Fantasy Baseball Starting Pitcher ADP Report - Draft Targets and Avoids (2025)

It is hard to believe February is already here. In just a few weeks, pitchers and catchers will report, and not long after that, spring training will officially be underway. Those preparations for the 2025 MLB season coincide with fantasy baseball’s main drafting period, so now is the time to do some research before our contests kick off.

Valuing players before we know what rosters and rotations will look like can feel nebulous. While popular mainstream fantasy sites like Yahoo, CBS, and ESPN have only just opened their fantasy games, NFBC has been running drafts since the end of last season. The ADP data accumulated over the last few months can be a useful tool to help us set our bearings.

I recently looked at catcher and outfielder ADPs for this purpose, and in this column, I’ll focus on starting pitchers. Using NFBC’s data, I’ll build a list of players who hold appeal (and a list of pitchers to avoid) based on their ADP for my own upcoming drafts. We've compiled this ADP data from NFBC Draft Champion drafts. You'll find the starting pitcher ADP table below, along with my analysis of the ADP at the starting pitcher position, player values I like/dislike, etc. Reminder: this report doesn't reflect my personal rankings but instead breaks down how the early draft market values these starting pitchers for 2025 fantasy baseball leagues.

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Starting Pitcher Fantasy Baseball ADP Analysis

Starting Pitchers I Will Buy At ADP

George Kirby, Seattle Mariners (44.28)
Dylan Cease, San Diego Padres (48.64)
Cole Ragans, Kansas City Royals (48.72)

My strategy for drafts in 2025 is to prioritize acquiring bats early. Only after my favorite hitters are gone will I dive into the pitching pool. These three are clustered tightly together and are the first pitchers I see myself going after to not fall too far behind in pitching.

George Kirby has reached 190 innings pitched in each of the last two seasons. His career 23.3% K% is a bit lacking for an SP1, but he should deliver top-end ratios to help my team’s overall ERA and WHIP.

Conversely, Cole Ragans and Dylan Cease offer higher strikeout upside but carry higher walk rates (8.8% and 8.5%, respectively, to Kirby’s 3.0%). Whoever I get from this group, I plan to pair with another SP down the board to counter their weaknesses.

Cole Ragans' ranks (min 200 IP) since joining Kansas City and becoming a full-time starter in July 2023.

IP (258): 15th | K (312): 4th | K-BB% (20.8%): 13th
ERA (3.00): 6th | WHIP (1.12): 16th | BAA (.207): 5th | #FantasyBaseballpic.twitter.com/OY9qrdGaaq

— Eric Cross (@EricCrossMLB) December 31, 2024

Michael King, San Diego Padres (66.88)
Framber Valdez, Houston Astros (67.36)

I’m surprised that Michael King is trailing Ragans and Cease by so much. King’s 27.7% strikeout rate in 2024 was just a tick behind theirs, and King had a better groundball rate, hard-hit rate, and average exit velocity (the latter ranked in the 99th percentile, even). Depending on what bats are available earlier, I may forgo the above trio and make King my first SP selection.

Like King, Framber Valdez is a fallback SP1 for me. His career 24.1% K% lags behind his peers, but his durability (Valdez has logged the fifth-most innings over the last three seasons) gives him the volume to push up his season-long totals.

He also reached double-digit wins in every season going back to 2021, tying for most in MLB (55) in that span. Valdez gives up a lot of hard contact, but his groundball rate (99th percentile or better in three of the last four years) limits damage, resulting in low ERAs.

Freddy Peralta, Milwaukee Brewers (103.17)
Hunter Brown, Houston Astros (110.16)

There is a cluster of eight pitchers with ADPs between roughly 100 and 110, and Freddy Peralta is my favorite. His K% dipped to 27.6% in 2024 from 30.9% in 2023, but he still finished the year with 200 strikeouts for the second year in a row. Peralta has elevated ratios, but his strikeout potential makes him a great pairing in drafts where I bite on George Kirby.

Hunter Brown rounds out the cluster, lying just outside the top 100 selections. A promising start in 2023 gave way to a catastrophic second half, but he rebounded nicely in 2024.

Last year, Brown’s barrel rate, average exit velocity, and hard-hit rate ranked in the 93rd, 95th, and 97th percentile. His four-seamer generated poor contact, and a new sinker added to his repertoire stymied right-handed batters. Entering his age-26 season, I see room for further growth.

