Last Updated on February 2, 2026 10:49 am by Paul Williamson | Published: February 2, 2026

Starting pitching is probably the one position group that is the most difficult to rank and might be the most important position group to get right in your draft.

While a lot of arms obtain fantasy viability off the wire, very few arms turn into bonafide top-25 arms, much less an SP1. Ensuring you get that kind of production is needed if you are going to draft a league winning pitching staff.

When should you draft starting pitchers? 

This is dependent on a couple of things.

First is the size of your league.

If you are in a deeper than 12-team league, reaching in the top 60 is almost non-negotiable as the true SP1’s are drafted rather quickly and get pushed up most draft boards. This is due to less options being available off the wire to replace lost production from injuries or underperformance.

If you are in a shallower league, then you can conceivably wait until closer to pick 100 to get your SP1, though it is important to watch your draft room and determine how quick you want to pull the trigger. If more pitchers go off the board than you may have thought, you may have to make the decision to draft one quicker than you thought. But waiting passed pick 100 to get your first arm is, in most cases, a mistake.

Second is personal preference.

Some managers like to go ‘pocket aces’ and draft two bonafide high end starters that allows them to focus heavily on hitters.

Some managers, including me, generally try really hard to wait as long as possible. Pitchers are probably the most volatile group, mainly due to injury risk. One bout of forearm soreness leads to them getting a second opinion and then you are without them for the rest of the year. These pitchers put so much strain on their arms with the amount of spin and velocity they produce that most arms are walking injury risks. This makes it hard for me to invest heavy draft capital into them.

Keep in mind these rankings are based on overall production. If you see you took arms from teams that won’t win many games, you probably need to push up arms from better teams later in the draft so you can get those wins.

Also, you’ll notice I generally prioritize swing and miss arms early in my rankings so if you notice you have plenty of arms that are at risk of blowing up your ratios, then you may need push up players with safer ratio production.

I will update this list throughout the offseason due to

• Spring training performance – do we see a dip in velocity? Change in pitch mix?
• Injuries – self explanatory.
• Announcements – some arms we are still waiting for updates on their availability. Others we need to know if they will be in the rotation.

My top-10 are free to all but to get access to the full list, you will need to have an MLB FantasyPass membership.

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• About the Author
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Paul Williamson

I grew up in Crosby, TX, just about 30 minutes east of Houston, TX. Yes, I am a major Houston Astros fan, and love my Texans and Rockets.

I graduated Crosby High School in 2006 (Go Coogs!) and attended San Jacinto College (Go Gators!) before attending and graduating from Texas Tech in 2012 (Go Tech!). I got my degree in journalism.

Throughout my academic life I was on some form of debate team, and it was the greatest experience of my academic career.

Now I couldn’t be more happier. Sports Ethos is allowing to me to live a life long dream: to be a sports writer.

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