The state of the starting pitcher position heading into 2027: Misiorowski takes the throne as former aces fall

2026 was a weird year for starting pitchers. Every year is a weird year for starting pitchers, of course – it's the most volatile position in Fantasy sports, and the only thing you can be sure of is that the position won't look anything like what you expect it to by the end of the season.But even by that standard, 2026 was a weird year for starting pitchers. There were three taken in the first round of most drafts, and all three were at least somewhat disappointing; the best of the bunch was, somehow, the one who had mid-season elbow surgery! Among the top 24 starters drafted, only eight actually managed to be top-24 starters by the end of the season. Let's put some numbers on it. From 2021 through 2025, the top 24 starters in ADP combined for at least $259.1 in value, per the FanGraphs Player Rater; in 2026, that was just $227 combined. What's especially weird, however, is that it's not like it was a hugely disappointing season for pitching across the board. SP25 through SP36 combined to return $155.6 in value, not quite the best of the group of five seasons prior to 2026, but not far from it – the best being 2024, when that crop of starters were worth $172.1.What makes 2026 really stand out is the way those mid-round pitchers nearly managed to eclipse the early rounders. Here's how that looked for every season from 2021 through 2026: 2021Top 12 SP: $208.80 SP13-24: $107.80 SPSP25-36: $71.102022Top 12 SP: $230.08 SP13-24: $121.81 SP25-36: $164.892023Top 12 SP: $172.80 SP13-24: $86.33 SP25-36: $127.422024Top 12 SP: $191.76 SP13-24: $111.73 SP25-36: $172.092025Top 12 SP: $183.25 SP13-24: $84.87 SP25-36: $119.092026Top 12 SP: $158.94SP13-24: $67.83SP25-36: $155.60The first thing you might notice here is that SP25-36 have outperformed SP13-24 every single season since 2021, typically by a pretty huge margin. That gets into the idea of the "SP Dead Zone" I've written about in the past, a trend that still managed to hold true, even during an especially weird season. I'll be writing even more about this topic moving forward this offseason, naturally. But what's most interesting is that the third group almost out-earned the first one. You probably already know how that happened: That's the group that featured Jacob Misiorowski, Cam Schlittler, and Chase Burns, along with Sonny Gray and Zack Wheeler. There were some busts in that range, too – Spencer Strider, Emmett Sheehan, and Nick Lodolo stand out, while none of Tyler Glasnow, Brandon Woodruff or Blake Snell pitched enough to really be worth the pick there.The lesson here isn't "Just wait until the 25th through 36th pitchers are about to be drafted and then jump in," of course. In part because plenty of those guys busted, too and in part because the specific circumstances of last year's pool won't apply this year. 2026's group of starting pitchers included an unusual number of very, very talented, very, very unproven pitchers in that range: Misiorowski, Burns, and Schlittler but also Nolan McLean and Eury Perez before them and Trey Yesavage and Bubba Chandler, who went off the board a bit later. We don't have that same kind of up-and-coming talent this season. Kade Anderson didn't exactly set the world on fire in his cup of coffee, while Didier Fuentes' and Grant Taylor's uncertain roles are enough to keep his price reasonable for now. There will be some hype around those two, along with the likes of Andrew Painter, Jackson Jobe, Noah Schultz and Hagen Smith, though they'll all likely be more in the 200-ish range of drafts.The best options might be Jared Jones and Walbert Ureña, both of whom fulfill the "young" and "interesting" columns, but who have larger track records than last year's crop, most of whom retained rookie eligibility heading into 2026. That doesn't mean Jones and Ureña don't have upside similar to that of those pitchers but it's clear that this year's group isn't analogous to last year's. Every year is different, of course, and that's especially true for starting pitchers. The only thing for sure is that next year's pool will look very different from this year's. 2026 Starting Pitcher ReviewJacob Misiorowski, MIL: 174.1 - 16 - 1.80 - 0.80 - 252Cam Schlittler, NYY: 193.1 - 14 - 1.95 - 0.92 - 239Yoshinobu Yamamoto, LAD: 185 - 14 - 2.53 - 0.87 - 182Chris Sale, ATL: 162.1 - 14 - 2.16 - 0.98 - 200Drew Rasmussen, TBR: 172 - 16 - 2.67 - 0.91 - 174Dylan Cease, TOR: 169 - 11 - 2.40 - 1.10 - 239Jesús Luzardo, PHI: 179.1 - 14 - 2.86 - 1.07 - 221Tarik Skubal, LAD: 158.1 - 12 - 2.72 - 0.96 - 186Parker Messick, CLE: 186 - 12 - 2.56 - 1.06 - 193Cristopher Sánchez, PHI: 207 - 18 - 2.91 - 1.20 - 231Zack Wheeler, PHI: 162 - 14 - 3.00 - 1.05 - 193Sonny Gray, BOS: 169 - 18 - 2.72 - 1.15 - 149Chase Burns, CIN: 154 - 15 - 2.86 - 1.17 - 185Logan Henderson, MIL: 98 - 11 - 2.47 - 0.84 - 110Jacob Latz, TEX: 72 - 3 - 2.13 - 0.81 - 83Gavin Williams, CLE: 184 - 14 - 3.76 - 1.11 - 248Cade Cavalli, WSN: 169.1 - 13 - 3.02 - 1.16 - 200Nick Martinez, TBR: 180 - 15 - 3.10 - 1.09 - 109Reid Detmers, LAA: 185 - 7 - 3.36 - 1.04 - 211Braxton Ashcraft, PIT: 165 - 14 - 3.65 - 1.09 - 173Nolan McLean, NYM: 179.1 - 12 - 3.16 - 1.17 - 194Logan Gilbert, SEA: 186 - 12 - 3.73 - 1.09 - 205Shohei Ohtani, LAD: 85.1 - 8 - 1.79 - 0.95 - 95Eduardo Rodriguez, ARI: 189.1 - 16 - 2.89 - 1.24 - 143Every season sees some shocking names breaking into the upper echelons of the rankings, but none stand out more than Martinez or Rodriguez. Neither has the strikeout skills we typically associate with high-end pitchers. While Martinez does at least have elite command to fall back on, neither seems especially likely to repeat their success in 2027. Someone will draft them both in most leagues based on the surface-level numbers, but I would leave them for the reserve rounds at best. show some growth in their plate discipline. Biggest Breakout from 2026Jacob Misiorowski, BrewersYou know Misiorowski had a great season. But you may not be aware of just how great it was. His 0.80 WHIP was the second-best in MLB history (if we aren't counting the 2020 season, and we aren't); his 37.9% strikeout rate was also the second-best in MLB history, with the same qualifications. If his ERA wasn't quite that historic, well, a 1.80 ERA is still pretty darn good, especially for a guy who had a 4.36 mark as a rookie. His control went from a liability to a strength, and the quality of his stuff somehow got even better from his impressive rookie season. Misiorowski is the current best pitcher in baseball. While that's not a title you can typically count on anyone to hold for too long – Tarik Skubal held the belt for about two years before Misiorowski caught up to him – it's nearly impossible to make a case for any pitcher being taken ahead of Misiorowski in 2027. Honorable Mention: Cam Schlittler, YankeesSchlittler was drafted around the same range of drafts as Misiorowski and nearly had as good a Fantasy season, so he's the natural choice here as a 1b. Schlittler isn't quite as good as Misiorowski, to be clear, but that's not a knock on Schlittler, who rode his three-fastball mix to what will almost certainly be the AL Cy Young award. He doesn't quite have the strikeout upside Misiorowski does, but he racked up 239 of them thanks to both a bigger workload and his own leap in strikeout rate. His ERA estimators are closer to 3.00 than 2.00 across the board, but even if he adds a full run to his ERA for 2027, he could still be an ace. That he's on a competitive team that trusts its pitchers to pitch deep into games routinely only helps his value. I'll probably take Schlittler behind Misiorowski and Tarik Skubal, but not far behind. Biggest Bust from 2026Garrett Crochet, Red SoxCrochet actually highlights, I think, where the Fantasy Baseball community fails in its analysis of injury risk. Because he made it through exactly one full season as a normal starting pitcher, he was treated as if the injury risk that defined his career were gone. And hey, I'm not absolving myself here: I had him ranked as a first-rounder last season and even made that pick in at least one league! After all, he made it through 64 straight starts without issue, if you include the weird second half of 2024, where the White Sox carefully managed his workload. The truth is, I think that ranking was right, even knowing how his season came apart after just six starts. Sure, Crochet might have elevated baseline injury risk relative to other starts, but every starting pitcher has a relatively high baseline level of injury risk. And not every starter is as good as Crochet is when he's right. There are maybe five of those in the entire world right now. Crochet is going to be one of the toughest pitchers to rank in 2027, coming off this lost season, but it's going to be tough to totally bury him, given how significant the upside is. Honorable Mention: Paul Skenes, PiratesUnlike with Crochet, there really wasn't any way to see Skenes' disappointing season coming. The overall numbers aren't as bad as you might think – 3.82 ERA, 1.12 WHIP, 200 strikeouts will play! But Skenes was pretty bad over the final four and a half months