Framber Valdez is tied for the most Quality Starts (63) since the start of the 2022 season. pic.twitter.com/iAB5rSk9Cb

— Kirk Snyder (@dynastyinfo411) October 31, 2024

Justin Steele, Chicago Cubs (130.99)

Justin Steele won 16 games in 2023 and was holding down a 3.07 ERA and 1.10 WHIP before injuries ended his season prematurely in 2024. It’s funny to me that he is slipping so far down draft boards in 2025.

Last year was the third season in a row since becoming a regular starter in 2022 that he reduced his WHIP, and in that time, his ERA checks in at a cool 3.10. The strikeout numbers aren’t gaudy but he’s good for about one per inning pitched and represents a boon to ratio categories hard to find at this point in the draft.

Sean Manaea, New York Mets (186.40)

Sean Manaea is not a pitcher I’m actively targeting, but he is a name I want to keep in mind in case I’m still in need of SPs as a draft winds down. His strikeout numbers have always been modest, but after joining the Mets last year, he posted career bests in ERA and WHIP.

Perhaps it has something to do with the coaching and they can continue working with him to xyz. Manaea has a solid offense behind him that will give run support and thus improve his odds of collecting wins. Considering the price, I have no qualms about cutting him if there are signs of trouble early in the season.

Starting Pitchers I Will Pass On At ADP

Jacob deGrom, Texas Rangers (44.99)

Jacob deGrom is the ninth SP off the board, just after the aforementioned Kirby. Even though he lands in the cluster with Kirby, Cease, and Ragans, I’m not keen on picking him up this early because of his injury history. One thing to know about NFBC is that their contests include overall prizes that encompass all leagues in a given category.

These big payouts can motivate managers to take big swings so a high-risk player like deGrom can get pushed up because of his sky-high ceiling if healthy. In mainstream leagues, we will likely see a lower ADP, and if he slips down past 70, I might take a shot.

Blake Snell, Los Angeles Dodgers (51.35)

What are we doing here? By now, we know how Blake Snell’s first two or three months will shake out. When Snell is on, he is among the best in baseball, but it will take a while to get there, and when he does, the volume will be limited.

In his nine-year career, he has topped 130 IP twice, has never averaged more than six innings per start in a season, and in four of those seasons, he actually averaged fewer than five innings. Cy Young years aside, he has never had more than eight wins in a season. Skip Snell in the draft and instead start sending trade offers for him after Memorial Day rolls around.

Luis Castillo, Seattle Mariners (90.28)

Luis Castillo looks like he is on the decline. His changeup, once his most effective pitch, was thrown just 14.3% of the time in 2024 and resulted in a .280 BAA for the second year in a row.

The fastball remained fairly effective, allowing opponents a .203 BAA and .365 slugging percentage but it did lose velocity for the third year in a row. Castillo’s K% dropped a full three points to 24.3% last season, and his hard-hit rate crept up for the fourth consecutive year.

Bryan Woo, Seattle Mariners (142.07)

Regression is due for Bryan Woo in 2025, but that is not what scares me off of him. The 25-year-old has already hit the injured list twice since joining the majors for right forearm/elbow inflammation, which raises a red flag in my mind.

His second stint delayed his 2024 debut until May 10, and he had to leave that start early due to discomfort. He missed another start in June because of the issue. His ADP seems to already have the injury risk baked in, but I’ll still skip sweating out when the next IL stint comes.

Bryan Woo:
8/8 2023: 15 day IL forearm inflammation
3/25 2024: 15 day IL elbow inflammation
5/10: removed from start, says he's been dealing with forearm tightness
6/11 Scratched from start / gets MRI on right arm

That's several instances of reoccurring elbow and forearm…

— Less than Dave (@RunDMcD) December 26, 2024

Ryan Pepiot, Tampa Bay Rays (168.95)

With Tropicana Field undergoing repairs following the destruction wrought by Hurricane Milton in October, the Rays will play their home games at George Steinbrenner Field in Tampa. The park is expected to play like a bandbox, which means trouble for a flyball pitcher like Ryan Pepiot.

Last season, Pepiot’s go-to four-seamer resulted in a .188 BAA but was suppressed by an unsustainable .228 BABIP and was still barreled at a 10.1% clip. Pepiot has the stuff to take another step forward in strikeout production but I hate to think where his ERA and WHIP will end up.

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