Fantasy Baseball: 2025 starting pitcher (SP) rankings, projections, outlooks

1. Paul Skenes

PIT – SP

Throws: R

Age: 22

Mixed 5×5: $38 | NL 5×5: $39

2024: Started: 23 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $36 | 2027: $34

Outlook: The Pirates caught some flack for not having Skenes, the first overall pick in the 2023 draft, open last season in their rotation, but they’re used to the gripes by now and things wound up pretty much as they should have anyway; Skenes won Rookie of the Year and claimed his full season of service time despite not debuting until May 11. In 23 major league starts, Skenes allowed just 31 runs, and in spite of the Pirates wanting to protect him, he was efficient enough to go six innings on 16 occasions. He never allowed more than six hits and only struck out fewer than six batters three times (once being Game 161, when he was pulled after two scoreless frames). It would have been a masterful showing even if he weren’t only one year out of college, and Skenes enters 2025 No. 1 on the pitching big board as a result. He’s probably a little riskier than Tarik Skubal in terms of health, but there were no red flags last year. It’d still be difficult to eschew a bat in favor of a pitcher in round one this year, but if anyone is worth it, it’s Skenes.

2. Tarik Skubal

DET – SP

Throws: L

Age: 28

Mixed 5×5: $37 | AL 5×5: $38

2024: Started: 31 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $33 | 2027: $27

Outlook: Skubal’s 15 starts after returning from flexor tendon surgery in 2023 were so incredible that he already had to be considered an ace. It was just a matter of whether he could keep it up for a full season. He did that, of course, and became the unanimous choice for AL Cy Young honors while leading the majors in strikeouts. His postseason started with 17 scoreless frames before one tough inning against the Guardians doomed the Tigers in the ALDS. Skubal entered the league with an average fastball at 94.5 mph and stayed right there for a couple of years, but he was all of the way up to 96.8 mph last season, giving him one of the league’s most effective heaters. His changeup has also gained three mph while retaining its movement. Health might still be a question mark, particularly in light of him throwing 211 innings between the regular and postseason last year. Still, it has to help that he’s so efficient on the mound; he never threw more than 103 pitches in any of his 34 outings. He’s the No. 2-ranked pitcher here and only barely behind Paul Skenes for the top spot.

3. Logan Gilbert

SEA – SP

Throws: R

Age: 27

Mixed 5×5: $33 | AL 5×5: $32

2024: Started: 33 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $31 | 2027: $29

Outlook: One would think leading the majors in innings pitched and WHIP would be good for double-figure wins, but that wasn’t the case for Gilbert last season. He was also sixth in strikeouts and 14th in ERA, yet all it got him was a 9-12 record. Credit and blame both go to T-Mobile Park, which played outrageously pitcher friendly last season. Gilbert had a 2.49 ERA and a 30% K rate at home, compared to a 3.94 ERA and a 25% K rate on the road. Those weren’t standout splits, either: Mariners pitchers on the whole had a 2.85 ERA and a 27% K rate at home to go with a 4.18 ERA and a 22% K rate on the road. There’s hope that Gilbert could become even better than he is now; his strikeout and groundball rates have improved each of the last two years, and he showed his best velocity to date last season. Still, if T-Mobile goes back to playing like a more normal pitcher’s park instead of the beast it was last year, it’ll likely cancel some of that out. He’s no longer a potential draft-day bargain, but even so, he’s a worthy fantasy ace.

