Constructing the perfect fantasy baseball bench

Follow theScore's fantasy feed on Twitter (@theScoreFantasy) for the latest news, features and more.

Common thinking is to use your fantasy baseball bench spots on position players, just like in reality. This is the wrong way to do it. Starting pitchers should be the foundation of your fantasy bench.

For the sake of this article, let's assume standard fantasy roster allocations:

Your league may vary in terms of how rosters are constructed, but this format is seemingly the most popular. The following article will devise how to make best use of your five bench spots in a standard 5x5 scoring league:

On Draft Day

Whether you're in head-to-head, rotisserie or points leagues, the best way to use your five bench spots on draft day is with starting pitchers. Starting pitchers get hurt so often, making it important to have depth at the position. This can help replenish any injuries you suffer and provide potential trade bait if another team is handed pitching injuries.

Furthermore, using position players to fill up your bench spots can be a waste. They will only end up spelling your starting position players once or twice a week. Off days are few and far between during the MLB season. Star players rarely rest. Having a starter make one or two starts per week is much more valuable than a hitter having four to eight plate appearances in a full week.

Owning multiple starting pitchers on your bench will vastly improve your results in counting stats and it will balance out your average stats, avoiding disastrous weeks with an ERA in the 5.00s (for the most part). Position players on your bench will rarely have a significant impact on the final results of the offensive categories at the end of the week.

If the end of the week draws to a close and you're trailing in multiple offensive categories, it is much easier to stream position players.

Whether you're streaming or looking for long-term replacements in 12-team leagues, it is much easier to pluck a reliable batter off the waiver wire than a SP. This is, of course, as long as your league doesn't carry additional position players, such as a middle infielder, a corner infielder and a fourth outfielder.

The one exception to drafting a position player who will start the season on your bench is someone like Tampa Bay Rays utility man Brad Miller. Last season, Miller was eligible at 1B, 2B, SS and OF. Oh, and he also hit 30 home runs. He is an ideal fill-in when one of your everyday players has an off day or is day-to-day with an injury and you can't place him in a DL spot and add a temporary replacement.

Throughout the season

Once the season begins, I'd still recommend using all of your bench spots on starting pitchers. At least until a position player comes across the waiver wire you need to add and don't have a position player of your own you feel you can drop.

This could mean an undrafted hitter who is off to a blazing hot start that seems somewhat sustainable. Or, it could be a highly drafted player off to a slow start who was prematurely dropped by a less-savvy competing owner. If this is the latter, you can use your bench to stash him until he heats up.

For example, Minnesota Twins 2B Brian Dozier was hitting just .206 with six home runs and 22 RBIs as of June 5. Someone in my league dropped him, and I don't totally blame them. In need of a second baseman and power production, I added him hoping he could turn it around. All he did was hit .297 with 36 homers and 77 RBIs the rest of the way.

Baseball is very weird in the sense some players can be so utterly terrible in the first half of the season, but then they'll play like Babe Ruth in the second half, or vice versa. This is especially true for position players. Not to say pitchers won't endure peaks and valleys, but hitters are more prone to elongated hot/cold streaks.

Down the stretch/playoffs

This is where fantasy owners need to get more creative with the use of their bench spots. If you're in a crucial matchup down the stretch with significant playoff implications, don't hesitate to drop one of your lower-end starting pitchers if they have only one start in the week. In their place, add a two-start SP or stream batters with favorable matchups to pad your offensive stats.

If you are trailing in a playoff matchup, you can get even more creative. If you own a solid left-handed hitter such as, Baltimore Orioles 1B Chris Davis, for example, it might be best to drop him if he finishes the week with a weekend series against the Boston Red Sox SP trio of Chris Sale, David Price and Drew Pomeranz - all of whom are lefties.

In the finals, you can throw the kitchen sink at your opponent. As soon as a starting pitcher makes his final start of the season, he will be placed on your bench, so drop him for someone who can help you. In the finals, you need to maximize the usage of all of your roster spots, not just your bench spots.