Week 22 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: Chris Duffy's shoulder injury, coupled with the trade of Rajai Davis to San Francisco, has opened up a big opportunity for Nate McLouth. He has hitting safely in 18 of his past 22 games. He has decent speed and a little bit of pop, but he's not going to challenge for any batting titles any time soon … Prince Fielder has his three-game suspension reduced to two games on Friday -- and he began serving that penalty immediately. What that means is he should be set for a full week of activity starting Monday. He's among the league leaders in homers and RBI … Gary Sheffield is resting his sore shoulder and he'll be questionable to start the road trip in Kansas City on Tuesday. He has been dealing with the injury since late July and has just one home run since July 20 … Ray Durham left Friday's game against the Brewers with a minor hamstring injury. He's having an awful August anyway (batting under .100), so reserve him even if he does play this weekend … Instead of coming off the 15-day disabled list this past week, David Dellucci suffered a setback with soreness in his surgically-repaired hamstring, and he is likely out until September … Scott Podsednik (strained rib cage muscle) has only been available to pinch hit recently, so keep him reserved for now … Miguel Tejada is batting .276 with six homers and 22 RBI in 25 games since the All-Star break.

Projections are for Aug. 27-Sept.2 games. All stats are through Friday's games.

This week's matchups
AL early	NL early	AL late	NL late
TB@BAL	NYM@PHI	BAL@BOS	NYM@ATL
DET@KC	ATL@FLA	DET@OAK	PHI@FLA
MIN@CLE	ARI@SD	CHW@CLE	COL@ARI
LAA@SEA	WAS@LAD	SEA@TOR	LAD@SD
TOR@OAK	COL@SF	TEX@LAA	SF@WAS
BOS@NYY	MIL@CHC	TB@NYY	PIT@MIL
CHW@TEX	STL@HOU	KC@MIN	HOU@CHC
	CIN@PIT		CIN@STL
Bold indicates a four-game series.
The following teams play seven games this week: Arizona, Chicago White Sox, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, Kansas City, Minnesota, N.Y. Mets, N.Y. Yankees, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, San Diego, Seattle and Tampa Bay.
The Yankees and Tigers play in Detroit on Monday to end a weekend series.
Kansas City and Minnesota (Friday), as well as Cincinnati and Pittsburgh (Tuesday), will play doubleheaders this week. The Royals and Twins postponed their Aug. 2 game after the collapsed bridge tragedy, and the Reds and Pirates were rained out on Aug. 5.
Makeup games: Seattle plays at Cleveland on Thursday as a makeup game for their April 8 game that was snowed out. Tampa Bay plays at the White Sox Monday as a makeup game for their May 26 game that was rained out.

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: N.Y. Mets at Atlanta (60 percent) on Saturday.

B E S T H I T T I N G S C H E D U L E
PITTSBURGH PIRATES
MON	TUE	TUE	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN
--	CIN Arroyo	CIN Ramirez	CIN Harang	CIN Belisle	@MIL TBA	@MIL Gallardo	@MIL Bush
CIN pitching: 4.98 ERA overall (29th), 5.05 Road ERA (26th), 6.06 Aug. ERA (28th).
MIL pitching: 4.54 ERA overall (18th), 4.14 Home ERA (16th), 6.45 Aug. ERA (30th).
The Pirates get the nod here again because they face two pf the worst pitching staffs in the majors for the month of August. They get four games at home also.

Five other favorable hitter schedules

Chicago Cubs -- vs. MIL (3), vs. HOU (3)

The Cubs get six home games -- three of which are against the Brewers and their struggling pitching staff and three against an Astros team that has the worst road ERA in the NL.

L.A. Angels -- at SEA (3), vs. TEX (3)

The Halos face the M's, who have an August ERA north of 4.75, and the Rangers, who have one of the worst road ERAs in the majors.

Boston Red Sox -- at NYY (3), vs. BAL (3)

The Orioles' pitching staff is horrible on the road, and the Yankees' August ERA is in the bottom third in the majors.

Milwaukee Brewers -- at CHC (3), vs. PIT (3)

The Cubs and Pirates rank in the bottom third among all pitching staffs for the month of August.

Cleveland Indians -- vs. MIN (3), vs. SEA (1), vs. CHW (3)

The Indians have seven home games in Week 22, and only Minnesota's staff is having a good August.