4. Zack Wheeler

PHI – SP

Throws: R

Age: 34

Mixed 5×5: $32 | NL 5×5: $32

2024: Started: 32 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $28 | 2027: $21

Outlook: Wheeler had a case for a Cy Young Award for a second time in his career last season, but he again was the runner-up, finishing second to Chris Sale. In 2021, he was second to Corbin Burnes. In truth, Wheeler never really had a shot, considering that Sale led the NL in wins, ERA and strikeouts. Wheeler, though, finished second in all of those categories while also making three more starts than Sale and dealing with a harder schedule and a tougher pitching situation in Philadelphia. In the postseason, Wheeler added to his big-game reputation, blanking the Mets for seven innings in his lone start and lowering his October ERA to 2.18. He’s had far better luck staying healthy in his thirties than he did in his twenties, but that’s not such an unusual pattern. That said, it is of some concern that his velocity has fallen off some; his 95.1-mph average on his fastball last year was down two mph from his peak in 2021. Another decline could leave him more vulnerable, though it’d probably be the difference between him being a top-four SP or merely a top-10.

5. Jacob deGrom

TEX – SP

Throws: R

Age: 36

Mixed 5×5: $31 | AL 5×5: $31

2024: Started: 3 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $23 | 2027: $11

Outlook: As the Rangers faded in the second half of last season, so too did hopes of deGrom making a significant contribution in fantasy leagues down the stretch. Still, the two-time Cy Young Award winner was activated for three late starts in his return from June 2023 Tommy John surgery and was successful despite giving up a lot of hard contact with his velocity down about 1.5 mph from before he got hurt. Fortunately, that still left his fastball at 97.3 mph on average. DeGrom enters 2025 not having put in anything close to a full season since 2019, and the Rangers will surely be careful with him in the hopes that he’ll have something in the tank should they return to the postseason. Still, it’s hard to imagine him being anything other than dominant when he’s healthy, and after all of the time off, he’s a better bet to stay relatively healthy in 2025 than he has been in a half-decade or ever will be again afterwards. This is a pitcher with a 2.07 ERA and a 36% K rate in 111 starts since 2018; he could miss a dozen starts and still provide third-round value. It’s worth rolling the dice.

6. George Kirby

SEA – SP

Throws: R

Age: 27

Mixed 5×5: $30 | AL 5×5: $30

2024: Started: 33 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $31 | 2027: $30

Outlook: With T-Mobile Park providing so much aid to his numbers, perhaps Kirby doesn’t know he’s supposed to be trying to get better. He was content to keep pounding the strike zone last season, and while it led to another brilliant walk rate, he actually led the AL in hits allowed. His 3.53 ERA seems quite good, but with T-Mobile doing its thing and run scoring down across the league, it rated as just a 104 ERA+. Obviously, none of this is to say Kirby is bad. He’s led the majors in K:BB ratio in back-to-back seasons, and he’s seventh in the majors in innings pitched over those two years. It just feels like he should be an ace by now, what with his top-notch command of an array of pitches that all feature plus velocity and ample movement. Maybe this will be the year, but it seems like someone will need to challenge him first.

7. Blake Snell

LA – SP

Throws: L

Age: 32

Mixed 5×5: $25 | NL 5×5: $28

2024: Started: 20 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $23 | 2027: $20

Outlook: It’s hard to imagine a more disparate two halves of a season. No one was eager to pay the price for the 2023 NL Cy Young Award winner a year ago, so Snell didn’t sign with the Giants until mid-March, and things fell apart in his haste to get ready for the season. He made his debut in the team’s 11th game while still on a pitch count and lost that one and two more before landing on the IL with an adductor strain. Back four weeks later, he struggled for three more starts and then suffered a groin strain. When he finally again returned on July 9, it was with an 0-3 record and a 9.51 ERA. And then all he did was go 5-0 with a 1.23 ERA and a 114/30 K/BB in 80 1/3 innings the rest of the way. The Giants were 12-2 in his starts, with the losses being 1-0 and 3-2 games. He even threw a no-hitter against the Reds on Aug. 2.  The career-best stretch got Snell paid to the tune of $182 million in a five-year deal with the Dodgers over the winter. That he’ll be part of a six-man rotation is a little bit of a downer, but it’s such a great situation otherwise that he rates as a top-10 fantasy SP.

