This week we bring you the starting pitchers, and it’s time to unveil our top 50!

#1 – #10

Rank	Player	Average
1	Paul Skenes	1.4
2	Tarik Skubal	2.4
3	Spencer Strider	2.9
4	Cole Ragans	4.7
5	Logan Gilbert	8.7
6	Garrett Crochet	7.9
7	Yoshinobu Yamamoto	10.3
8	Hunter Greene	10.9
9	Dylan Cease	11.4
10	Roki Sasaki	11.7

While it has felt like the top ten starting pitchers have been going through a revolving door over the past few years, there remains a major thread among those there now. Having dominant stuff has become the name of the game. The pitcher who breaks this mold is Logan Gilbert who more-so relies on a wide arsenal, command, and consistent durability to achieve his high ranking. I personally prefer the high stuff guys to the volume dependent ones, as I see pitcher health as binary: hurt or not hurt. But it is hard to argue with the results from Gilbert. One thing I do like about him is his willingness and desire to tinker with his repertoire. The cutter he added in 2024 (10% usage) did get knocked around a bit, but it helped to make his four-seamer more effective (.349 wOBA against in 2023 → .274 wOBA against in 2024). As long as he is pitching half of his games in T-Mobile Park, he should continue to find himself among the upper echelon of pitchers.

Tarik Skubal is one of my key examples as to why I think that predicting pitcher injuries is a fickle game. After missing time to injury in 2022 and 2023, Skubal ripped off 192 innings en route to his first Cy Young in 2024. The giant K-BB% numbers in the minor leagues always suggested this outcome was possible. Bet on the talent folks.

Spencer Strider will join Cole Ragans in the club of pitchers with two Tommy John surgeries (I’m counting internal base procedures). With a 2023 study from Jeff Zimmerman of Fangraphs showing that there is little discernable difference for pitchers after a second TJS, I am not too worried about how Strider will produce in the coming years. Inevitably, we may unfortunately run into some of these pitchers having to have a third TJS, at which point we ask how much a single elbow can take. For now though, I will continue to treat these stuff monsters as the stuff monsters they are.

Paul Skenes showed in 2024 that concerns over fastball shape are overblown when you sit at a cool 99 MPH (98.8 MPH average, forgive me for rounding up). On top of this fastball, Skenes wields five other above average pitches, including a 147 Stuff+ slider. It is not crazy to expect below a three ERA over the next 10 years with a 10+ K/9 from Skenes. Assuming health, there is nobody in the universe that is likely to knock him off this top spot. 

Getting out of Chicago felt like it could not have possibly been a bad thing for Garrett Crochet, but Fenway is a tough landing spot. He has the stuff to overcome the BABIP machine that is the green monster, but the ERA and WHIP will likely elevate over what Crochet’s true talent might be. How the arm holds up will remain to be seen, but I think this question makes Crochet more attainable than he should be. Another previous White Sox pitcher in our top ten who might be on the move at some point this season is Dylan Cease, who put forth one of his best seasons in the MLB in 2024. This was in part thanks to improved control, which greatly improved his WHIP (1.42 in 2023 → 1.07 in 2024). Being in San Diego surely helps, but if he is able to continue his gains in control, he should be just as dominant wherever he gets moved to. Hunter Greene reminds me a lot of Dylan Cease with his combination of high strikeouts and occasionally shaky control. The shaky control is picking nits, as a career average 3.55 BB/9 is completely acceptable for someone who misses as many bats as Greene. I expect the ratios to climb a bit from 2024, where Greene had a career low 0.72 HR/9, which clashes with the combination of a high fastball approach and Great American Ball Park. Still, if there is a pitcher in this top ten with another level to reach, it is the 25-year-old Greene.