H O T H I T T E R S
We aren't suggesting you start these players no matter what, but you might consider starting them over struggling stars. The following eight hitters have extremely favorable matchups and/or are in the midst of hot streaks:
Jarrod Saltalamacchia, C/1B, Texas: Salty has more homers with Texas (five) in almost half the at-bats he had in Atlanta (four).
Mark Teixeira, 1B, Atlanta: Both sides won in this deal so far -- Big Tex has nearly as many homers with Atlanta (10), as he did with Texas (13), in nearly a third of the games.
Jeff Keppinger, 2B/SS/3B, Cincinnati: Even with Alex Gonzalez back, Keppinger should still see plenty of at-bats, considering he has an active 13-game hitting streak.
Freddy Sanchez, 2B/SS/3B, Pittsburgh: Only three hitters have more RBI over the past two weeks than Sanchez's 17.
Josh Fields, 3B, Chicago White Sox: His batting average continues to hover around .250, but he has five homers in the past two weeks.
Chris Young, OF, Arizona: As a leadoff hitter he has a horrible OBP, but he has more homers (seven) than any other major leaguer -- not named Magglio Ordonez -- since Aug. 10.
Brian Giles, OF, San Diego: He's batting .360 with four homers, 10 RBI and 10 runs scored since Aug. 10.
Frank Catalanotto, OF, Texas: He's hitting over .361 in his past 36-plus at-bats and he has an active six-game hitting streak.

W O R S T H I T T I N G S C H E D U L E
WASHINGTON NATIONALS
MON	TUE	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN
@LAD Lowe	@LAD Billingsley	@LAD Penny	--	SF Misch	SF Lincecum	SF Zito
LAD pitching: 4.00 ERA overall (6th), 4.04 Home ERA (10th), 3.98 Aug. ERA (7th).
SF pitching: 4.07 ERA overall (8th), 4.25 Road ERA (8th), 4.03 Aug. ERA (9th).
The Nats are on the road in a tough hitter's park in Chavez Ravine, and both the Dodgers and Giants have top 10 pitching staffs for the month of August.

Five other below-average hitter schedules

Chicago White Sox -- at TEX (3), at CLE (3)

The Pale Hose are on the road for six games against two pitching staffs that have stepped it up in August, ranking among the top 10 in the majors.

L.A. Dodgers -- vs. WAS (3), at SD (3)

Only six games for the Boys in Blue and the Padres lead the NL in August ERA. The Nats aren't too bad either over the past month.

Seattle Mariners -- vs. LAA (3), at TOR (3)

The M's will have to face their 1977 expansion partners in Toronto. The Jays have the best staff in the majors for the month of August.

Arizona Diamondbacks -- at SD (4), vs. COL (3)

The Padres have the best ERA in the majors at home and the Rockies aren't too bad on the road.

Tampa Bay Devil Rays -- at CHW (1), at BAL (3), at NYY (3)

While the Orioles have the worst staff in the AL for August, the Rays are still on the road for seven games.

C O L D H I T T E R S
We aren't suggesting you sit anyone, but take a look at your roster to see if you have a better alternative. The following eight hitters have poor matchups and/or are in the midst of cold streaks:
Ramon Hernandez, C, Baltimore: He has just one hit in his past 34 at-bats, giving him a two-week batting average of .029.
Carlos Delgado, 1B, N.Y. Mets: Over the past couple weeks, he's hitting just .194 with one homer and three RBI.
B.J. Upton, 2B/3B/OF, Tampa Bay: Bossman Jr. is batting just .213 in the month of August.
Aaron Hill, 2B/SS, Toronto: He's one of the streakiest hitters in baseball -- and he's in a bad slump now. He's batting just .189 over the past half a month.
Garrett Atkins, 3B, Colorado: He started the season slow, picked it up, but now he's batting just .255 with one homer and four RBI in his past 47 at-bats.
Reggie Willits, OF, L.A. Angels: Over the past two weeks, the speedy rookie is hitting just .200, and he has been caught twice in four stolen base attempts.
Delmon Young, OF, Tampa Bay: He has just three RBI -- and a .191 batting average -- since Aug. 10.
Justin Upton, OF, Arizona: In his past 39 at-bats, the youngster is batting just .153 with two RBI and two runs scored in the past half month.

You can e-mail your Fantasy Baseball questions to DMFantasyBaseball@cbs.com. Be sure to include "Attn: Hitting Planner" in the subject heading. Please include your full name, hometown and state. Be aware, due to the large volume of submissions received, we cannot guarantee personal responses or answers to all questions.