2026 Fantasy Baseball Starting Pitcher Preview: Sleepers, breakouts, busts, ranking the top 24 and more
A complete position breakdown on what you need to know before you draft
What is it that makes picking pitchers for Fantasy so tricky? In part, it's the injuries – upwards of 40% of pitchers go on the IL in any given season, and MLB data shows that, while the rate might be slowing down, it isn't reversing. Throwing a baseball 100 times at max effort once or twice a week just isn't something our elbows and shoulders are built to handle without bending and eventually breaking.
But it's not just the injuries. It's also that identifying pitcher talent is harder than with hitters. Pitchers only have so much control over how many outs they record; the highest qualifying strikeout rate in MLB history was Gerrit Cole's 39.9% mark in 2019, and he still needed the defense behind him to account for 49% of the outs he recorded. For a typical starter, that number is likely to be closer to 65-70% of their outs. An especially good defense, like the Cubs', can make their pitchers look a lot better than they actually are; a poor defense like the Nationals can be tough to overcome even for the best pitchers.
And then there's this: Pitcher talent is almost never static. Velocity fluctuates from one start to the next, and pitchers are constantly tweaking grips and arm angles and everything else to try to find the best way to attack hitters. Sometimes, guys will add a pitch and immediately level up, like when Logan Gilbert added the splitter in 2023 that has since become one of the best putaway pitches in baseball. Other times, pitchers will lose their feel for their best pitch and become less effective; it feels like Framber Valdez goes through this for a month or two every season with his curveball.
The best pitchers are the ones who have shown they can weather the various storms that come with the position for multiple seasons, and those guys tend to be the highest pitchers drafted every year. This season, that includes Garret Crochet, Paul Skenes, and Tarik Skubal, who have spent the past two seasons terrorizing hitters and have pushed their way into the first round in most drafts. Deservedly so.
After that, things get a lot messier. Research I did last spring shows that starting pitcher values tend to drop off at a linear rate for the first three rounds of drafts, and then it's just chaos; on average pitchers drafted in the fourth round from 2015 through 2024 return $20 or more in value just around 12% of the time; in the 10th round, it's about 10% of the time. Pitchers drafted in the 40 range of drafts generally offer better returns than those in the 10th round, but not nearly enough to justify the price difference.
This is what I've taken to calling "The SP Dead Zone." That's not to say you shouldn't take pitchers in the fourth, fifth, and sixth rounds, but that's the range of the draft where I need to feel like I'm getting a pretty obvious value to pull the trigger. Because history shows I'm not likely to get a better pitcher there than the ones I'll take around the 100th pick or later.
Why does that happen? I have some theories, and you can see them at play in this year's player pool. At the very top, we have those multi-year aces with (relatively) few recent injury question marks. And once Skenes, Crochet, and Skubal are off the board, you're immediately met with the likes of Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Cristopher Sanchez, and Bryan Woo, according to ADP – all good pitchers, but none of whom have multiple years of true ace production to their name. After them, you get Logan Gilbert (missed time with an elbow injury in 2025), Chris Sale (lengthy injury history), and Cole Ragans (missed significant time in 2025 with a shoulder injury).
Which is to say: None of those guys are perfect pitchers. That's not to say they don't deserve to be ranked where they are, but it is to say that there are big questions about all of them. They're all super talented and might be aces, but we don't have that multi-year track record of performance and health to bet on. And this year, we have an especially wide second tier, with the gap between SP4 and SP15 looking a lot smaller than ever before.
And that's also true for the tiers after them. I can probably get close to 50 names deep into the SP pool before I run out of pitchers I really like. Attrition will wreck a lot of that depth, but that's also a good reason to make sure you aren't paying a premium over and over. This year, more than ever, I'm content to just take the values at starting pitcher; the tiers are wide and comparable, so I just don't see much justification in consistently jumping ahead of ADP to get "My Guys" these days.
There's plenty of talent available as long as you don't totally neglect the position, so don't sweat it. You're gonna deal with injuries, and you're going to get some stuff wrong; so will your leaguemates. Why pay extra for the privilege?
- Position Previews: C | 1B | 2B | 3B | SS | OF | SP
- Position Tiers (v. 2.0): C | 1B | 2B | 3B | SS | OF | SP | RP
- Position Strategies: C | 1B | 2B | 3B | SS | OF | SP | RP
You can't go wrong with any of the top three SPs, but Skubal's multi-year track record of excellence gives him the edge for me. It's consecutive 190-inning seasons with an ERA below 2.50 and a WHIP below 0.93; let's not overthink this too much. This is as good as it gets.