Following in Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s footsteps, Roki Sasaki signed with the new evil empire going into 2025. Yamamoto showed that again that the transition to the MLB from the NPB is a much easier step for pitchers than hitters, to the tune of a 3.00 ERA over 90 innings. The low innings number was due to an injury in June, initially diagnosed as a rotator cuff strain and later changed to triceps tightness, something he had been dealing with in spring training of 2024. It will be interesting to monitor if the gains he made in K/9 from the NPB to the MLB hold up as hitters continue to adjust to his pitching. As for Sasaki, I was among the lowest on him, but still had him at 15 in my personal rankings. I think that he is being perceived as a finished product, which Lance Brodzowski (@lancebroz.bsky.social) who knows about 1,000,000,000,000x more than me about pitching pointed out as questionable in this wonderful video. My take on Sasaki is that there is still work to be done, injury questions, and a loaded enough rotation that he could find himself in AAA if things don’t immediately go right for the young phenom. Still, the talent is obvious, and I think I said something early about betting on these kinds of guys.

(Joe Juliette)

#11 – #20

Rank	Player	Average
11	George Kirby	13
12	Blake Snell	13.4
13	Corbin Burnes	13.6
14	Zack Wheeler	13.6
15	Eury Pérez	18.7
16	Pablo López	18.7
17	Tyler Glasnow	19.4
18	Shane McClanahan	19.7
19	Shohei Ohtani	21.3
20	Bryce Miller	21.4

THE BAD or AT LEAST NOT SO GOOD

Pablo López takes a step back in 2024

Pablo López showed signs of regression in 2024 by taking the opposite approach of Logan Gilbert when it came to making adjustments. While López was coming off a phenomenal 2023 season, stagnation in today’s era of advanced scouting, analytics, and research can be a recipe for disaster—and that may have been exactly what happened.

A look at his pitch mix and velocity in 2024 compared to 2023 highlights his lack of evolution:

2024: Four-Seamer (40% at 95.0 mph), Sweeper (22% at 84.5 mph), Changeup (20% at 88.5 mph), Curveball (10% at 82.4 mph), Sinker (8% at 94.5 mph)

2023: Four-Seamer (34% at 94.9 mph), Sweeper (21% at 84.4 mph), Changeup (21% at 88.5 mph), Curveball (12% at 82.5 mph), Sinker (11% at 94.5 mph)

As you can see the differences are minimal at best. López may have become too predictable. This predictability forced him to rely more heavily on his four-seamer, as his secondary pitches became less effective. Hitters crushed his sweeper, improving their batting average against it by 66 points. His changeup, once a serviceable weapon, became a liability, with batters hitting .281 against it—26 points higher than in 2023. The biggest concern, however, was his sinker, which opponents teed off on for a .406 average, leading López to abandon it late in the season. These struggles, coupled with the lack of movement variation among his pitches, contributed to his disappointing performance in 2024.

The good news? López acknowledged these issues in an interview right before Spring Training with MLB.com, stating that he plans to be “more unpredictable” with his pitch mix and “a lot more aggressive” in 2025. If he follows through, a bounce-back season is certainly possible.

 

and THE UGLY UNCERTAINTY

Injuries and Their Impact

Injuries are an unfortunate reality for pitchers, and in 2024, four of these pitchers in this part of the rankings—Eury Pérez, Tyler Glasnow, Shane McClanahan, and Shohei Ohtani—suffered significant arm injuries, forcing them to miss part or all of the season. While modern medicine has made great strides in pitcher recovery, setbacks are still a real possibility.

If you have any of these pitchers on your roster, now is the time to start planning ahead. Make sure to look at our entire rankings to find contingency options, as injuries and workload management could create bumps in the road. Just look at Eury Pérez, who was shut down with elbow inflammation in Spring Training before being placed on the 60-day IL—a cautionary tale for fantasy managers relying too heavily on injured aces. As they say, the best ability is availability.

(Ryan Felix Fernandes)

#21 – #30

Rank	Player	Average
21	Michael King	21.6
22	Grayson Rodriguez	23.6
23	Chris Sale	24.6
24	Spencer Schwellenbach	26.6
25	Gerrit Cole	27.3
26	Logan Webb	27.7
27	Tanner Bibee	29.6
28	Framber Valdez	30
29	Shota Imanaga	30.7
30	Freddy Peralta	31.1

This grouping has a strong cast of reliable arms that should give bulk, strong ratios, and Cy Young upside in any given year. Grayson Rodriguez and Spencer Schwellenbach are the two most poised to continue to jump in the rankings. Rodriguez is still just 25 years old, and took a great step forward in his second MLB season. Thanks to a dominant changeup, Rodriguez ran reverse platoon splits in 2024, being significantly better against lefties (.272 wOBA) than righties (.347 wOBA). I more-so expect the latter to come down than the former to come up. Unlocking this improvement will be key to taking the next step towards becoming an elite dynasty arm. The Braves did the Spencer thing again, as Schwellenbach exploded onto the scene in 2024. A wicked wide arsenal with six legit offerings at 24 years old is incredibly impressive. It’s not like hitters were adjusting to him either, as he improved as he went, posting a 2.73 ERA in the second half with 86 Ks in 79 innings.

