Fantasy Baseball Rankings: MacKenzie Gore’s Breakthrough? Lawful

The Shuffle Up series rolls along with the starting pitchers. This is how I would rate and grade the board if it were for a new draft today.

Remember, if ever there was a position where “nobody knows anything,” this is it.

What has happened so far is just an audition. Suppose players with the same salary are considered equal. I’ve included courtesy rankings from some injured pitchers at the bottom, but they’re not up for debate. Everyone has their own version of optimism or pessimism regarding injuries; I will always be extremely careful with injured pitchers.

Do you have disagreements? That’s good, that’s what the game is based on. Find me on Twitter/X: @scott_pianowski.

And there we go.

The big tickets

Glasnow is on pace to throw an impressive 195 innings, a number the Dodgers certainly won’t let him approach. No organization knows better than the Dodgers that October is the only month that truly matters. He leads the majors in strikeouts and K/9, and while he’s also thrown a league-worst 11 wild pitches, he’s yet to strike out an opposing hitter. I assume he will pitch between 165-175 innings, inevitably contracting the false disease known as Dodgeritis.

Fried’s strikeout rate has dropped and he is walking more hitters, but the best ground ball rate in the league erases many sins. He is also getting positive value on six different proposals. In a year where little has gone right in Atlanta, Fried is one of the right answers.

Legitimate building blocks

Crochet’s component stats suggest an ERA of 2.42, almost a full run below the actual 3.25. Chicago’s terrible offense is a bummer, of course, although Crochet still has a respectable six wins. The platoon’s disadvantage did not stop him, how righties have a pedestrian .194/.242/.351 slash against him (Lefties, predictably, are even worse). The White Sox are the trash of the AL, but Crochet is a legitimate star.

Everyone knows Atlanta’s López will regress from that brilliant 1.57 ERA, but what is the true talent level? Savant suggests a 3.79 ERA, while SIERA is not far off with 3.61. The usual signs of luck appear, with a strand rate of 87.4% and a small HR/FB rate of 5.1%. López should be a year-round starter and could fall under the Forced Hold label, as this is the type of pitcher that can be difficult to trade; your opponents may look at this breakout with suspicion.

Gausman’s fastball has dropped a bit (and has been especially lagging in recent outings) and his strikeout rate has increased; the data from Baseball Savant suggests that your ugly ERA 4.24 should actually be higher than five. Gausman’s fastball, splitter and slider are classified as negative pitches during the first half of the year. If you want to get out of Gausman’s business, you need something to sell. I would wait for a good turnaround or two and then see what the market will bear.

Talk to them, talk to them

Gore is delivering a legitimate breakthrough year, It’s just a little masked. His strikeout and walk rates are moving in the right direction, his swinging strike rate has improved, and the barrel rate against him has been cut nearly in half. FIP suggests Gore should have a 2.83 ERA, although Savant data justifies the full number. Gore has always had a penchant for the fly ball and that will lead to some homers, although he is beating league average for HR/FB. Washington isn’t far from a contending team, and Gore is good enough to be a pitcher who could be a playoff contender.

I want so badly to call Waldron a knuckleballer, but we have to recognize he only throws the pitch a little over a third of the time. What led to his success was getting positive results on four different pitches: fastball, sinker, slider and knuckle. Maybe there’s a risk of collapse when we consider that his fastball tops out at 90.6 mph, but we’re far enough into the season that Waldron deserves a set-and-forget salary. He struggled strangely at Petco Park (4.36 ERA); His ERA is 2.86 for his nine road starts.

Some plausible advantages

Quantrill is a straight-contact guy in a world where that’s a dirty phrase, but he survived in the elements of Colorado (3.97 ERA) and It was great on the road (3.06 ERA). He’s a legitimate target for a contender next month when trade season begins. Q has allowed three runs or less in 11 starts, and only two of his innings have been truly disastrous starts. You need to fill in the crossed out column elsewhere, but that kind of consistency works in a mixed league as long as you can adjust the schedule.

Detroit’s disappointing offense held Olson to one win, but a 3.04 ERA and 1.23 WHIP are good enough for any mixed-league manager. Olson’s strikeout rate is down slightly from last year’s fast debut, but he has also slightly reduced his walk rate. More brands for chase rate and ground ball rate help fuel Olson’s consistency.

Bargain box

Injured pitcher salaries – not up for debate