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Crochet managed 205.1 innings in 2025, a frankly stunning number for a guy with his history of injuries and workload limitations. Does it mean he'll do it again? Of course not, there are always ways for things to go wrong. But once you've shown you can get to 200 innings, that ceiling is in play, and the skill set here is nearly as good as Skubal's. Like I said, you can't go wrong.
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You can quibble about the win potential or the slightly smaller workload or lighter strikeout numbers, but that's all kind of silly when we're talking about a guy who opened his career with consecutive sub-2.00 ERA seasons. The margins between these top three SPs are tiny, and someone has to be third, but don't take that as a knock against Skenes. He should be a first-rounder in every draft, too!
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This is also a case where someone has to be the No. 4 SP, and Yamamoto has become the default choice. His absolute upside is never going to be as high as some of the guys behind him because he's going to be in a full-time six-man rotation, but he also seemingly carries a very high floor thanks to a stable mix of skills. He's not my No. 4 SP, and I don't think it makes sense to push his price much higher than the rest of this next tier of starters, but I don't think you're likely to be disappointed in Yamamoto, either.
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Last year's flexor strain and slightly elevated ERA are red flags in the profile, but if Gilbert stays healthy, I think he's going to be a monster. The emergence and refinement of his splitter has taken his strikeout skills to the next level, and he has the upside to lead the league if he pitches 190 innings again, something he did in both 2023 and 2024. And his home park should help keep the ERA low at least half the time. Gilbert is my personal choice for SP4.
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The injury history is extensive, but it isn't as concerning as you might think – since his return from Tommy John surgery in 2023, Sale has gon on the IL just once with an arm injury. The skills have been remarkably consistent over the past two seasons, and his per-inning upside isn't far from the Big 3. He'll just do it for 20 fewer innings or so.
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Sanchez dialed up his velocity without sacrificing control, shrugged off a forearm injury scare in April, and emerged as a legitimate ace. The per-inning strikeout rates are a step behind some of the other high-end pitchers, and he only really has the one season of pitching like an ace to go on. But his combination of a dominant sinker and changeup gives him a very high floor, and the ceiling can get pretty impressive too, as he showed in 2025. I'm worried about some regression, but not enough to actually fade him; he just isn't one of my targets.
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I don't question the skills. He's the next in that Zack Wheeler/Brandon Woodruff lineage of guys with an unusual ability to throw both an elite four-seamer and sinker, which gives him an absurdly strong base on which to build the rest of his arsenal out from. The question is whether his mostly healthy 2025 season (he did deal with a lat injury late) puts all or most of the injury questions behind him. I want to believe that's the case here, but I'm not so convinced that I'm willing to pay his newly elevated price every time out.
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This is definitely the "Let's see you do it again" tier of SPs, and I am varying degrees of out on all of them. Brown does the "two good fastballs and a wide arsenal behind them" trick, but I'm not sure I buy the big jump in strikeout rate we saw from him in 2025 – his swinging strike rate didn't back it up, and we saw real regression in the second half. He's a very good pitcher, but I'm not sure I feel as comfortable with Brown as a true difference maker as some of the guys going behind him.
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Fried stayed healthy, and the Yankees rewarded him with the trust to pitch deep into games and the 19 wins that went along with it. You can't expect Fried to repeat those 19 wins, but his skill set remains remarkably stable. The history of so-far minor arm issues is a red flag here, but Fried feels very easy to project as long as he stays on the mound. But the ceiling is lower than with some other pitchers in this range.
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deGrom is going to be the poster boy for "velocity isn't everything" for a long time. He took 1.6 mph off his peak fastball velocity and managed to stay healthy for the first time since 2020. He wasn't quite as dominant as his best, but a sub-3.00 ERA and elite WHIP made up for what he lacked in strikeouts. deGrom still had the third-highest swinging strike rate in baseball, so there is probably a bit more strikeout upside he can unlock here. There is still some elevated injury risk, given the history, but it's more in the normal range than it has been for a long time for deGrom, and the strikeout upside makes him a fine target this year.