Chris Sale finally was able to avoid sustaining any freak injuries in 2024, allowing him to win his (somehow) first Cy Young award. It appears that the lanky lefty’s unique delivery is going to age extremely well. I am betting on 2-3 more years of this level of production, which is truly the kind of window that we should be dealing within in dynasty leagues anyways. He did pick up an injury at the tail end of the year last year, but that appears to be behind him heading into 2025. 

Now to get to those rather boring but foundational pitchers that all competing teams need. Tanner Bibee is perhaps the most exciting as both the youngest member of the group, as well as the one with the highest strikeout upside. Still, I am unsure that Bibee has the juice to ever make a jump much higher than this in the rankings during his career. Framber Valdez and Logan Webb have been absolute horses for the last few years, but I get concerned about volume-based guys. Webb is truly the face of this archetype. He has a fantastic change-up, a great home park, and his ability to induce ground balls allows him to be a quality start machine. However, he and Valdez are both an injury away from tanking down these rankings. I fear that an injury is not the only thing that could drag Webb down, as it appears his 2024 may have been worse than it appears on the surface, as he struggled to limit hard contact. I did not initially have Shota Imanaga in this grouping, but his rather modest 9.03 K/9 surprised me. I am happy to see that it was not an issue of having hitters adjust to him and his unique fastball as the year went, as his production remained relatively stable across the first and second half of 2024. His 3.50 SIERA suggests the 2.91 ERA he provided in 2024 is bound to regress, and I question if there are any rabbits for him to pull out of the hat to take a step forward. 

Of the group of non-25 year olds, Freddy Peralta is my favorite. I am a sucker for guys who get strikeouts after all. You never want to rely on a guy to get lucky with HR/9, but if Peralta were to return to the 0.6-0.8 range he achieved in 2020-2022, you could be getting an extreme value out of Peralta. This would allow him to get to a low-3’s ERA, which simply makes him a better fantasy pitcher than the others in this group. Do I think he jumps up much higher than this on the rankings even if that does happen? No. But, I do think it makes him a relative target of mine among the others in this grouping.

For notes on Michael King and Gerrit Cole check out my Risers/Fallers article for our group of SPs. I’ll give a short TLDR to substitute here. King managed the relief to starting pitcher transition in large part due to a dominant change-up. He is just on the borderline of the ‘ace’ discussion in my eyes, which at just 29 makes him a target of mine in dynasty leagues. For Cole, I am worried about fundamental changes to his arsenal that were present under the hood in 2023, and became visibly present with a heightened ERA and lowered K/9 in 2024. I fear that the rest of his 30s will leave dynasty managers chasing a ceiling which is no longer attainable for the once dominant pitcher.

(Joe Juliette)

#31 – #40

Rank	Player	Average
31	Jacob deGrom	34.4
32	Jared Jones	31.7
33	Joe Ryan	31.7
34	Andrew Painter	35
35	Hunter Brown	36
36	Aaron Nola	36.1
37	Max Fried	36.6
38	Zac Gallen	36.5
39	Luis Castillo	37.1
40	Bailey Ober	42.4

If I could make my starting staff only out of this group, I would every day and twice on Tuesdays. Could you imagine a staff of five of these guys? Let’s talk favorites. You want a top pitching prospect, oh hello, Andrew Painter. He’s recovered from TJ, ready to get back to being one of the top pitching prospects. He last pitched competitively in 2022 (age 19); he’s 22 now, so, expecting him up in 2025 is hopeful, but not probable.