of the season, posting a 4.56 ERA and his strikeout rate fell to just 22% in August and September. It was a precipitous fall for the best young pitcher we've seen since Dwight Gooden, and I'm going to need a better answer than "I dunno, I guess the two starts I made in the World Baseball Classic just made me really tired" (I'm paraphrasing) to buy back in. There's no question he brings significant upside with him, but I actually find it harder to give Skenes the benefit of the doubt for his regression not coming with an injury. I'll probably still rank him as a top-20 starting pitcher, but I don't know if I'll ever feel like being the person to make the pick. Biggest rankings movers from 2026 to 2027Up: Jacob Misiorowski, Brewers; Cam Schlittler, Yankees; Drew Rasmussen, Rays; Jesus Luzardo, Phillies; Zack Wheeler, Phillies The Rays took the restrictions off Rasmussen, and he not only held up to a career-high workload but he cemented himself as one of the very best pitchers in baseball. On the one hand, we are talking about a 31-year-old coming off a career season, which is usually a pretty good reason to be skeptical; on the other hand, Rasmussen hasn't put up an ERA higher than 2.84 in any role in the majors since 2020. He's definitely a very good pitcher. The injury risk hasn't gone away entirely, and a step back in 2027 wouldn't be a surprise. But the skill set seems so strong – every ERA estimator is in the low-3.00s at worst – that the only real risk feels like injury risk, and with three straight seasons without issue, I'm just not inclined to ding him for that too much. Luzardo is a big win for the advanced metrics. His inflated ERA over the previous couple of seasons scared some folks off, but his 3.33 xERA and 2.90 FIP in 2025 hinted at the kind of upside he lived up to in 2026. The key here was avoiding the blow-up starts that felt inevitable beforehand. I'm not sure the downside risk has gone away completely – Luzardo's fastball has a razor-thin margin for error given the very low extension on his release, and the injury track record here is quite scary, including a shoulder issue in September – but with how good Luzardo was in 2026, he's going to be drafted as an ace. Wheeler will too. There have been multiple periods in the past year where that seemed impossible, but he overcame Thoracic Outlet surgery last offseason and pitched like an ace despite it. There was a hiccup around the middle of the season when we wondered if Wheeler still had it. Then he closed the season out with a 1.67 ERA and 45 strikeouts in 37.2 innings over his final six starts, putting those concerns to bed. You're going to have to spend an early-round pick on a soon-to-be 37-year-old who had a serious injury less than two years ago, which isn't ideal. But Wheeler just keeps proving the doubters wrong. Down: Paul Skenes, Pirates; Garrett Crochet, Red Sox; Blake Snell, Dodgers; Kyle Bradish, Orioles; George Kirby, MarinersThe Snell one is kind of just wishful thinking here: He's been arguably the most over-drafted player in Fantasy baseball over the past decade. When he's at his best, he's unbelievable, and his 2023 season stands as the 17th-best over the past six seasons for a starter, per the Razzball Player Rater. But here's the thing: His second-best season in that span ranks 268th. The final numbers usually end up very good – 1.90 ERA, 1.10 WHIP in 2026! – but it is often a rocky ride along the way, and he has thrown more than 130 innings just twice in an 11-year MLB career. I'm open to the idea that we should just be drafting for skills and letting the playing time fall where it may with pitchers, but unless Snell finally falls outside of the top-30 SPs in ADP, I still won't be able to make that bet at this point. Clearly, we overrated Bradish, at least in part based on a couple of 30-ish-inning samples sandwiched around his 2024 Tommy John surgery when he put up outlier strikeout numbers. But the thing that makes his 2026 season especially disappointing is that, even if he wasn't actually as good as he looked in those small samples, he was still a very good pitcher in 2023 before the strikeout jump. He wasn't good at basically anything in 2026, earning every bit of his 4.12 ERA before a hernia ended his season prematurely. I thought at the very least he was a high-floor pitcher who could tap into the upside he flashed in 2024 and 2025, so the disappointment of his 2026 was especially tough to swallow. I don't think the upside has disappeared entirely, but he'll need to come at a significant discount to buy back in. The Mariners are a very, very