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If you guaranteed every starting pitcher the same number of innings, I think Ragans might be every bit as good as those three guys at the top. Yes, he had an elevated ERA in 2025, but it came with a 2.67 xERA and 2.50 FIP with the best strikeout rate among starters. But Ragans has only ever reached even 140 innings once as a professional, and he missed most of last season with a shoulder injury, so the risks are obvious. If I'm waiting for my first starting pitcher, he's my favorite target, because at that point, it's all about upside, and few pitchers can match his.
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He's the boring guy you settle for. Nobody is ever excited to draft Webb, despite what is usually a pretty good ERA, tons of innings, plus an elevated strikeout rate in 2025. The biggest problem is the 1.24 WHIP, which is a pretty big anchor in a Roto league, given the innings Webb usually contributes. But he's a legitimate ace in a points league, and he's a rock-solid option in Roto, albeit one whose limitations you do have to account for.
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Kriby has pitched in just one game as of March 5, so we can't exactly say whether he's back to his pre-2025 form. We did see an elevated strikeout rate from Kirby after his return from a shoulder injury, but we also saw the worst walk rate and quality of contact of his career, leading to a 4.21 ERA that is only slightly worse than his 3.88 expected mark. He lowered his arm slot after the shoulder injury and lost his splitter, and while that was never a particularly important pitch for Kirby, it was a sign that things weren't quite right for him. I'm buying the bounce back, but I'd feel a bit better about that optimism if I saw signs of the old Kirby this spring.
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It's easy enough to look past the elevated ERA when Luzardo was so good for most of the season and had the peripherals to match. And I'm mostly on board with that – Luzardo was better than his peripherals in 2025! But I'm having trouble actually clicking the draft button when his name comes up as high as it does, just because the injury history here is significant, with basically just three healthy seasons to his name since he was drafted 10 years ago. If he stays on the mound … well, Luzardo still might not be great, given how much his actual production has fluctuated over the years, too. The likeliest outcome is Luzardo pitches more or less like he did in 2025 with better results, but the risk is significantly higher than with a lot of other pitchers in this range.
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Bradish is everyone's favorite breakout candidate for 2026, and why not? The breakout already happened in 2024 when his strikeout rate spiked, and it sustained after his return from Tommy John surgery last season. It's not a huge sample size, just around 70 innings, but a 2.65 ERA, 12.6 K/9, and 2.86 xERA make it really easy to bet on. Bradish has some workload-related risk, but I think you'll get an ace for 160 or so innings this season.
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Peralta is who he is: A very good bat miss with enough command issues that it's hard to get away from the inherent inconsistency in his skill set. He largely avoided that in 2025, which is how his ERA dropped by nearly a run, though the underlying skill set didn't change enough to make it worth buying into. He's a No. 2 SP who would probably feel a bit better as a No. 3, but he's backed up by a good defense and should be in a good spot for another strong season. Just not one as good as 2025.
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Ryan is currently dealing with a back issue this spring, which is concerning for a guy whose biggest drawback has been his ability to rack up big innings. When he's on the mound, you generally get a mid-3.00s ERA, an excellent WHIP, and a bunch of strikeouts from him. But there's been some in-season inconsistency issues to go along with the injuries, which make him more palatable as a No. 3. That feels true for a lot of pitchers at this point in the rankings, to be honest.
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Everything I said about Logan Webb can pretty much be copied and pasted for Valdez. They go about that in very different ways, and there does tend to be more inconsistency for Valdez over the course of the season as a result. But the end result is usually a lot of innings and good (but usually not great) rate stats. The move to Detroit gives Valdez an excellent home park to pitch in, but it doesn't really change my expectations. He's an excellent rotation stabilizer after the true aces are gone.
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It's been a real roller coaster ride for Cease, but here's why I'm more confident in him than most: For the first time, his struggles didn't seem to be entirely his fault. When he put up a 4.58 ERA in 2023, it was because his strikeout rate and walk rates moved in the wrong direction at the same time, as his quality of contact allowed. He earned that poor ERA, as seen by his 4.14 xERA. But his xERA in 2025 was more than a full run lower than his actual 4.55 mark at 3.45. That's not a guarantee Cease will be excellent, but the Blue Jays did give him a $210 million vote of confidence this offseason, which should count for something. There's real downside with Cease, but if the ERA is more in the mid-3.00s range, you're going to be very happy you took the risk.