On the complete opposite end is former Cy Young winner and best pitcher in baseball when healthy, Jacob deGrom. Over the last four seasons, he’s pitched 197.1 innings…total (49 IP per season). That’s not good for your Dynasty team; because availability can be as important as skill in this game. Trade for the 36-year-old if you’re in win-now mode, but I wouldn’t part with a lot.

If you live in the Fantasy/Dynasty Baseball world as yours truly does, the helium is high on the Pirates’ Jared Jones this season. Only 23-years-old, Jones lowered his walk rate under 3 (2.88 to be exact) last season in 121.2 innings pitched at the big-league level in 2024. His minor league strikeout rate was over 10, though his walk rate was over 3.5; his xFIP was over 4 as well. There is room to improve, but it feels like this ranking already factors that in. The hype train around the Pirates pitching staff is in full effect, so if your team is heavy in pitching Jones is a good candidate to bring a top hitter back.

The Astros’ Hunter Brown had a terrible April 2024; giving up 25 earned runs over five starts. From May 1 onward however, he locked in, and ended 2024 with a 3.49 ERA (3.47 xFIP) with a K/BB rate a hair under 3 (2.98 to be exact). Brown walked too many in the minors, but is fixing that issue at the big-league level; the arrow is pointing up on his Dynasty status, and if he’s undervalued due to that terrible April 2024, scoop him up.

The Twins’ Joe Ryan is one of my favorite pitchers, and it is very clear why; a career MLB walk rate of only 2.09 and strikeout rate of 10.05 over his first 470.1 innings. His ERA hasn’t matched it (3.92) yet, but it’s coming. However, Ryan missed the final seven weeks of the 2024 season after a right shoulder strain ended his season on August 7^th. He said he had a normal off-season, so all systems go in 2025. If the injury discount made him available in your league, at least inquire.

The 29 and over group of Aaron Nola, Max Fried, Zac Gallen, Luis Castillo and Bailey Ober rank 36-40, respectively, of their advanced(lol) ages. Pitchers can be valuable well into their mid-30s, so a starting five of this group would produce top 3 pitching stats in most leagues, for the next few seasons. Lesson: go after bats early if you’re in a startup.

Aaron Nola is an every-other-year pitcher (seriously, his ERAs over the last seven seasons, from 2024-2018: 3.57, 4.46, 3.25, 4.63, 3.28, 3.87, 2.37). I traded him in a 16-teamer for Triston Casas, if you’re buying into the every-other-year theory, now is the time to move him. I still love him, although his K rate dropped to a career-worst 8.89, that walk rate stayed sparkling at 2.26 (though that has climbed the last few seasons).

Newest Yankee Max Fried also has a walk rate under three, but has never been a huge strikeout guy, with his K rate hovering around 8.5 that last few seasons. Still, Fried will be good for wins and quality innings. Zac Gallen is similar, strikeout rate around 10 for his career, though that has been slowly declining (9.49 last season), and his walk rate was one walk per game higher in 2024 than it was in 2022-23. After 2022 we thought he was going to be a top-10 SP for years, we now know he isn’t that, but he’s better than this ranking for sure. It is known that I keep repeating these analogous stats, but Luis Castillo has a equivalent profile, 10ish K rate, walk rate under 3, and pitching in Seattle has me liking him more than Nola, Gallen and Fried. His ERA for the last two seasons has been 3.64 and 3.34, and while ERA can be fluky, and an ERA over 3 isn’t a death knell to starters.

My favorite pitcher in this group we ranked at the end, Joe Ryan’s Twins teammate, Bailey Ober. I bet you know why…career walk rate of 1.95, K rate of 9.24, the theme is known to all by now, yes? In a 12-teamer starting 2 catchers, I added him to my team for a team in need of 1B/C, Christian Walker and Austin Wells. He may be the easiest SP in this group to get on your team; you know what to do!