8. Dylan Cease

SD – SP

Throws: R

Age: 29

Mixed 5×5: $24 | NL 5×5: $27

2024: Started: 33 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $20 | 2027: $18

Outlook: All those who drafted Cease in his first year in the NL were surely happy with the results, but it seems like he should have been even better. Among qualified starters, he was fifth in strikeout rate, eighth in WHIP, sixth in FIP and 10th in SIERA, but he was 21st in ERA. His peripherals were all similar to 2022, when he finished second in the AL Cy Young balloting. The problem was that Cease did his best work with the bases empty; the league hit .173/.251/.273 against him with none on, compared to .247/.300/.431 the rest of the time. That hadn’t been much of an issue for him previously, so there’s nothing to suggest it’ll carry over. Cease’s slider is one of the game’s most effective pitches, and his velocity came back up to 2022 levels last season after dipping some in 2023. As he enters his walk year, he’s as good of a bet as he’s ever been, and he places as a top-10 fantasy SP in San Diego. He would fall some in the rankings if he’s traded into a worse situation.

9. Garrett Crochet

BOS – SP

Throws: L

Age: 25

Mixed 5×5: $23 | AL 5×5: $26

2024: Started: 32 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $23 | 2027: $22

Outlook: Did anyone see that coming? Crochet was a pretty good reliever in his first full season in 2021, but his stuff was already down from his 2020 debut. He then underwent Tommy John in 2022 and dealt with shoulder issues while trying to come back in 2023. Another team probably would have left him in the pen last year and hoped for the best, but the 121-loss White Sox had nothing to lose by trying him in the rotation, and he looked as good as any starter in the big leagues in May and June before his workload was curtailed; he wasn’t allowed to throw more than four innings in any of his final 14 starts. The White Sox wanted to capitalize on his success and trade him prior to the deadline, but Crochet’s self-imposed innings restrictions limited demand then. The Red Sox wound up acquiring him in a bidding war in December. Dating back to college, Crochet had never topped 70 innings in a season prior to throwing 146 last year. His durability remains in question, but he’s clearly demonstrated that he’s an elite talent. Even with the risk, he has to be viewed as a top-10 SP.

10. Framber Valdez

HOU – SP

Throws: L

Age: 31

Mixed 5×5: $22 | AL 5×5: $26

2024: Started: 28 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $20 | 2027: $17

Outlook: Postseason again aside, Valdez was mostly at the top of his game last year, shaking off some early elbow soreness to win 15 games. Typically an exceptional producer of grounders, Valdez didn’t meet his usual standards in 2023 and gave up a career-high 19 homers. Last season, though, his groundball rate was back up to 61%, just shy of his career mark of 63%, and he didn’t have to sacrifice strikeouts to get there. It’s still entirely possible that Valdez has a Cy Young-type season in him, and in spite of last year’s arm problem, leading to just his second IL stint as a major leaguer, he’s a better bet than most to top 180 innings. He’s a great option as a No. 2 in mixed leagues.

11. Joe Ryan

MIN – SP

Throws: R

Age: 28

Mixed 5×5: $22 | AL 5×5: $25

2024: Started: 23 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $21 | 2027: $20

Outlook: The breakout season didn’t materialize and might not have even if Ryan didn’t miss the final eight weeks with a shoulder muscle strain. Still, he seems to be getting closer. Holding him back last year were some big problems with men on base; the league hit .183 against him with the bases empty and .290 with runners on. Not only did Ryan show up throwing about two mph harder than usual last spring anyway, but he made a conscious decision to switch to a harder splitter. He’s still looking for that perfect mix to go along with his elite fastball, but both his splitter and slider produced their best results to date last year. Ryan will be healthy this spring, and he remains a potential fantasy ace with his 27% K rate and 1.07 WHIP to date. He just needs to finally produce the corresponding ERA.

