Top 101 Starting Pitchers: Rest-Of-Season Rankings for Fantasy Baseball Week 9 (2025)

May 29, 2025

Nick Mariano's updated fantasy baseball starting pitcher rankings for Week 9 (2025). Baller Ranks is a weekly rankings list for the top-101 starting pitchers.

With June around the corner, this writer hopes that you find yourself in a strong position to enjoy some summertime fun. We hope to entertain and empower each week with the latest FSWA-award-winning Best Baseball Series. Let's all keep our cool as the temperatures heat up with this week's edition of my weekly Starting Pitcher Baller Ranks!

As usual, readers will find my SP thoughts with tiered ranks (the tiers matter, the ranks within are cool but don't blow a gasket), complemented by a rest-of-season auction value ($), their Previous Week's Value (PV), the trend between the two, and a (+/-) column denoting the rank shift compared to last week. There is also a prospect table at the end via our star scout, Eric Cross.

As always, these ranks are geared toward traditional 5x5 roto leagues, and I typically exclude most injured SPs unless they're about to come back. This week, I wrote most of this on Monday, as my Tuesday is booked with more surgeons' appointments. Be kind to one another, and don't take your two lil' feeties for granted. Now, on with the show!

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Starting Pitcher Rankings Analysis for Week 9

-Tarik Skubal and Zack Wheeler are the top two starting pitchers per 5x5 scoring over the last 30 days, and all is right with the world (citation needed). Skubal made some history with the first 13-strikeout “Maddux” complete-game shutout. Wheeler twirled his third straight scoreless gem, which gives him four straight wins and six straight quality starts. Studs!

94 pitches. 13 strikeouts. Shutout.

Tarik Skubal with the most strikeouts in a Maddux (SHO on fewer than 100 pitches) since pitch counts have been tracked (1988)

Prior most: 12, Carlos Carrasco & Cliff Lee

Prior most in Maddux of no more than 94 pitches: 10 https://t.co/LdgS07wyJQ

— Sarah Langs (@SlangsOnSports) May 25, 2025

-Robbie Ray is No. 3 on that L30 list thanks to his own streak of six QS that houses four wins with only one walk over his last two outings (13 IP). Each of his last six starts has enjoyed a FIP below 2.45, though we can’t expect zero-homer stretches like this to last. Then again, he’s facing Miami next. (Sorry for the jinx.)

-Jacob deGrom was featured in an MLB.com piece by David Adler that detailed his lower arm angle and how he faces less soreness in between starts with it. The ace threw at 35 and 36 degrees in 2020 and ‘21, respectively, with those being the first two years that Statcast tracked the data.

It’s sitting at 30 degrees thus far, and clearly, the results are just dandy outside of this bizarre, zero-strikeout affair. Let’s treat it like the historical one-off that it currently is. If these mechanics help us comfortably approach 150 IP, then we’re thrilled.

-Max Fried conquered Coors Field for his seventh win (7 ⅓ IP, 1 ER, 7 K, some sweet pickoffs), but gets a road date with the Dodgers as a reward. Not that you’re benching Fried, who has a 28.3% K% this May, compared to 21% in April. This creep up has helped permeate that final fantasy potential barrier.

Max Fried in 11 games in 2025:

7-0 REC
1.29 ERA
67 SO

Only Juan Marichal in 1966 had gone 7-0 or better with 67+ SO and a sub-1.30 ERA in their first 11 starts. pic.twitter.com/7PjMfuzlys

— StatMuse Baseball (@statmusemlb) May 27, 2025

-Corbin Burnes indeed handled the Dodgers, allowing three runs on four hits and a walk with eight strikeouts over seven frames. He held a 1-0 lead going into the seventh, but some weak contact found grass to put two on for a Teoscar Hernandez home run on a poorly-placed slider.

We’ll focus on the good, with his cutter’s .261 xSLG this month slicing the .532 xSLG seen in April at the waist. The curveball has been outstanding, and it looks like his average vertical release point has come down with a slightly tempered arm angle.

Let's keep an eye on it and hope that he doesn’t bomb in a cushy matchup against the Pirates on Tuesday night after this article goes in for submission!

-Spencer Schwellenbach logged a season-high 11 strikeouts in Sunday’s loss to the Padres, but only two of the four runs allowed were earned. The 40.7% whiff rate on his four-seamer was the fourth-best mark of his career, and comes after his only start of the year without a single whiff on the heater.

And the overall 35% PutAway% was his best clip of the year. His 43.6% Edge% (edge of the zone) was his highest mark since April 21, and the 45.5% chase rate on it was the best rate of his career.

All of this is to say, let’s hope this signals a regained confidence and command with the pitch, as it sets his arsenal up for success and gives us that game-breaking potential. He’ll face the Red Sox next, who typically rack up Ks but only had three over 7 IP against him on May 18.