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When he's on the mount, Ohtani is going to be very good. He had a 2.87 ERA and 2.53 xERA in 2025! He's awesome! He also isn't pitching in games this spring as the Dodgers try to manage his innings, which will likely lead to some shorter outings early in the season. I'm not expecting much more than the 132 innings he threw back in 2023, though the ceiling might be closer to 140 or 150 in a best-case scenario. They should be very good innings, though the specter of another arm injury for a guy who has had elbow surgery twice in six years looms large.
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Perez won't turn 23 until a few weeks after Opening Day. He's like a year and a half younger than Nolan McLean, the top pitching prospect in baseball; he's younger than Bubba Chandler, Payton Tolle, Andrew Painter, and most other rookies we expect to make an impact this season. As a reminder, Perez made his debut in 2023. Last year was a bit rocky as he worked his way back from Tommy John surgery, but the stuff was still elite, and he showed real growth as the season went on. We're probably only looking at around 150 or 160 innings even in a best-case scenario here, but he could very easily be a top-10 SP on a per-inning basis.
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It's a 70-grade slider and a 70-grade fastball. Maybe the command won't be good enough. Maybe the lack of a reliable third pitch will trip him up. I don't know. But it's a 70-grade slider and a 70-grade fastball. It's the kind of arsenal that made Hunter Greene and Spencer Strider aces, and Burns has that kind of upside. And that kind of risk profile, given how hard he throws. Like Perez, we're probably looking at a max of 150-160 innings, and like Perez, he might be one of the very best pitchers in baseball on a per-inning basis. He's easier to stomach as a No. 3 SP, but the upside makes him worth a gamble even at a higher price point.
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Pivetta is kind of boring. Boring is not a bad thing, but I'm finding it hard to buy into Pivetta's merely decent upside when it comes attached to an extraordinarily long track record of failure. Yes, he had a 2.87 ERA, and yes, Petco Park certainly helps in that regard. But his xERA was 3.97, and the rest of his peripherals were in the mid-3.00s range. None of that is bad, but it suggests we probably got something close to the best-case scenario in 2025, and expecting a repeat is probably a mistake.
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McLean had an incredible 2025 season, and he seems poised to make the leap to stardom in 2026. He dominated both Double-A and Triple-A and then came up to the majors and had a 2.06 ERA over his first eight starts. He has a wide arsenal with multiple plus pitches and the skills to handle both lefties and righties, and he might be a rare groundball pitcher with elite strikeout abilities. He's being drafted a few rounds ahead of most of the other exciting pitchers who debuted last season, so the likes of Jacob Misiorowski or Trey Yesavage might be better values. But it would be moderately surprising if they were better than him.
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Gausman is a good example of how upside can sometimes be underrated for older pitchers. He lost the feel for his splitter after a shoulder injury in 2024 and muddled through it, but he bounced back with a much better 2025. The days of Gausman being a true ace are probably gone as he nears his late 30s, but he has made 30-plus starts in five straight seasons and should approach 200 strikeouts. There's some risk of the bottom falling out here, but Gausman still feels underrated to me.
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A lingering finger injury messed up Lodolo's 2024, but he got his curveball back and was back to being a very effective pitcher in 2025. There might be some strikeout upside to unlock here (he was at a 28% mark in 2023), and that would be the primary avenue for any improvement for Lodolo, who otherwise won't get a ton of help from his teammates or especially his home park. I tend to think that'll be enough to keep him from ever truly being an ace for Fantasy, but you can squint and see the upside here if he bumps the strikeout rate up without any other losses.
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I want to believe Woodruff can hold up. He was phenomenal when he returned from his nearly two year absence due to shoulder surgery, putting up an elite 32% strikeout rate despite losing nearly 3 mph on his fastballs. But his return from the surgery was rocky and he couldn't even get to 70 innings in the majors before suffering what would end up being a season-ending lat injury in mid-September. He should be healthy to open 2025, but can you really count on him to stay healthy? If so, he has top-12 upside. But you can't draft him anywhere near that price right now.
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Alcantara had the classic post-Tommy John season: He was a disaster in the first half as he struggled mightily to get his command and feel back, but once he settled in, he more or less looked like himself. He got his ERA down to 3.33 while pitching deep pretty much every time out, and while his strikeout rate (21.3%) wasn't quite where it was at his best, his command improved greatly and his ability to generate weak contact was there. Alcantara can be very good with just an average strikeout rate, but the two years he had an above-average strikeout rate saw him put up a combined 2.71 ERA (with a Cy Young award in 2022). I don't expect him to be quite that good, but a low-3.00s ERA with some of the most consistent volume in the league is nothing to sneeze at.
