Starting Pitcher Fantasy Baseball Breakouts or Fake Outs? Part 9

Dan analyzes pitcher stats from 2024 and 2025 to see who is struggling for fantasy baseball this season. Are these pitchers guys who can bounce back or are they destined to continue to struggle?

After a week away from the column, I am back, and, as promised, I am going to finish my mid-season review of starting pitchers.

This time, however, we will be focusing on those who have taken a step back in one or more of the green flag statistics.

Some of these pitchers could be buy-low opportunities for the second half, while others might have too many red flags and are potential cut candidates. Let's explore some of the biggest underachieving starters in 2025 when compared to their 2024 season results.

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The Green Flag Statistics

This week, we are looking at starting pitchers who have improved in one or more of the five statistics that I have deemed to be important. In order, we will look at pitchers who have improved in K%, BB%, SIERA, WHIP, and Pitching+.

Strikeouts are not only valuable in fantasy baseball for scoring purposes, but strikeout rates are also highly correlated with other pitching stats.

Walk rates are often overlooked, but pitchers who show above-average control and limit free passes also usually have low WHIPs. I'm specifically separating strikeouts from walks here because K-BB% is a nice overall metric to us, but it doesn't tell us if a pitcher has improved their strikeouts or walks, or both.

SIERA is my favorite ERA indicator to use when evaluating pitchers. Unlike FIP and xFIP, SIERA factors in batted ball data other than home runs. It's the most nuanced of the popular ERA indicators.

WHIP doesn't need much explanation; it's simply the number of walks and hits that a pitcher allows per inning pitched. It's a standard category in 5x5 roto leagues, but as far as a pitching metric, it helps us understand how good a pitcher is at keeping runners off base. Pitchers with higher WHIPs have to work much harder to get out of jams and leave runners on base and will have to post high LOB% rates to compete in ERA with lower WHIP pitchers.

Pitching+ is one of three metrics (along with Stuff+ and Location+) that were created by Eno Sarris and Max Bay to measure pitcher effectiveness by stripping away all on-field results after a pitch is thrown. Pitching+ factors in the physical characteristics of the pitch (location, velocity, spin rate), the count that the pitch is thrown in, and even batter handedness.

Biggest Strikeout Rate Decreases

All stats used in these leaderboards were current as of Thursday, July 3.

Bailey Ober was a guy who I liked coming into the season, but we know now that he was pitching through an injury. He just hit the IL, so you can stash him if you have the space, but no guarantees that he will be able to return to his 2024 form this season when he comes back.

Bailey Ober has allowed 14 home runs in 30 innings this month.

Yikes.

— Eric Cross (@EricCrossMLB) June 29, 2025

Imanaga's lack of strikeouts is weird. He still has a 12% SwStr%, which suggests that he could push up into the low 20s, but he's not putting away hitters effectively. He has pitched pretty well in his first two starts after returning from the IL, but he only struck out seven hitters over 10 frames. He's worth rostering, but perhaps we should be lowering our expectations a bit going forward.

Bowden Francis is a guy who is going to show up on multiple leaderboards (not a good thing for him) and is making the second half of last season look like a fluke with how bad he has been. The strikeouts have evaporated, but his contact metrics are also awful, and he can't stop giving up home runs.

I'm not worried about Paul Skenes, are you? However, the dip in strikeouts has created a clear separation between him and Tarik Skubal, who is still whiffing hitters at an elite rate.

One of the big reasons we drafted Taj Bradley was his strikeouts, but he's gone from a top 10% strikeout artist to a below-league average at just 20%. Tanner Bibee has suffered a similar drop from the borderline elite range into mediocrity at 21%.

Brandon Pfaadt is on the cover of this article, so you probably won't be surprised to see him on multiple leaderboards. He's another huge disappointment and a guy who I had touted going into this season. The lack of strikeouts for Pfaadt has coincided with an increase in hard contact allowed, too, and his numbers across the board are suffering.

Brayan Bello was always a guy who was more dependent on ground balls, but his 5% drop in strikeouts has made him even more vulnerable from game to game. While his ERA is still a respectable 3.42, his SIERA and xERA are both a full run higher.

Biggest Walk Rate Increases

I'll try not to pile on Francis in every category, so let's discuss a few other fantasy-relevant pitchers here instead.

Kikuchi has been very good of late, but the walks are certainly concerning as he's back up to double-digits for the first time since his 2022 season in Toronto (12.8%). He was at 6% and 7% in the last two seasons, which was crucial to his success. As much as I am a fan of his stuff, Kikuchi needs to dial back the walks and is a regression candidate for the second half, as his ERA is a run lower than his indicators.

