planner is the essential guide to setting your lineup for the upcoming week. Every Saturday, we provide you with favorable hitting matchups for teams, as well as which hitters are hot or not. The Pitching Planner, complete with upcoming two-start pitchers, will be posted on Sunday.

Taking BP: Alejandro De Aza gets first crack at the center field job in Florida. He had four steals this spring, making him a nice Rotisserie option for now ... Stephen Drew tweaked his quad muscle earlier this week, but he should be fine for the opener at Coors Field ... Erubiel Durazo wins the first baseman's job in Oakland by default now that Dan Johnson is sidelined for up to three months with torn cartilage in his left hip ... Kevin Millar will receive a decent amount of at-bats early on this month while Jay Payton (hamstring) heals on the 15-day disabled list ... Jim Edmonds (shoulder, toe) could be ready for opening day after getting some at-bats in this past week.

Projections are for April 1-8 games. All stats are through Thursday's spring training games.

Taking into account all games with at least a 50 percent chance of precipitation according to the Weather.com, the following might be threatened by poor weather: Florida at Washington (60 percent), Tampa Bay at N.Y. Yankees (60), Atlanta at Philadelphia (60) on Wednesday, Detroit at Kansas City (60) on Friday; Detroit at Kansas City (60) on Saturday and Seattle at Cleveland (60), Baltimore at N.Y. Yankees (60), N.Y. Mets at Atlanta (60), Philadelphia at Florida (60), Pittsburgh at Cincinnati (60), Boston at Texas (60) on Sunday.

Five other favorable hitter schedules

1. Arizona Diamondbacks -- at COL (3), at WAS (4)

• The D-Backs have seven games this week -- three at Coors Field against a team that had the worst ERA last September (6.38) and four against a Nationals staff that was the worst in the NL a year ago

• Disregard the six road games, Boston faces the worst AL staff in the majors from '06 (KC) and the Rangers Ballpark in Arlington (formerly Ameriquest Field) allowed 10.3 RPG last season.

• The Redlegs have six home games at the Great American Ballpark.

• The Halos get seven home games to start the season, four of which come against an A's staff without Barry Zito.

• The Dodgers travel on the road, but they face two staffs that averaged a 5.55 ERA last year.

Five other below-average hitter schedules

1. St. Louis Cardinals -- vs. NYM (3), at HOU (3)

• The Mets will be looking for revenge against the team that beat them in the NLCS last year. Houston had the NL's best pitching staff a year ago, although there are some new faces in '07.

• The M's open the season against an Oakland staff that had a 4.21 ERA last year, good enough for seventh in the majors. The Indians have an improved bullpen and a solid starting staff.

• The Diamondbacks had a surprisingly good pitching staff last season and the Padres were second in team ERA (3.87) only to Detroit (3.84).

• Only the Tigers had a better staff ERA than the Twins last season and while the back of the Yankees' rotation isn't a great one, they did have a home ERA under 4.00 last year at Yankee Stadium.

• While they have six home games, both staffs they face were ranked among the top four in the NL last year.

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