What? There are game limits?

The only recent movement in baseball's off-season has been sideways or downward rather than moving any player or team's prospects upward.
The Rangers' bad news is that LHP Derek Holland could miss half of this season. He underwent arthroscopic surgery on his left knee after a fall in his home.
Rockies OF Carlos Gonzalez had his appendix removed, but that doesn't seem likely to cost him any playing time in 2014. Other injuries? Those seem probable, given his history.
The Nationals signed RHP Stephen Strasburg to a one-year contract for $3.975 million plus incentives, to avoid arbitration.
The Yankees designated OF Vernon Wells for assignment, officially to clear room on their 40-man roster. For what? Unless it's Masahiro Tanaka, the move could be no more than addition by subtraction, removing Wells from consideration in a crowded outfield picture. Too bad for them that they'll still be on the hook for most if not all of his contract. Most likely, Wells will simply go into the pile of mostly scrap-heap free agents. He would fit in there.
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Hockey. I'm still treading water in third place, at 67 points. Five out of second place. I'm above average in every category except for goals against average (10th) and save percentage (ninth). I just recently realized that we have a limit for games played -- for forwards, defensemen, utility players and goalies. I can't find on the ESPN site a breakdown of games played by position. But the total games played seems to indicate that the league's top three teams could be on a pace to run out of games before the season ends. There is a gap down to the other seven teams, but guess who they would catch first if they're playing longer into the season. I think that even though the first-place team has more games played than anyone, it's so far ahead that none of us could catch up.
The games limit makes it most important to build a lead in the "average" categories -- GAA, save percentage and ATOI -- as well as plus/minus. If you run out of games at any position, those "average" figures wouldn't change. And they'd have to add a positive performance in plus/minus. Someone would have to outperform you in those categories. In the other seven categories, just showing up every day would build the totals and allow them to pass the teams with exhausted player limits. Not sure whether I could devise a strategy for limiting games played during the time remaining this season, but if I do, I'll pass it along. But I will observe the stretch run, and have a strategy before next season.
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Basketball. Before I fell asleep at about 9:30 last night, I had a 5-1-2 lead this week. Right now, it's 7-1. If all of this week's matchups remain the same -- and I probably shouldn't be saying or even thinking this because it could jinx me -- I would move into third place (from fourth) but just two games out of first place (seven games coming into the week).
Several categories are close. I'm trailing by three steals, lead by one 3-pointer, two blocks and five assists. I currently have just two players active for Sunday. My opponent has three, but two are point guards. I might have to pick up a viable point guard of my own, one who's playing Sunday, to protect my lead. I'll figure that out more after Saturday's games.
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Turns out I placed third in a Pittsburgh bowl pool. My winnings will pretty much cover my entry fees in the bowl and NFL playoff pools I entered.
Just realized I don't have any choice in the AMFL playoffs. I have eight players on my roster: Chagers QBs (hoping it's all Philip Rivers), D'Angelo Williams and Danny Woodhead at RB, Keenan Allen and Danny Amendola at WR, Vernon Davis at TE, Patriots Ks (Stephen Gostkowski) and Seahawks D/ST. This is a scoring-only league. This week is our league semifinals. The two winners in the top-division playoffs advance to the two-week AMFL Super Bowl. For this week at least, I have to hope the Chargers' offense performs well. There's a good chance against the Broncos. Also a good chance San Diego would lose 45-42. That would be OK as long as I could win and advance, and get good draft picks for the conference finals and big game 48.