Jack Flaherty has hit a rough patch, and despite still keeping a high K%, his walk rate has ballooned to nearly 10%. He had trimmed it to just 6% last season, and it's no coincidence that it was the best year of his career. I saw some discussion of cutting him after his last start, but I would not advise that yet; he could easily bounce back in the second half.

Gavin Williams and his 13% walk rate jump off the page. Williams' control is a major issue and one of the reasons he has failed to meet expectations this season.

BREAKING: Luis Ortiz asks why Gavin Williams is not also being investigated for his terrible pitches.

— Always the Jake (@JacobsFieldRBW) July 3, 2025

He was sitting in the 9-10% range, which is higher than average but a number you could stomach with a 25% strikeout rate. However, Williams' K% has dropped to 22% while his BB% has risen, making his K-BB% just 8.8% (yuck!). I am starting to think he may never break out.

Biggest SIERA Increases

If you haven't noticed, I have not been getting into specifics with pitchers like Erick Fedde, Mitchell Parker, or Randy Vasquez, as they simply aren't pitchers who are relevant in standard leagues.

We have a lot of repeats on this list, but a few pitchers we haven't addressed yet.

Brady Singer had a promising start in Cincinnati, but he's fallen off in a big way. While it would be easy to blame his home ballpark, which plays favorably for hitters, his home ERA is a half-run better than his road ERA. He tried to tinker with his pitch mix, but it has led to fewer strikeouts and more walks. And his career-low 34.9% GB% is simply not going to play well in that park (or any park) going forward.

Luis Severino has been a disaster in his first season with the Athletics. You might be able to stream him when he starts on the road, but at home, he has a 6.79 ERA. OOF!

Luis Castillo has also been very "meh" this season. He's certainly still very useful for fantasy purposes, eating innings and putting up decent ratios. But his stats continue to trend down for the second season in a row. His 11.5% K-BB% is a career-low, and his 1.29 WHIP is the highest since 2021.

Biggest WHIP Increases

No one cares about Trevor Williams or Jack Kochanowicz, but Zach Eflin and Dylan Cease are guys who were drafted with expectations by their managers.

Eflin has been a master of control and has continued that with a great 4% walk rate. However, his K% has dropped to just 15%, and he's giving up a ton of contact, resulting in a career-high 11.3 hits per nine innings. He's getting torched on home runs, too, allowing 2.32 HR/9. Eflin's days of being a fantasy contributor may be over.

Cease is a guy I'm not that worried about at all. If anything, his underlying stats suggest he could have better luck going forward, as he has a .328 BABIP and isn't walking any more guys than in prior seasons.

Biggest Pitching+ Decreases

We can leave Burnes alone since he's done for the year. But some of our biggest repeat offenders show up here - Pfaadt, Williams, Bello, and Bradley. Remember that 100 is the baseline for this rating, so all three pitchers have seen their stuff fall from the verge of being quite good to now being quite average or below average.

Joe Ryan is a bit of an outlier here. His rating was elite last season and has dipped to just "above average," yet he's still getting excellent results and isn't showing any other red flags.

Emerson Hancock is irrelevant, but there was a slight bit of hype for Woods Richardson coming into this season; however, he has been objectively bad. Zebby Matthews and David Festa are the young arms in Minnesota you want to keep tabs on. I am not convinced that SWR ever materializes into much.

Five Category Decreases

So, what are the big takeaways? Let's summarize.

• Fedde's brief stint as a relevant fantasy player is far in the past; he's someone we should target in DFS often!
• Francis looks like a potential "one-hit wonder" from last season; he's taken a major step back. I don't have much confidence in him returning to form, especially as the sample size of his poor performance continues to grow.
• Bradley has been a major disappointment when compared to the expectations placed on him coming into this season. His arrow is pointing down.
• Pfaadt still has great control, but isn't missing bats this year and looking a lot more like Eflin than Zack Wheeler.
• Eflin is (as the kids like to say) cooked?
• Kikuchi is on a strikeout binge right now and is still a guy who is very relevant in fantasy. I am not sure he can sustain it much longer, but the ride the last month has been fun.
• Williams is firmly in the "bust" category as he's regressed this season instead of taking the step forward that many of us had hoped that he would.
• Flaherty may have peaked last season, but don't give up on him just yet. He's got the kind of talent to bounce back from his recent slump.
• I love making charts and graphs with pitching data!

I hope you enjoyed this one, and have a happy holiday weekend! If you have feedback for future columns, feel free to let me know @ThunderDanDFS on X.

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