12. Tanner Bibee

CLE – SP

Throws: R

Age: 25

Mixed 5×5: $21 | AL 5×5: $25

2024: Started: 31 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $23 | 2027: $24

Outlook: With expectations high for year two in the bigs, Bibee stumbled out of the gate last season. Not that it was a problem for the Guardians. He had a 4.91 ERA and completed six innings just once in his first eight starts, but Cleveland went 7-1 in those games anyway. He turned things around nicely in mid-May, pitching to a 3.04 ERA in his final 23 starts. He gave fantasy leaguers a brief scare at the end of July, when he came down with some shoulder tightness. However, he missed just one start. In the postseason, he pitched well in three of four outings, finishing with a 3.45 ERA in 15 2/3 innings. Bibee’s slider again performed as one of the game’s best as a sophomore, but he still only uses it about 28% of the time. He tried a harder curveball last year that the Stuff models liked, but it still wasn’t particularly effective. Bibee’s only real problem is that he’s a big flyball pitcher, but the deadened baseball and pitching in Cleveland both help there. He’s the perfect No. 2 in mixed leagues.

13. Corbin Burnes

ARI – SP

Throws: R

Age: 30

Mixed 5×5: $21 | NL 5×5: $25

2024: Started: 32 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $18 | 2027: $13

Outlook: Burnes received Cy Young votes for a fifth straight season in 2024 and made 32 starts for a third straight year, all while showing the best velocity of his career. Still, there’s one blindingly obvious concern here as he begins his Diamondbacks career; his strikeout rate has plummeted from 36% in 2021 to 30%, 26% and 23% the last three years. The changing shape of his cutter seems to be the biggest culprit, though he’s also getting fewer missed swings with his curve and changeup; only his slider is generating whiffs like it used to, which is probably why he started using it more last year. Still, the lack of strikeouts hasn’t turned into a real problem yet. Burnes’ cutter continues to produce mostly soft contact; of the 58 pitchers to qualify for the ERA title last year, he had the fourth-lowest hard-hit rate. And since his arm strength obviously hasn’t gone anywhere — he averaged 97 mph with the cutter last year — it might be that a pretty simple tweak could lead to him reclaiming some of those lost strikeouts. He’ll have another quality defense backing him in Arizona, and while Chase Field does yield plenty of doubles and triples, it suppresses homers. His fantasy ceiling appears lower than it has in some time, but he can’t slip too far in drafts.

14. Chris Sale

ATL – SP

Throws: L

Age: 35

Mixed 5×5: $18 | NL 5×5: $23

2024: Started: 29 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $9 | 2027: $2

Outlook: 14 years into his big-league career, Sale got his Cy Young Award when it was least expected. The left-hander received votes every year from 2012-18, but he entered last season having made 56 starts with a 4.16 ERA in the five years since that streak ended. Acquired from the Red Sox for Vaughn Grissom, Sale started 29 times for the Braves and won a career-high 18 games while leading the majors in ERA and the NL in strikeouts. Unfortunately, things did not go as hoped in the end. Due to a back problem, he made his final start on Sept. 19, though the Braves didn’t let on that anything was wrong until about 30 minutes before he was supposed to start the Game 162 clincher. He was scratched then and didn’t take part in the Wild Card loss to the Padres. Whether 2024 was a last hurrah for Sale or the beginning of a late-career renaissance remains to be seen. The soon-to-be 36-year-old underwent Tommy John surgery in 2020, missed much of 2022 with a ribcage stress fracture, a broken finger and a broken non-pitching wrist and then sat out two months with a stress reaction in his shoulder in 2023. Somehow, his stuff is just as good as ever; his 94.8 mph average fastball velocity last season edged out his previous career high. The quality should stick around, but the quantity will likely take a hit.

