Updated Starting Pitcher Rankings for Fantasy Baseball: The Top 101 Baller Ranks

Hello again, RotoBallers, and welcome to the latest updated edition of my top-101 starting pitcher rankings that look at rest-of-season values. June is wrapping up soon and the season's halfway point approaches! As always, I've got you covered with ranks, tiers, trends, and notes with the top-101 in a table with other fun things like earned value via Fangraphs. It's time for another edition of my weekly Starting Pitcher Baller Ranks!

This google sheet accompanies the table below and adds relevant 5x5 stats, K%, BB%, BABIP, FIP, xFIP, SIERA, ERA-FIP, and CSW% from the last 30 days. I highly encourage you to click the sheet.

As is tradition, these fantasy baseball starting pitcher rankings are geared toward traditional 5x5 leagues. Without further ado, here's my top-101 SP for the rest of 2022!

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Starting Pitcher Rankings Analysis

-Pablo Lopez has come back to Earth after an untouchable beginning to 2022. His year-long stats still read well but a 4.85 ERA/1.31 WHIP to go with a 4.91 FIP and modest 15.9% K-BB rate in the last month isn’t paying the bills. Remember that comical 52.2% swing-and-miss rate from April on changeups in the strike zone? That came down to 26% in May and is 22% so far in June. He’s still getting the same healthy chase rate on it, around 40%, but the superhuman start 

-Jack Flaherty returned to action on Tuesday night against the Brew Crew after good showings throughout his rehab assignment. I think some people still remember his peak from back in 2019 and attach that to his name, but health has been a struggle (only ~120 IP since then) and I’m not holding my breath for another 7% walk rate (career 8.5%). His success rides on locating the fastball high in the zone and setting up hitters to bite at it, so let’s see how that goes.

Post-start addendum: It didn’t go well! He only threw 35 strikes on 71 pitches and racked up five walks against one strikeout over three innings. He had horrible command and will need to prove he can hit his spots before I deploy him in a league.

-Logan Webb is back, baby. He’d lost the sinker sharpness for a stretch and saw his WHIP balloon and strikeouts dip as a result, but the past month has seen him post a 2.89 ERA/1.02 WHIP with 31 strikeouts in 37 ⅓ IP. When you get elite ratios with over a strikeout per inning, then you get rewarded.

-Lucas Giolito is getting flamed of late, with hitters teeing off on the four-seamer (.464 BA, .341 xBA, .714 SLG, .544 xSLG) as the whiff rate on his secondaries has slid down towards 25% from ~40% earlier in the year. The velocity is fine, the spin rate is down a touch in 2022 but not awful, and yet his command has disappeared. 

When the fastball stays high then he gets whiffs but the base hits come in waves when he fires it down the middle, which can’t be shocking to anyone. Giolito’s 12.3% Barrel–per-Batted-Ball rate (Brl/BBE) is the 11th-highest out of 161 pitchers with at least 100 batted-ball events on the season. Jose Berrios has the eighth-highest rate. Alex Cobb has the fourth-lowest at 2.5%!

-Michael Kopech had a rough go against the Astros in Houston on Sunday, which is a tough assignment on anyone, let alone a guy coming off a knee injury. Kopech planted awkwardly back on June 12 against Texas and left that start in the first inning, but escaped long-term damage and was able to make that next start at Houston. Perhaps we should’ve just taken an IL stint after he gave up four runs on seven hits and a walk over four innings against the ‘Stros.

While Kopech has had a great 2022 so far, he’s been quite the lucky fellow on top of the skill, with a 3.48 FIP and 4.49 xFIP behind the 2.38 ERA. His .194 BABIP over 56 ⅔ IP is a tough sell moving forward, as is rocking a 5.3% HR/FB rate when he’s only got a 29.4% groundball rate. That’s a lot of balls in the air, which helps keep BABIP low but it’s tough to avoid homers for long. He’ll also have workload questions to answer down the stretch after posting 69 ⅓ IP last year, largely out of the ‘pen, so I’m tempering expectations for the second half.

-Mike Clevinger and Andrew Heaney are back on the map but carry considerable re-injury risk at this point. I’m more bullish on Heaney staying healthy but pitching shoulder discomfort is a terrifying phrase. Still, the southpaw struck out seven while only walking one over five frames against Cleveland and looked as strong as ever. He gets a tough test at Atlanta next.

On the other hand, Clevinger returned out of the bullpen first, pitching two innings in relief at Coors before a slated start on Wednesday versus Arizona. Going from away at Coors (where he gave up two runs in two innings) to home against Arizona is quite the matchup swing but I doubt he works deeper than five innings. He missed 2021 due to Tommy John surgery and then opened 2022 on the IL with a knee injury, which caused him to miss April. He then hit the IL again with a triceps strain and just returned from the COVID-19 IL as well. He missed time in 2020 with a torn left meniscus and ‘19 saw him out with a back injury. Just keep some depth in place around him, yeah?

-Robbie Ray continues to return to form with a sinker anchoring his arsenal, which we noted last week. You love to see it.

-MacKenzie Gore has surrendered 14 runs over his last two starts, both of which were against Colorado, with a paltry four strikeouts next to seven walks in those 6 ⅓ IP. The worst showing came at Coors so we can largely write that off, but he’ll have to rebound at home against a potent Phillies order on Thursday to remain in our circle of trust.

-Eric Lauer slides further down with a second consecutive start allowing three home runs. There is some understanding in getting shelled at Great American Ballpark, though it continues an emerging pattern of decreased velocity and command of late. Lauer’s hot start saw him throwing the fastball under 40% of the time, but that has quietly risen towards the 45% mark over the last month per Baseball Savant. That four-seam velocity was averaging about 94 MPH early on but around mid-May began to slip, and June 17’s outing saw that figure at 92.4 MPH. Until he shows concrete improvement, he is nowhere near any must-start territory.

-Blake Snell remains a snazzy name but is 0-4 with a 5.16 BB/9 that bloats the bases and his striking out 34 in 29 ⅔ IP isn’t that special in 2022. He’s been fortunate to not surrender a home run in any of his last four games but has also eaten a BABIP north of .350 in three straight outings. The former AL Cy Young winner is not a drop, at least not while he holds a FIP of 3.43 behind the 5.46 ERA. He’s only had six starts after all, and his latest was a Coors special with reduced judgment.

Top-101 Starting Pitchers for Fantasy Baseball

These are rest-of-season fantasy baseball rankings for starting pitchers.

More 2020 Fantasy Baseball Advice