We rolled out our final update on 2017 rankings this past weekend. While there haven’t been seismic shifts, some players have naturally seen their stocks rise or fall since our initial valuations were made in December. We’re gathered here today to look at part one of our outfield rankings, tiers, and auction values, which have certainly seen some movement. Part one of this SP look will check in with three risers and three fallers within the top five tiers.

As before, this round of rankings features picks from myself -- Nick Mariano, as well as Kyle Bishop, Bill Dubiel, Brad Johnson, Harris Yudin and Jeff Kahntroff.

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2017 Fantasy Baseball Rankings: Starting Pitcher

Starting Pitcher (Part One) Rankings Analysis: March Risers and Fallers

Rankings Risers

Kenta Maeda, Dodgers

Maeda impressed us all by striking out 179 in his first Major League season, surpassing a strikeout per inning in his 175 2/3 frames last season alongside the plus ratios. His 3.58 FIP, 3.70 xFIP and 3.69 SIERA give credence to that 3.48 ERA and his status as an above-average arm. This is a guy who does well to deliver the ball where he wants to with very infrequent mistakes, with it also helping to have Yasmani Grandal receiving his pitches, but that does lead to some floor issues should he ever lose that edge (think Sonny Gray). We’ve bumped him up a couple spots in our rankings, which elevated him from Tier Five into Tier Four.

Lance McCullers, Astros

McCullers’ rise may be entirely on me, as I bumped him up 30 slots since last time -- from No. 135 to No. 105. Let me put it to you this way, the longer he doesn’t get hurt, the more I love him. This isn’t breaking news, of course, as we know durability is the major concern here, but boy howdy that stuff is electric. Houston’s young arm is slated to start their second game of the season and has posted a lovely 18-to-2 K:BB ratio in 12 spring innings thus far. While he has allowed too many hits (15) alongside that, what I mostly look for is control and velocity in ST. This is an arm that could rack up 200 strikeouts, so he deserves to sniff the top 100.

Julio Urias, Dodgers

Here’s another guy who jumped tiers, as he goes from Tier Six to Tier Five on the heels of a bump from No. 38 to No. 34 in the SP ranks. It appears that most of us kept him rather static in our rankings aside from Bill, who shot him up roughly 60 slots. While Urias’ stock will likely see a short-term drop due to his starting the season in extended spring training, that LA rotation has a ton of arms that are tattooed with the big red FRAGILE stamp. It won’t be long before we see the 20-year-old in the MLB again, and his 140 innings should be mighty productive.

Dallas Keuchel, Astros

He goes from No. 45 to No. 39, as it seems Bill and Jeff really warmed up to him after pessimistic rankings around the 180-190 range in February. While Brad and I still have Keuchel up there, it appears that we as a collective staff have come around on the notion that he could regain much of his effectiveness in inducing whiffs and weak contact. If he can deliver a low-to-mid threes ERA, then this strong Houston lineup could allow for him to challenge the 20-win mark again – but that’s his ceiling, of course.

Rankings Fallers

Stephen Strasburg, Nationals

Strasburg is already flashing those warning signs as to why we’ve feared for his health over the years, as he’s admitted to cutting back on his slider usage because it led to injury last season. While that revelation does lead to the possibility of improved durability in 2017, it also raises questions about his effectiveness if he feels as though he can’t utilize his full arsenal – or at least the one we’re accustomed to see him roll out. Going from SP9 to SP11 isn’t huge, but dropping out of the top 10 is notable.

Aaron Sanchez, Blue Jays

Sanchez dropped from the end of Tier Three (SP18) to the middle of Tier Four (SP23) here, which may be one part worrying about his ability to replicate last season’s strong metrics (.267 BABIP, 54.4% groundball rate) and another part worrying about his awful spring thus far (10 ER, 9-to-8 K:BB ratio in 10 2/3 innings). Perhaps that’s not what my cohorts were thinking, but that’s what I was thinking. He still has plenty of potential here, but I scaled him back over a full round in my March update.

Tanner Roark, Nationals

Roark is one of those guys that can be easy to bump down in lieu of another exciting arm due to his uninspiring strikeout stuff, and here he has slipped from our SP40 to SP44. It isn’t a huge drop, but it’s still rather noticeable when putting the February and March tables up against one another. At least Roark has looked good this spring, allowing only one run on seven hits and zero walks against 12 strikeouts in 12 1/3 innings of work. For what it’s worth, I’m the high man on him at No. 139 overall.

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