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Sleeper: Kris Bubic, Royals
That Bubic is coming back from a rotator cuff strain that ended his breakout season early is likely what is keeping his price down, and that's a pretty big red flag … if he costs much at all to draft. However, with his price sitting outside of the top 200, much of the downside risk here is mitigated, and what we're left with is a pitcher who showed legitimate front-of-rotation upside last season. Bubic threw 116.1 innings with a 2.55 ERA, and while the peripherals don't quite back it up, they don't suggest it was some fluke either – you'd still take his 3.16 expected ERA, wouldn't you? Bubic missed plenty of bats with his four-seamer last season, and when he didn't, hitters still struggled to do damage against it, putting up a lowly .287 expected wOBA as they often just got under the ball with the barrel. An excellent changeup surely helped in that regard, and overall, as does an overall five-pitch mix without an obvious weak spot. Bubic isn't an ace when healthy, but he should be a must-start pitcher who isn't being drafted that way. Even accounting for the injury risk, I think he's one of the very best values in drafts right now.
Breakout: Chase Burns, Reds
It's a 70-grade fastball and a 70-grade slider. The changeup is a work in progress, the command can be an issue, and there are real questions about his ability to stay healthy given how hard he throws (and last year's IL stint with a Grade 1 flexor tendon strain). It's not hard to see how things go wrong, and Burns isn't even guaranteed a spot in the rotation as of now, though it seems extremely unlikely he won't be in the end! But it's a 70-grade fastball and a 70-grade slider. At the risk of oversimplifying, players with this kind of stuff usually work out. It's a limited arsenal (he's working on the changeup and has a curveball, but neither is likely to be much more than show-me pitches), but it's the kind of limited arsenal that has made stars out of Hunter Greene and Spencer Strider. Turns out, when you can throw like those dudes, nuance matters a lot less.
Bust: Spencer Strider, Braves
I'm at the point where I need to see a real reason to get excited about Strider, and the last time I saw that was roughly in September of 2023. His fastball went from an exemplary weapon to an outright liability in 2025 after his return from the Internal Brace procedure on his right elbow, and nothing we've seen so far this spring makes me think he's solved that issue. Yes, he's not focusing on velocity this spring, but I can't give him credit for being the 2023 version of himself without seeing signs of it, and right now, he's maxing out around the same velocity he used to average. The slider is still a special pitch, but right now, it doesn't look like he has anything to go with it. Maybe I'll end up wrong. I hope so – I'm rooting against myself on this one! But Strider looks like someone you can roll the dice on around the 45th-50th pitcher off the board, not a top-30 one.
Starting Pitcher Top Prospects
1. Bubba Chandler, SP, Pirates
Age (on opening day): 23
Where he played in 2025: Triple-A, majors
Minor league stats: 5-6, 4.05 ERA, 1.48 WHIP, 100 IP, 53 BB, 121 K
Major league stats: 4-1, 4.02 ERA, 0.93 WHIP, 31.1 IP, 4 BB, 31 K
The whole world thought Chandler should be promoted when he had a 2.03 ERA and 12.8 K/9 through 11 Triple-A starts, but then, when he wasn't, frustration mounted, and his control went awry. He was pinpoint accurate when he finally reached the majors, though, blowing hitters away with his A-grade fastball, so it's easy to get behind him as the top pitching prospect still.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: pencil him in
2. Trey Yesavage, SP, Blue Jays
Age (on opening day): 22
Where he played in 2025: Low-A, High-A, Double-A, Triple-A, majors
Minor league stats: 5-1, 3.12 ERA, 0.97 WHIP, 98 IP, 41 BB, 160 K
Major league stats: 1-0, 3.21 ERA, 1.43 WHIP, 14 IP, 7 BB, 16 K
Yesavage is the most battle-tested of rookies, having played a starring role in the Blue Jays' AL championship run, and anyone who came along for that ride knows full well about his over-the-top delivery, his devastating splitter, his reverse-breaking slider, and the unhittable quality found in such an unfamiliar arsenal. He could give some of it back as the league becomes more familiar with him, particularly on those days when he struggles to throw strikes, but he's been a bat-missing monstrosity everywhere he's pitched so far.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: pencil him in
3. Nolan McLean, SP, Mets
Age (on opening day): 24
Where he played in 2025: Double-A, Triple-A