-Will Warren has a better FIP (1.51) than Tarik Skubal for top honors on the month. This may lead you all to disavow FIP (Skubal’s 1.41 SIERA blows away Warren’s 2.37 mark, yet both are first and second, ha), but it’s still fun to note.

Will Warren’s start was cut short after 4 innings by the rain yesterday, but he was still dialed:

45 Chase%
37 CSW%
50 Whiff% (17)

Attacked COL hitters with the two fastballs and had both working. I’ve been beating the 4S drum for Warren lately #RepBX pic.twitter.com/1INBIIJLve

— Ben Halsey (@benhalsey_) May 26, 2025

-Zebby Matthews (0.80 FIP, 2.58 SIERA, 7.71 ERA) is capable of such dominant innings, but the blowback with too many lost batters (four walks) and a .588 BABIP is causing trouble. We like betting on raw talent and can forgive blemishes in place of one beautiful tool, but there are limits.

Racking up strikeouts can already strain efficiency, but lengthy counts and batted-ball misfortune make it impossible. He’s only yielded one barrel on 17 balls in play, but the sweet-spot rate is nearly 50%.

-Sandy Alcantara is near the top of that list, sporting a 2.73-point gap between his 7.71 ERA and 4.99 FIP, but that still isn’t good! Brown being below the 3.00 mark is one thing, and Alcantara does have a cleaner 4.02 SIERA on the month, but faith is shattered. And rightfully so. Keep tabs on his starts, but from a safe distance!

-Ben Brown has immense upside with the strikeout ceiling, but he appears destined for the bullpen when Shota Imanaga returns in June. This is good news for Cade Horton, but it’s frustrating to see Brown with a 2.65 FIP and 2.73 SIERA behind the gaudy 6.75 ERA in May.

Outside of the Coors-cursed Antonio Senzatela, no one else has an ERA-FIP gap above 3.0 out of the 111 pitchers with >20 IP this month. And Brown’s gap is 4.1! Ouch. But if sabermetrics like SIERA were some skeleton key, then this game wouldn’t be all that fun, eh?

-Miles Mikolas is the arm keeping Burnes just off the top on the aforementioned L30 5x5 leaderboard. Notching four wins in a 30-day slice carries lots of weight and helps counterbalance the fact that he hasn’t struck out more than five batters in a game since April 12. (Compare that to posting zero wins despite four QS, such as Paul Skenes.)

Frankly, the pendulum seen with luck on the fastball does plenty to illustrate our thoughts. In April, he had a .407 AVG, .519 SLG, and .434 wOBA against the heater, with a .302 xBA, .611 xSLG, and .415 xwOBA.

Those were still crummy expected stats, but also unlucky. This May, he’s enjoyed a .200 AVG (.318 xBA), .350 SLG (.819 xSLG), and .297 wOBA (.502 xwOBA). The xStats got worse, yet his results swung into the arms of Lady Luck! He does face a struggling Baltimore team next, but just keep two feet on the ground here.

-Logan Henderson was the subject of a helpful back-and-forth on Reddit, with a user asking if his modest rank was largely rooted in a demotion risk. The answer was yes, though I didn’t anticipate such a swift illustration of that.

The Brewers demoted him on Monday morning due to a taxed bullpen, having Thursday off and not needing a fifth starter, and Henderson’s own workload management. Milwaukee just got Aaron Ashby and DL Hall back as long relievers, but they won’t be immediately thrown like they’re 100%.

Jose Quintana, Brandon Woodruff, and Aaron Civale will need to be handled delicately off the IL. Quinn Priester has only one option remaining. Jacob Misiorowski could get a whirl if a 40-man roster spot is deemed available.

And Henderson is up to 51 IP between the minors and majors already, after tossing 81 ⅓ IP last year. It’s not fun, but the Brewers have shown their hand in being flexible here.

**Nathan Eovaldi exited Tuesday’s game after two innings due to right triceps fatigue. His age and medical history mean even smaller things deemed “precautionary” raise a few red flags. Keep those fingers crossed, but be prepared for the 35-year-old to miss a turn.

Nathan Eovaldi left the game with right triceps fatigure. He was removed as a precaution and is not expected to miss time due to the issue, but he will continue to be evaluated.

— kennedi landry (@kennlandry) May 28, 2025

Top 101 Starting Pitchers for Fantasy Baseball - Week 9

Top Starting Pitcher Stashes for Fantasy Baseball - Week 9

Here are the key SP stashes from our esteemed, industry-leading prospect analyst, Eric Cross. You can also read his full Top 25 Fantasy Baseball Prospects To Stash article, which is updated weekly!

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