15. Gerrit Cole

NYY – SP

Throws: R

Age: 34

Mixed 5×5: $18 | AL 5×5: $23

2024: Started: 17 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $15 | 2027: $12

Outlook: Cole did have elbow issues as a youngster, but he entered last year as the gold standard in terms of durability. His only IL stint from 2017-23 was due to COVID, and he finished in the top five in his league in innings pitched in all seven of those seasons. So, it was quite the nasty surprise when he came down with an elbow problem last spring. Rumors of Tommy John surgery quickly arose, but he was diagnosed with an edema and nerve irritation that sidelined him until June 19. Once back, he started off kind of shaky, but he settled in nicely in posting a 2.25 ERA in the final two months. In the postseason, he was a little erratic, but until the defensive disaster that was the fifth inning of Game 5, he was great against the Dodgers, and he finished with a 2.17 ERA in his five starts. For the year, Cole’s velocity was down almost two mph from his peak in 2022, leaving his fastball at 96 mph on average. His strikeout rate, which had already tumbled to 27% in 2023 after coming in at 35% the previous five years, was 25%. At 34, he’s probably on the decline and he should be. Still, it’s notable that Cole felt strong enough to opt out of the remaining four years and $144 million on his Yankees contract last winter and that the Yankees, with their access to his MRI results, were still willing to pay that much to bring him back afterwards. He probably won’t be a top-five pitcher in 2025, but top 15 seems reasonable.

16. Max Fried

NYY – SP

Throws: L

Age: 31

Mixed 5×5: $17 | AL 5×5: $21

2024: Started: 29 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $16 | 2027: $15

Outlook: Apart from the odd spike in his walk rate, it was business as usual for Fried last season. He did have another scare with his forearm, but it was just a case of neuritis this time and he missed only three turns. It wasn’t like in 2023, when it was whispered he might need Tommy John and he missed half of the season. No one seemed particularly worried about his arm when he hit free agency, and he wound up taking a eight-year, $218 million deal from the Yankees. A big groundball pitcher, Fried should fare well in Yankee Stadium. Of the 67 pitchers to throw 500 innings so far this decade, Fried has the best barrel rate, second-best home run rate and third-best groundball rate. That he’s just average in terms of strikeouts caps his fantasy upside some, but barring any additional health scares this spring, he’s still a clear No. 2 in mixed leagues.

17. Michael King

SD – SP

Throws: R

Age: 29

Mixed 5×5: $14 | NL 5×5: $21

2024: Started: 30 Relieved: 1

Mixed 2026: $13 | 2027: $12

Outlook: With expectations fairly high for the former reliever after his successful eight-start run at the end of 2023 (1.88 ERA, 48/9 K/BB in 38 IP), King was pretty disappointing at the very beginning of his Padres career. The primary return in the Juan Soto deal with the Yankees, King was 2-3 with a 5.00 ERA after a month. Because he’d allowed 10 homers in 36 innings, his FIP was all of the way up at 6.31. Things, though, turned around very suddenly in May. He shut out the powerful D-backs and Dodgers lineups for 13 innings in his first two starts of the month and kept rolling from there. Overall, he was 11-6 with a 2.42 ERA in his final 24 starts, giving up just seven homers along the way. He went on to shut out the Braves for seven innings in his first career postseason start, though he did give up five runs in a loss to the Dodgers in the NLDS. King’s fastball velocity is down about two mph as a starter, but he actually threw his slider harder than ever last season, and his changeup, which was mostly unaffected by the velocity drop, became his most valuable pitch. There’s some concern that the huge workload jump could catch up to him this season, but if he remains healthy, he’ll probably be a top-20 SP again.

18. Cole Ragans

KC – SP

Throws: L

Age: 27

Mixed 5×5: $14 | AL 5×5: $21

2024: Started: 32 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $15 | 2027: $14

Outlook: The big velocity gain that made Ragans look like an ace-in-waiting in the second half of 2023 held up at the beginning of last year, and the southpaw had a 3.16 ERA and a 30% strikeout rate entering the break. As the year went on, though, Ragans’ velocity took quite a hit, especially on his outstanding changeup, which he threw about three mph slower in August than he did in April. Fortunately, it just didn’t seem to matter, and Ragans posted a 3.10 ERA and a 29% strikeout rate during the second half. He wound up just five strikeouts behind Tarik Skubal for the major league lead, and he finished fourth in the AL Cy Young balloting. Even if the changeup stands out, all four of Ragans’ pitches are perfectly legit, and his command has improved to the point at which he doesn’t need to sit 96 mph with his fastball in order to be a top starter. In spite of last year’s team success, Kansas City still isn’t a great situation for pitchers, which holds back Ragans’ ranking some here. He should be terrific, though.