good pitching development organization, but it's hard to overlook a few high-profile examples of regression over the past couple of years. Kirby is right at the top of that list, as he was somehow even worse in 2026 than he was in his injury-plagued 2025. The skill set took a step back, basically across the board, and at this point, he feels like a prime change-of-scenery candidate. The problem there is, well, any change of scenery is going to come with a move away from the best pitching environment in baseball. Maybe some other team can get Kirby back to pitching like a borderline ace, but doing that away from T-Mobile Park is going to heighten the risks of buying in. Offseason preview Who needs an upgrade most? AstrosRedsAthleticsWhite SoxGiantsRoyalsMetsTwinsPadresDiamondbacksCubsOriolesBut also: Every single team could use some more pitching. Okay, maybe the Mariners and Yankees are okay, but everyone else. That's the nature of the position. If you have six healthy starters in March, it means you will likely have four healthy starters by June if you're lucky. There will never be enough pitching for every team to feel good about their options. Impending free agents Top impending free agents Tarik SkubalMichael KingSonny GrayShota ImanagaZac GallenKevin GausmanChris BassittJameson TaillonMatthew BoydNick MartinezClay HolmesTyler MahleMichael SorokaTrevor RogersThis actually isn't a bad crop of free agent starting pitchers. Sure, some of these guys are a few presidential administrations past their best days, but there are plenty of viable rotation fillers out there. Skubal is the clearest difference maker and should be in line for a record-breaking contract if the new CBA doesn't get in his way. Still, King, Gray, and Imanaga would all be upgrades for most rotations in baseball. There are plenty of useful No. 4 SP types here, even if there aren't many exciting Fantasy options around. One name to keep in mind: Soroka. He only managed 116 innings, though the fact that it was his highest total since 2019 kind of tells you the story about him. He's no longer the groundball, pitch-to-contact guy he was early in his career, but he has reinvented himself as a viable swing-and-miss guy by leaning on his very good breaking ball for whiffs, and he introduced a cutter last season that seemed to help him steal some cheap outs. The injury risk here remains significant, but if Soroka lands in the right spot, he could be a pretty interesting sleeper coming off a 3.41 ERA with decent peripherals. Trade candidates George Kirby, MarinersLogan Gilbert, MarinersSandy Alcantara, MarlinsDrew Rasmussen, RaysJacob deGrom, RangersJoe Ryan, TwinsReid Detmers, AngelsSpencer Strider, BravesYou might think it's unlikely the Rays would trade their ace coming off a World Series appearance, but that's exactly what they did after their previous World Series run, moving Blake Snell just a few months after the season ended. And Snell still had three years left under contract at the time, while Rasmussen only has a team option for 2027 before he hits the market. I have a hard time believing the Rays would actually do this again, but the precedent is there for a team that almost never lets any of their good players actually reach free agency before trading them. It would be exactly the kind of risk the Rays are willing to take (and that any other team would get destroyed for).Top rookies to know for 2027Kade Anderson, MarinersLiam Doyle, CardinalsRyan Sloan, MarinersSeth Hernandez, PiratesGage Wood, PhilliesTyler Bremner, AngelsAnthony Eyanson, OriolesRiver Ryan, TigersTravis Sykora, NationalsJamie Arnold, AthleticsThomas White, MarlinsBrody Hopkins, RaysAnderson, Ryan, and Hopkins have made their debuts, and I think it's all but certain the first two will be in their team's rotations next season. Hopkins is less of a sure thing. The stuff is outrageous – if you haven't seen .gifs of him pitching, you will soon – and he'll surely garner comps to Jacob Misiorowski before long, if he isn't already. That's an inherently unfair comparison to put on any pitcher, but especially one who walked 98 batters in 99.1 innings between Triple-A and a brief cup of coffee out of the Rays' bullpen late in the season. His control hasn't always been quite that bad. Still, it's never been a strength, and there really isn't any comp for a pitcher who walks 20% of opposing batters in the high minors and eventually becomes a viable starting pitcher in the majors. It's not impossible, given the talent here, but he's not someone I would be willing to bet on inside the top 200 if it comes to that.