Minor league stats: 8-5, 2.45 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, 113.2 IP, 50 BB, 127 K
Major league stats: 5-1, 2.06 ERA, 1.04 WHIP, 48 IP, 16 BB, 57 K
McLean's story is similar to Spencer Schwellenbach's in that you'd never know by his six-pitch arsenal and wily approach that he only gave up hitting the year before. His dominance down the stretch is a testament to both his stuff and approach, but it probably overstates his strikeout potential and may have papered over some lingering (albeit minor) control issues.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: pencil him in
4. Thomas White, SP, Marlins
Age (on opening day): 21
Where he played in 2025: High-A, Double-A, Triple-A
Minor league stats: 4-3, 2.31 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, 89.2 IP, 51 BB, 145 K
A 19 percent swinging-strike rate is next to impossible for any pitcher and unprecedented for a lefty, but White made it happen with a deceptive delivery and three pitches that rate as plus. The Marlins spent the offseason clearing out rotation space, but he may need to sort out some control issues at Triple-A before getting his shot.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: fighting this spring
5. Andrew Painter, SP, Phillies
Age (on opening day): 22
Where he played in 2025: Low-A, Triple-A
Minor league stats: 5-8, 5.26 ERA, 1.49 WHIP, 118 IP, 47 BB, 123 K
Much like Spencer Strider, Andrew Painter lost his once-elite fastball shape on the road back from Tommy John surgery and looked nothing like the 19-year-old who put together a 1.56 ERA, 0.89 WHIP, and 13.5 K/9 while climbing to Double-A in 2023. As such, he brings considerable risk, but the scouting reports remain bullish amid whispers of a possible mechanical fix, namely raising his arm slot.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: fighting this spring
6. Kade Anderson, SP, Mariners
Age (on opening day): 21
Where he played in 2025: did not play -- draft year
The third overall pick and consensus top pitcher in the 2025 draft stands out most for his polish and pitchability, featuring a fleshed-out arsenal with a couple of high-spin breakers and strong command of everything. Though some who rank behind him here will turn out better, he'll move fast and is all but certain to matter.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: midseason hopeful
7. Tatsuya Imai, SP, Astros
Age (on opening day): 27
Where he played in 2025: Japan
NPB stats: 10-5, 1.92 ERA, 0.89 WHIP, 163.2 IP, 45 BB, 178 K
Imai's low-release fastball and reverse-breaking slider make for an unusual look that led to oodles of success in Japan, but he's older than conventional prospects and can't exactly go back to the drawing board if his tricks don't work in the majors.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: pencil him in
8. Robby Snelling, SP, Marlins
Age (on opening day): 22
Where he played in 2025: Double-A, Triple-A
Minor league stats: 9-7, 2.51 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, 136 IP, 39 BB, 166 K
Though Thomas White (see above) is implicated as well, the Marlins' efforts to free up rotation space this offseason likely have more to do with Snelling, who couldn't break through last September despite a 1.27 ERA, 0.99 WHIP, and 11.5 K/9 in 11 Triple-A starts. The Marlins bought low on the former Padres prospect two years ago and have restored his lost command and velocity.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: fighting this spring
9. Jonah Tong, SP, Mets
Age (on opening day): 22
Where he played in 2025: Double-A, Triple-A, majors
Minor league stats: 10-5, 1.43 ERA, 0.92 WHIP, 113.2 IP, 47 BB, 179 K
Major league stats: 2-3, 7.71 ERA, 1.77 WHIP, 18.2 IP, 9 BB, 22 K
Tong's minor-league dominance had him looking like the game's top pitching prospect when he arrived in August, but his unique fastball, which has a low release height despite an over-the-top delivery, didn't baffle major leaguers like it did minor leaguers. If it doesn't work, neither does he. A legitimate breaking ball would do wonders, though, and he perhaps needed more time at Triple-A to refine his.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: fighting this spring
10. Seth Hernandez, SP, Pirates
Age (on opening day): 19
Where he played in 2025: did not play -- draft year
The hit rate on high school pitchers who score big on draft day is embarrassing, so I can't help but cringe a little in slotting Hernandez this high. But he's an actual pitching savant, judging by the reports, with a fastball and changeup that both rate near the top of the scales already, two breaking balls that trail close behind, and an aptitude for throwing strikes. Time will tell.
Scott's 2026 Fantasy impact: don't count on it