19. Spencer Strider

ATL – SP

Throws: R

Age: 26

Mixed 5×5: $13 | NL 5×5: $20

2024: Started: 2 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $29 | 2027: $28

Outlook: Coming off a 2023 season in which he led the majors in wins and strikeouts, Strider was the top pitcher on draft boards going into 2024, and he certainly looked the part last spring, when he had a 0.79 ERA and 35 strikeouts in 22 2/3 innings. His regular season lasted just two starts, though, and after being diagnosed with a UCL sprain, he underwent internal brace surgery on Apr. 12. That’s typically a 12-month recovery, rather than the 14-18 months for Tommy John (which Strider already had in college). Strider was back working off a mound in January, setting up the possibility that he could have a normal spring and open up in the Atlanta rotation. The Braves, though, will likely slow play that a little and have him spend at least the first 2-4 weeks of the season on the injured list. Strider’s velocity dropped one mph from 2022 to 2023 and then was down an additional one mph before last year’s injury, so it’ll be interesting to see if he gets some of that back. He’ll probably be exceptional regardless, but it’d be nice to see what he looks like this spring before making him a top-100 pick.

20. Bryce Miller

SEA – SP

Throws: R

Age: 26

Mixed 5×5: $12 | AL 5×5: $20

2024: Started: 31 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $14 | 2027: $14

Outlook: Miller continued to overwhelm right-handed hitters as a sophomore, limiting them to a .512 OPS on the season. Thanks in part to a new splitter, he also greatly improved against left-handers, with his OPS against dropping to .673 from .917 as a rookie. Of course, T-Mobile Park is helping more than just a little; Miller had a 1.96 ERA and a 33% strikeout rate at home last season, compared to a 4.07 ERA and a 19% strikeout rate on the road. All five Mariners starters had significant home-road splits last season, but Miller’s gap was the biggest, which makes sense because he’s the biggest flyball pitcher of the group. Fortunately, T-Mobile isn’t about to stop being a pitcher’s park, even if it might not remain quite as extreme of one this year. Miller has one of the game’s better fastballs, doesn’t walk many batters and has been durable to date. He seems like a top-25 SP from here.

21. Yoshinobu Yamamoto

LA – SP

Throws: R

Age: 26

Mixed 5×5: $12 | NL 5×5: $20

2024: Started: 18 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $15 | 2027: $17

Outlook: The first start of Yamamoto’s 12-year, $325 million deal with the Dodgers was quite the disaster; facing the Padres in his native Japan, he gave up five runs while getting just three outs. Aside from that, though, he met expectations while on the mound, and his 105/22 K/BB was particularly impressive. He missed 11 weeks with a rotator cuff strain before returning in mid-September and helping the Dodgers win the World Series while going 2-0 with a 3.86 ERA in four postseason starts. Yamamoto never pitched on fewer than five days’ rest last season, and it doesn’t look like that will change this year with the Dodgers employing a six-man rotation. Even if he stays perfectly healthy, his ceiling is probably around 160 innings, limiting his ultimate upside. If the splitter that helped him dominate in Japan works a little better with the MLB baseball in year two, then he could match up with the NL’s best pitchers. As is, it seems like he’s one tier below.