(Phil Barrington)

#41 – #50

Rank	Player	Average
41	Jackson Jobe	40.4
42	Kodai Senga	42.4
43	Jack Flaherty	42
44	Bryan Woo	44.6
45	Noah Schultz	46.9
46	Bubba Chandler	53.4
47	Justin Steele	47
48	Luis Gil	49.3
49	Sandy Alcántara	50
50	Kyle Bradish	79.4

Dynasty pitcher rankings can be volatile, and this tier has several examples. Luis Gil is certainly one of them. A history of command issues in the minors and 2022 Tommy John surgery had made him an afterthought entering last season, but a big spring and a Gerrit Cole injury unexpectedly put him in the rotation. He thrived, winning 15 games and AL Rookie of the Year, and surely contributing to many fantasy championships. There were some red flags, however. He benefitted from a .237 BABIP, struggled in the second half, and had a terrible postseason. Now there’s another big one this preseason, as he was shut down with shoulder tightness. If he misses significant time, he’ll join Kyle Bradish on the shelf. Bradish was building on his breakout 2023 with an impressive eight-game run before needing Tommy John surgery, and won’t be back until late this season. And Bradish isn’t even the only Tommy John returnee in the bunch.

Sandy Alcantara won the NL Cy Young in 2022 and entered 2023 as our fourth-ranked starting pitcher, but struggled to a 4.14 ERA before ultimately needing TJ. He sure looks back this preseason, already hitting 100 on the radar gun, but there are still questions. To get back to his Cy Young form, he’s going to need volume as well as velocity. He has a career 21.4% K-rate despite bringing the heat, and has relied on going deep into games to compile enough strikeouts to be a fantasy ace. It’s not clear if he’ll still be able to handle a 200-plus inning workload, and even if he can, that 2.28 ERA from 2022 looks like an outlier compared to his career 3.32 mark. It’s also not clear how long he’ll be with Miami – the Marlins have him under contract through 2026 with a club option for 2027, but their gutted roster looks unlikely to compete anytime soon, so they may not want to wait to make a trade. Alcantara would get more run support just about anywhere else, but he’d also say goodbye to a very pitcher-friendly park.

So who can you trust in this group? Justin Steele and Bryan Woo feel relatively safe thanks to their great command, even though they both missed time due to injury last season. They ranked first and second in percentage of pitches in the strike zone among pitchers who threw at least 100 innings. Steele’s upside may be limited by his age and velocity, but a few more seasons like his last three would be more than enough to justify his ranking. Woo’s microscopic 2.8% walk rate last season is partially a product of throwing so many fastballs – more than 70% of his pitches were four-seamers or sinkers. To get more strikeouts and ascend to ace territory, he’ll need to find a strikeout pitch among his other offerings.

Kodai Senga definitely has his out pitch. His “ghost forkball” produced an absurd 59.5% whiff rate in his 2023 MLB debut season. That alone makes him perhaps the most exciting pitcher of this group, even though he’s 32, missed almost all last season due to injury, and had an 11.1% walk rate in 2023. His command improved as the year progressed, and if he can stay healthy and replicate his second-half performance over a full season, he has ace upside for at least a short time.

Jack Flaherty is probably Senga’s top competition for short-term value on this list. His return to Detroit should help, although it’s unlikely he’ll be able to replicate the absurd 32% K-rate and 4.6% BB-rate he posted there before being traded to the Dodgers at the deadline. He’s teased fantasy managers with ace-level performance before, but command or injury issues always seem to derail him. He did throw the most innings of anyone in this tier last season, but there are still health concerns. The Yankees reportedly nixed a deadline trade due to his medical records, and he couldn’t secure a long-term deal in free agency.

My dynasty experience has made me a believer that there’s no such thing as a pitching prospect, but after lamenting all that has and might still go wrong for the seven above, younger arms don’t sound so bad. All three in this group have lived up to the hype so far after being drafted out of high school, so maybe they can defy the odds in the majors. Jackson Jobe looks like the most promising of the group. He was drafted third overall in 2021, and has big velocity and a strong mix of secondary pitches. He made an MLB cameo late last season and is in the mix for a rotation spot this year. Noah Schultz was also a first-round pick, a 6’9 lefty with an elite slider. The rest of his offerings need some refinement and he’s the furthest away of the three, but he might have the highest ceiling. Bubba Chandler was technically a third-rounder, but got first-round bonus money to sign with the Pirates rather than play both baseball and football in college. Focusing just on pitching has led to rapid development. He’s put up more than 100 solid innings each of the last two seasons and has a strong three-pitch mix. For all three of these guys, balancing their elite upside with the typical pitching prospect risk makes a rank in the 40s feel about right.

(Ben Sanders)