22. Tyler Glasnow

LA – SP

Throws: R

Age: 31

Mixed 5×5: $11 | NL 5×5: $19

2024: Started: 22 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $12 | 2027: $11

Outlook: Even though he was underachieving a bit with an 8-5 record and a 3.47 ERA, Glasnow provided plenty of value over the first three-plus months last season. He went on the IL in early July with back tightness, but he missed only a couple of starts and was still pitching well into August, when his elbow started barking. It was supposed to be minor, but that didn’t turn out to be the case, and after he suffered a setback in mid-September, he was quickly shut down for the year. The actual injury never received much clarification; the Dodgers originally said there was no structural damage but later termed it a sprain, which is certainly structural damage. Glasnow, who underwent Tommy John in 2021, opted against any surgery this time around. Glasnow’s 134 innings last season produced the second-best xERA (to Paul Skenes), third-best K rate, fifth-best WHIP and fifth-best SIERA among starters (min. 120 IP). Alas, it was also his career high for innings, and even if he stays relatively healthy, he might not beat that total as part of a six-man rotation this year. If he appears healthy this spring, he’ll warrant consideration as a top-20 SP, but he’s a little lower than that now.

23. Justin Steele

CHI – SP

Throws: L

Age: 29

Mixed 5×5: $11 | NL 5×5: $19

2024: Started: 24 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $10 | 2027: $8

Outlook: His luck ran out when it came to wins, but otherwise, Steele kept rolling in 2024, finishing with essentially the same ERA for the third year in a row. He did miss three starts in September due to elbow tendinitis, but he returned to pitch twice at the end of the month. His other absence was due to a hamstring strain. Even though Steele throws fastballs and sliders 90 percent of the time, the league isn’t gaining any ground on him; his strikeout rate has held steady at 24-25%, and his batting average against was a career-best .216 last season. It had to help that Wrigley was a graveyard for offense in 2024, but Steele was actually better on the road (2.87 ERA, 4.7 K:BB) than at home (3.29 ERA, 2.9 K:BB). Wrigley probably won’t be quite as kind this year, but the Cubs offense should be more generous. The track record demands that he be viewed as at least a No. 3 in mixed leagues.

24. Shota Imanaga

CHI – SP

Throws: L

Age: 31

Mixed 5×5: $10 | NL 5×5: $18

2024: Started: 29 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $8 | 2027: $5

Outlook: The 2024 National League first-year class was so strong that Imanaga was more of a factor in the Cy Young vote, finishing fifth, than in the Rookie of the Year race, where he was named on only four of 30 ballots. The left-hander’s Cubs career couldn’t have gotten off to any better of a start, as he opened up 5-0 with a 0.84 ERA in nine starts. The homers started coming frequently afterwards, but Imanaga was very stingy with the singles and walks and wound up going 7-1 with a 2.83 ERA and a 0.90 WHIP after the break. It certainly helped Imanaga that Wrigley Field played as an extreme pitcher’s park last season; there were 217 fewer runs scored in Cubs home games than in their road games. Wrigley, though can vary widely in how it plays from year to year. Imanaga’s expansive arsenal is largely full of flyball pitches, and he’ll surely again give up more homers than most. Still, the WHIP and strikeout numbers should be there to make him a top-30 SP.

25. Logan Webb

SF – SP

Throws: R

Age: 28

Mixed 5×5: $10 | NL 5×5: $18

2024: Started: 33 Relieved: 0

Mixed 2026: $9 | 2027: $7

Outlook: Webb led the NL in innings for a second straight season in 2024 and allowed the same exact number of runs and one more hit than he did in 2023. It seemed like he was very fortunate in one regard, as he allowed just 11 homers on 43 barrels. In 2023, he also allowed 43 barrels and gave up 20 homers then. The average pitcher allowed 56% as many homers as barrels last season, which would have been 24 for Webb. Still, most of Webb’s barrels were simply on the weak side. Pitching in San Francisco helped, but Statcast still gave him just 11.9 xHR based on pitching in neutral settings. Of the 11 homers Webb allowed, nine came on his changeup, which wasn’t nearly as effective as usual. That’ll give him something to work on while the league continues to simply pound his sinker into the ground. He’s a safe pick but not a great one on a Giants team that probably isn’t as improved as some would like to think.